In distinguishing syntactic from sentential units, Hervey defines sentence-building as endowing a meaningful linguistic unit with an illocutionary function. He explains that, although illocutionary functions can be understood across the most diverse cultural boundaries, their cultural relativity makes it difficult to transfer them in translation. He proposes a strategic approach which keeps very much in mind that, to convey these functions, English for example predominantly uses intonation, German prefers illocutionary particles while Hungarian resorts to sequential focus.