Existential There

Language Analysis

The existential there construction (There is/are + NP) introduces new entities into discourse. It is an information-structure device, not a locative — the there is a dummy (expletive) subject with no referential meaning.

Structure

There + be + notional subject (+ locative/temporal adjunct)

There is a bookshop on the corner.
There are several problems with this approach.
There has been an accident.

The notional (real) subject is the noun phrase that follows the verb. The grammatical subject position is filled by semantically empty there.

Information Structure Function

Existential there serves a discourse purpose: it presents new information in end position, where it carries greater informational weight. Compare:

A book is on the table. (awkward — indefinite subject in theme position)
There is a book on the table. (natural — new entity introduced in rheme)

This connects to the Given and New Information principle and Thematic Structure: English prefers given information before new. Existential there allows the speaker to delay the new referent to a position of focus.

Agreement

The verb should agree with the notional subject:

There is a problem. / There are problems.
There has been a delay. / There have been delays.

In informal spoken English, there's commonly precedes plural nouns (There's lots of people here). This is standard in speech but considered non-standard in formal writing. See Subject-Verb Agreement.

Variants

Beyond be, existential there occurs with other verbs in formal or literary registers:

There exist several theories...
There remain a number of issues.
There arose a complication.

These are restricted to academic and literary prose.

Teaching Considerations

Existential there is taught early (A1/A2) for describing places and introducing topics
The agreement issue (there is vs there are) requires explicit attention, especially in writing
Distinguish from locative there (Put it there) — same word, entirely different function
Overuse in writing produces weak, wordy prose (There are many students who... vs Many students...) — advanced learners should learn to vary their sentence openings
The construction is a useful tool for Paragraph Structure: topic-introducing sentences often use existential there