The History of English grammars

The History of English grammars

Alongside with the practical and theoretical grammar there exist a number of types of grammar differing not only in the aims but also in the methods applied. There does not appear to exist a generally accepted periodization of the history of English grammars, so there are roughly distinguished two periods:

o English grammars before 1900 (the end of 16th – 19th): The pre-normative grammar (William Bullokar’s “Bref grammar of

English” 1585) - the age of pre-scientific grammar. The normative (prescriptive) grammar (middle of 18th –19th century)

stated strict rules of grammatical usage. The most influential grammar of the period was R. Lowth’s “Short Introduction to English grammar” 1762. The best prescriptive grammars of this period, like C.P. Manson’s “English grammar” (1858) and A. Bain’s “Higher English grammar (1863) paved the way for the first scientific grammar of English.

The classical scientific grammar appeared after the description of the grammatical system, especially that of syntax, had been completed (the end of 19th century) A need was felt for a scientific explanation of the grammatical phenomena. The appearance of H.Sweet’s “New English grammar, Logical and Historical” (1891) met this demand. H.Sweet is mainly famous for his a system of parts of speech.

o English grammars in the 20th century:

The modern period may be divided into two chronologically unequal parts:

o The first from the beginning of the 20th century till the 1940’s, when there were only two types of grammars in use – theprescriptive and the classical scientific. a.1. Prescriptive grammar in 20th century changed very little, some 19th century grammars continued to be reprinted. Among the 20th century prescriptive grammars, which are of some interest, is a work of J.Nesfield, which underwent a number of editions J. Nesfield developed the system of members of the sentence. a.2. The founders of classical scientific grammar in Modern period either specialize in syntax or deal with the problem of both morphology and syntax. Among the authors who specialize in syntax are L.G. Kimball, C.T. Onions and H. R. Stokoe. A greater number of grammarians have more ambitious aim – to describe English grammar scientifically as a whole, the most famous scientists are Poustma H. And Kruisinga A., Curme G.O. and Bryant M.M.. Of all the authors of scientific grammars the classical type O.Jespersen is the most original.

o The second from the 1940’s, during which time first structural grammar, and then other grammars of other types have been added.

b.1. Structural (descriptive) grammarians began treating the problems of the structure of English with criticism of traditional grammar. The representative of this approach is Ch. Fries. Among American linguists should be mentioned L. Bloomfield, K.L. Pike, and R. Wells, E. Nida, Z.S. Harris and others. Sentence structure was

represented in terms of immediate constituents analysis. The generally favorite method of linguistic description became that of description (distributional analysis and substitution). The difference between the traditional and structural approaches consists in that the former did not rely on this method as a part of explicitly formulated theory.

b.2. Other grammars may be presented by the following ones:

A new type of grammar, which is known as transformational generative grammar, followed structural linguistics. Its main aim was to find out mechanisms, which account for the generation of the variety of sentences of language out of a kernel sentence. The representative of this grammar is E.Bach “An introduction to transformational grammas” (1964).

The representatives of the Generative semantics vigorously opposed the notion of “deep structure”. They propounded the idea of the semantic level where all the information relevant for the syntactic structure of a sentence is accumulated. The representatives of this grammar are Ch. Fillmore “The case for case” (1968), K. Donnellan “Reference and Definite Descriptions (1971).

Besides the analysis of the semantic properties of sentences there appeared a new trend – textual Linguistics. Its aim is to provide a formal device needed for theoretical description of discourse. M.A.K. Halliday’s work illustrates an attempt at giving a theoretical basis of textual linguistics. (3)

Literature: Iofik L.L., Chakhoyan L.P., Pospelova A.G. – Readings in the Theory of English grammar. – L., 1981, pp5-40

Theoretical grammar as a linguistic discipline

Language and speech Hierarchy of language levels Grammar Methods of linguistic investigation Approaches

Language and speech

Language is a very complicated system, i.e. a whole, orderly arranged, consisting of interrelated and interconnected units (elements). In the process of social intercourse language gets its realization in speech - the actual use of material units governed by the laws of their interaction. The system of language is characterized by its substance - the body (inventory) of material units (sounds, morphemes, words, word-groups) and its structure - interrelations and interconnections of the units, regularities of the use of these units in the construction of utterances. Language in the narrow sense of the word is a system of means of expression, while speech

in the same narrow sense should be understood as the manifestation of the system of language in the process of intercourse. (1)

Hierarchy of language levels

The units of language from a number of levels which present a hierarchy It means, on the one hand, that language units are not equal relevance and, on the other hand, that units of the higher level and formed of units of the immediate lower level. The composition of units of higher level from the units of a lower level is by no means mechanical. Units of each level are characterized by their own specific features, revealed in their functioning, which provide for the very recognition of the units of each level.

The lowest level of language units is phonetic. It consists of phonemes, the smallest units of language devoid of any meaning, serving as the material building elements of the higher-level units. Their function is purely differential; to differentiate morpheme and words as material units, e.g.: /p/ -/b/; /t/-/d/; /i/, /a/ etc. As the phoneme has no meaning it is not a sign.

The level higher than phonemic is morphemic. The morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit of language. The morpheme is a sign as it is double entity having its form and meaning, uniting a sound-image and a concept. E.g.: {-clear-}, {-able-}, {-s}, {be=-ing}, etc.

The third level is lexemic or the level of words which are naming units: they name objects, properties, activities, etc., e.g.: table, good, turn, etc.

The next higher level is the phrasemic level or the level of phrases (word-combinations). Here belong combinations of two or more words. These combinations may have a nominating function just like words but the object or phenomenon they name is complicated. (E.g.: My brother; writes letters; to his friends; etc.) Or they may be just functional, e.g.: such as; out of, etc.

Higher than phrasemic level (according to the majority of modern linguists) there is the level of sentences or the prosemic level. The peculiarity of units of this level lies in the fact that they not name some situation or event but also show the relation of this situation or event to reality and the speaker’s attitude towards the object of thought. Consequently, the sentence is predicative unit, which enters the system of language by its syntactic pattern, e.g.: My brother writes letters to his friends rather often.

Above the proposemic level they distinguish the level of sentence-groups (supra-sentential constructions) - the supra-proposemic level. The supra-sentential construction is a combination of two or more utterances forming textual unity, e.g.: I don’t like writing letters. But my brother writes letters to his friends rather often. And it is but natural that he himself should get much more letters than me.

NB: Some linguists do not treat sentences and supra-sentential constructions among language units claiming that they belong to the domain of speech. For them the highest language level is phrasemic. (4)

Grammar

The part of the language system, which embraces units beginning with the morphemic, levels upwards the Grammar. This part of the language system is studied by a particular linguistic, discipline, which is also called Grammar. Thus, grammar deals with their customary arrangements in phrases and sentences for the formation of utterances (syntax).

Grammar is responsible for the very organization of the informative content of utterances providing stable formal devices for arranging words into classes and connecting them into phrases and sentences. It is grammar that makes language human characteristics.

Methods of linguistic investigation

The last few years have seen a rapid development of various new methods of investigation, and there are a great variety of views as to their merits. There are three main positions in this field:

Some scholars think that these new methods mark the beginning of linguistics as a science and that everything that was done earlier in linguistics belongs to a ‘pre-scientific age”;

Other scholars are skeptical about these new methods and think that they trend to lead linguistic science away from its proper tasks;

There is the view that the new methods mark new period in the development of linguistics, and should be tried out, without implying that everything done in earlier periods should be considered as valueless and “pre-scientific”. (2)

Nowadays there are the following methods of investigation – observation, description, transformation, and substitution. Methods of analysis – distributional, combinatorial, transformational.

Approaches

As there are many methods of investigation, each grammatical phenomenon may be treated from different sides. That’s why there exist several types of grammars, which use different approaches to investigation. The main of them are:

Formal approach is concerned only with a form, i.e. structural words and the sentences, e.g.: Colorless green ideas sleep furiously (N.Chomsky). This sentence is illogical semantically, but grammatically it is correct.

Semantic approach is concerned with the meaning, e.g.: Up he goes. Semantically it is correct, but grammatically is wrong, inverted word order.

A combination of semantic and formal approach, which takes into consideration both the form and the meaning.

Literature: 1.Blokh M.Y. - A course in Theoretical English grammar. - M., 2000, pp.6-11

2. Ilyish B.A. - The structure of Modern English – L., 1971, pp5-9 3. В.К.Гатилова Теоретическая грамматика английского языка. Часть 1. Алма-

ата,1993, С.7-10

Aim of theoretical grammar

A theoretical description (theoretical grammar) is aimed at : a) elucidating the fundamentals of the grammatical structure of language in accordance with the latest developments in linguistics; b) initiating the students into most important

problems of the grammatical structure of language; c) developing the students ability to digest scientific information, from judgments of their own and apply their knowledge to their teaching practice.

Difference between theoretical and practical grammar

Grammatical description as any other linguistic description may have practical and theoretical aims. The purpose of a practical description (Practical grammar) is to supply the student with the knowledge of the grammatical structure of language in terms of standards of correctness (rules that should be obeyed) as the basis for the creation of the student’s general grammatical aptitude. But it is one thing to use language, it is quite another to understand how it works.

A theoretical description (theoretical grammar) is aimed at:

Elucidating the fundamentals of the grammatical structure of language in accordance with the latest developments in linguistics;

Initiating the students into most important problems of the grammatical structure of language;

Developing the students’ ability to digest scientific information, form judgments of their own and apply their knowledge to their teaching practice.

Alongside with the practical and theoretical grammar there exist a number of types of grammar differing not only in the aims pursued but also in the method applied. Consequently, they discriminate between historical, comparative, contrastive, texonomic, structural, transformational, generative, case, functional and some other types of grammar.

Literature: Blokh M.Y. - A course in Theoretical English grammar. - M., 2000, pp.6-11

Classifications of the phrase

According to the type of syntactic bond According to the head-word According to the inner structure

In linguistics there are different classifications of phrases . The basis of the structural theory of word-groups is the division of phrases into endocentric (i.e. containing a head-word or centre) and exocentric (i.e. non-headed)

suggested by L.Bloomfield. This classification is based on the criteria of distribution and substitution. In terms of substitution the head- word of the endocentric groups functions in the same way as the whole phrase. According to L.Bloomfield “poor John” is an endocentric phrase because the component “John” can substitute the word-group “poor John” in the structure “poor John ran away”. Each of the components of the phrase structure “Tom and Mary ran away" can substitute the whole group (Tom ran away, Mary ran away), as a result “Tom and Mary” is also an endocentric phrase.The members of exocentric phrases cannot be used in the function of either of its members: John ran, beside John. Further Bloomfield subdivides endocentric phrases in accordance with the type of syntactic bond into subordinate and coordinate. The subdivision of exocentric groups is based on another criterion and gives ground to speak about predicative and prepositional phrases.Pr.Barhudarov propounded a classification based on the type of syntactic bond. He distinguishes three types of phrases;1/ subordinate (fine weather, to tell the story, nothing of interest) In this type of phrases subordinate relations exist between the components; 2/ coordinate (books and notebooks,either you or me, young but clever). The relations of such phrases are based on coordination; 3/ predicative (the lesson over, for you to read, him singing). Here belong predicative constructions consisting of nominal and verbal componentsmbetween which the predicative relations are established.The subordinate phrases are further classified according to the head-word into noun phrases, adjective phrases, adverbial phrases and verbal phrases.Pr.Ivanova, Burlakova and Pocheptsov suggest another classification based onthe inner structure of a phrase. According to this criterion all phrases fall into two main groups: headed and non-headed. Headed phrases are based on subordination. In such phrases one element is leading, i.e. not subordinated to any other element within the phrase. By the direction of the relations, i.e. by the position of the subordinateelement with regard to the leading element, headed phrases are subdivided into regressive ( the subordinate element precedes the leading element: very nice, real friendship, my book) and progressive (the subordinate element follows the leading element: to answer the question, to look guilty, to look at the children). The non-headed phrases are versatile in structure. Such phrases can be based on coordination, predication or cumulation. They fall into two big groups: independent and dependent phrases.Independent phrases are phrases which can be identified as grammatically arranged groups without any additional context: easy and simple, shouting and singing, [she nodded]. Dependent phrases require some additional context without which they cannot be identified as grammatically arranged groups: his own (dog), (send) him a letter, (to find) the car gone.

Theory of the supra-sentential unit

The object of text linguistics is the text. The term “text” is used in two meanings - with reference to any utterance consisting of two or more sentences, on the one hand, and with reference to such units as a story, a novel, a monograph, etc. To avoid ambiguity O.I.Moskalskaya suggests differentiating two main objects of text linguistics: macrotext, i.e. a complete speech composition and microtext, i.e. a supra-phrasal unit, which is a sequence of sentences characterized by semantico-syntactic cohesion and a communicative purpose. The semantic integrity of a supra-phrasal unit is reflected in the existence of the microtheme, i.e. the semantic topic. The supra-phrasal unit is always monothematic. The unity of the theme is revealed in regular recurrence of the key words connected with the theme and is ensured by the correlation of the words with one and the same object of reality.The communicative integrity is expressed by the communicative continuity of its components. The essence of this phenomenon lies in the fact that each succeeding sentence in the super-phrasal unit in the communicative aspect depends on the preceding sentence developing the narration from the unknown information to the new information.The structural integrity of the super-phrasal unit is revealed in the existence of different signals showing that the sentences comprising the super-phrasal unit are components of the whole. Here belong pronouns, conjunctions, conjunctive adverbs, articles, etc.Text linguistics is very much concerned with various means of sentence connection. The linguists distinguish lexico-grammatical, lexical and syntactical means of sentence connection. Lexico-grammatical means of connection are represented by conjunctions, conjunctive adverbs pro-forms, articles, etc. Lexical means of connection cover different types of repetition, synonyms, words of the same thematic group, words of abstract meaning (thing, matter, case, stuff, etc). Syntactic means of connection include word order, parallel constructions, ellipsis.The above-mentioned means of connection are not used separately. As a rule, they accompany each other ensuring logical consistency, interdependence of separate facts, actions, etc.

Theory of the sentence

The category of predication

The sentence is the smallest unit of speech conveying some thought or emotion, built up according to a definite syntactic pattern and distinguished by a definite communicative purpose.

In contrast to words and groups of words, the sentence denotes a definite actualized, i.e. correlated with reality, situation. The word “night”, for example, as an element of the word stock, is a nominative unit of language which denotes a natural phenomenon. The noun “night” is a linguistic expression of the concept “night”. The sentence “Night.” represents a natural phenomenon as a fact of reality. It has a definite modal characteristic (the speaker treats this phenomenon /event as real or true to life) and a

definite temporal perspective (this event can be either present, past or future). In other words, the sentence is characterized by the category of predication, which establishes the relation of the thought of a sentence to the situation of speech. The sentence as a predicative unit not only names some referents with the help of the words, but also, first, presents these referents as making up a certain situation and, secondly, reflects the connection between this situation, on the one hand, and objective reality, on the other, showing the time of the event, its being real or unreal, desirable or undesirable, necessary or unnecessary, etc.

The category of predication includes:

1/ the time correlation of the act of speech with all other events mentioned in the sentence which is grammatically expressed by the category of tense;

2/ the speaker’s relation to other persons and things mentioned in the sentence which is grammatically expressed by the categories of person and number;

3/ The speaker’s attitude to the action mentioned in the sentence from the point of view of reality which is grammatically expressed by the category of mood. According to the purpose of utterance/communication the following types of the sentence have been recognized in linguistic tradition: declarative, interrogative and imperative.

According to the purpose of utterance

The declarative sentence The interrogative sentence The imperative sentence The exclamatory sentence The negative sentences

The declarative sentence contains a statement which gives some information about various events, activities or attitudes , thoughts and feelings. Grammatically statements are characterized by the subject-predicate structure with the direct order of words.The interrogative sentence contains a question, i.e. a request for information wanted by the speaker from the listener. Interrogative sentences are formed by means of inversion, the predicate or part of it being placed before the subject. There are 4 types of questions: general, special, alternative and disjunctive. Some grammarians /Kobrina, Korneyeva/ single out suggestive or declarative questions. Suggestive questions preserve the word order of the statements but serve as questions owing to the rising tone and a question mark in writing, as in “You still don’t believe me, Aunt Nora? - No, I don’t”.

The imperative sentence expresses inducement, i.e. it urges the listener in the form of a request or command to perform or not to perform a certain action. Formally imperative sentences are marked by the predicate verb in the imperative mood, the reference to the second person and lack of subject.In addition to the three cardinal communicative types of sentences another type is recognized in the theory of syntax, namely the exclamatory sentence.The relation of the exclamatory sentence to the three established types presents some difficulty. Some scholars (Blokh, Ivanova, Pocheptsov) claim that exclamatory sentences do not possess a set of qualities that could place them on one and the same level with the three cardinal communicative types. In their opinion the property of exclamation should be considered as an accompanying feature of the established types. In other words, each of the three types of sentences can be represented in two variants - non-exclamatory and exclamatory. Consequently, the communicative classification of sentences discriminates between the six sentence-types.Pr.Ilyish’s approach to the problem of exclamatory sentences is different. He admits the fact that every sentence - declarative, interrogative and imperative - may be exclamatory at the same time, i.e. it may convey the speaker’s feelings and be characterized by emphatic intonation and by an exclamatory mark in writing. On the other hand, a sentence, in Ilyish’s opinion, may be purely exclamatory, i.e. it may not belong to any of the three established types, i.e. Oh, for God’s sake! Henry! Pr.Ilyish suggests using different terms for sentences which are purely exclamatory and thus constitute a special type and those which add an emotional element to their basic quality which is either declarative, interrogative or imperative. In this case classification of sentences according to type of communication includes:1/declarative (including emotional ones);2/ interrogative (including emotional ones);3/ imperative ( including emotional ones);4/ exclamatory.Communicative types of sentences fall into affirmative/positive and negative. Analyzingnegative sentences, Pr.Ilyish raises a problem which can be formulated in the following way:do negative sentences constitute a special grammatical type and if so, what are its grammatical features?The difficulty of the problem lies in the peculiarity of negative expressions in modern English. The thing is that negation can be expressed grammatically by means of auxiliary verb and the negative particle “not” and lexically, by means of the negative pronouns “nobody, nothing, none”, adverbs “nowhere, never” etc. Since in the second case negative sentences are not characterized by any grammatical peculiarities, they are not a grammatical type.Some scholars think that it is essential to differentiate between full and partial negation (Ivanova, Khaimovich, Rogovskaya). Full negation is predicate negation. Partial negation can refer to any member of the sentence except the predicate, e.g. Not a person could be seen around. Further it is claimed that a sentence can be termed negative only if it contains the predicate negation. In this case it can be opposed to the affirmative sentence together with which it constitutes the syntactical category of information (Khaimovich).

According to the structure

Simple and composite Complete and incomplete (elliptical) Two-member (double-nucleus) and one-member

(single-nucleus).

From the point of view of their structure sentences can be:1/simple and composite (compound and complex);The difference between the simple and the composite sentence lies in the fact that the former contains only one subject-predicate unit, or one predicative line, and the latter more than one.e.g. Opinions differ (one predicative line)He says that opinions differ (two predicative lines).Some words should be said about the sentences with homogeneous subjects and predicates. Some scholars do not single them out into a separate structural type, regarding them as simple (Ilyish, Iofic, Vinogradov, Bryant). Other grammarians claim that the presence of homogeneous subjects or predicates influences the status of the sentence (Peshkovsky, Pospelov, Poutsma). Prof.Blokh states that if we define the simple sentence as a sentence in which only one predicative line is expressed, sentences with several predicates referring to one and the same subject can not be considered as simple. The sentence “I took the child in my arms and held him” expresses two different predicative lines, since two predicates are separately connected with the subject. Pr.Blokh treats sentences with homogeneous subjects and predicates as sentences of composite structure.2/ complete and incomplete (elliptical);Complete and incomplete (or elliptical) sentences are distinguished by the presence or absence of word-forms in the principal positions of two-member sentences. In a complete sentence both principal positions are filled with word-forms, e.g. “Where do you live?” In an incomplete sentence one or both of the main positions are not filled with word-forms but they can easily be filled, e.g. “Ready? Wrong again”.Pr.Ilyish refers to elliptical sentences with one or more of their parts left out which can be unambiguously inferred from the context. He applies this term to any sentence of this kind, no matter what part or parts of it have been left out.There are several types of elliptical sentences in English: sentences without a word-form in a subject position (e.g. Looks like rain.), in the subject position and part of the predicate position (e.g. Going home soon?), in part of the predicate position (e.g. You seen them?)3/ two-member (double-nucleus) and one-member (single-nucleus).These three classifications are based on different approaches to the structural organization of sentences and reflect its different aspects.

Actual Division

The theme The rheme

The purpose of the Actual Division of the Sentence, called also the “functional sentence perspective”, is to reveal the correlative significance of the sentence parts from the point of view of their actual informative role in an utterance.. The main components of the actual division are the theme and the rheme. The theme expresses the starting point of the communication, i.e. it denotes an object or a phenomenon about which something is reported. The rheme expresses the basic informative part of the communication, its contextually relevant centre. Compare the two sentences: “The book is on the table” and “There is a book on the table”.The first sentence is an answer to the question :”Where is the book?” The second question is an answer to the question “What is their on the table?”In the first sentence “on the table” is the centre, the focus of information, i.e. . the rheme, in the second sentence the rheme is “a book”, as it conveys the main information.The actual division of the sentence finds its full expression in a concrete context of speech, therefore it is sometimes referred to as the “contexual” division of the sentence. It explains the fact that one and the same sentence can be interpreted differently with reference to its division into the theme and the rheme. For example, if the teacher asks the group “Who is absent?” and gets the answer “Petrov is absent”, the theme of the sentence is “is absent” and the rheme is “Petrov”. In a different situation the division of the sentence can be entirely different. If the sentence “Petrov is absent” is a reaction to the teacher’s utterance “Today I’m going to ask Petrov”, the theme here is “Petrov” and the rheme is “is absent”.Every language has worked out special means of expressing rheme in a sentence. In English all sentences can be theoretically divided into two groups. In the first group there are sentences which do not possess special means of expressing the rheme. In such sentence the theme is expressed by the subject or the subject group while the rheme is expressed by the predicate or the predicate group, e.g. The forest was calm. She is fond of music.The second group include sentences which have some special means of expressing the rheme. In the English language they are as follows: . 1. intonation. It can mark any word as a rheme of a sentence either independently or in combination with any other rheme-identifying means.

2.construction “there is/are” which introduces the subject as its rheme.

3.particles, used to intensify this or that member of the sentence,e.g . Only John came.

4. negation. Negative particles or words make any part of a sentence a rheme, e.g.

Nobody saw me. I couldn’t face the sight.

5.articles. The definite article usually though not alwaysaccompanies the theme and the indefinite article goes with therheme.

6.construction “It is ... that/who” which can make a rheme any partof a sentence except a predicate, e,g,It was John who met me in the park.It was in the part that John met me.7.word-order,e.g.He opened the door. There was nobody. In he went.Not a penny could George find in his pockets.

MORPHEMIC STRUCTURE OF THE WORD

The morphological system of language The morpheme The word The distributional classification Descriptive classification

The morphological system of language reveals its properties through the morphemic structure of words. It follows from this that morphology as part of grammatical theory faces the two segmental units: the morpheme and the word. But, as we have already pointed out, the morpheme is not identified otherwise than part of the word; the functions of the morpheme are effected only as the corresponding constituent functions of the word as a whole. For instance, the form of the verbal past tense is built up by means of the dental grammatical suffix: train-erf [-d]; publish-ed [-t]; meditat-ed [-id]. However, the past tense as a definite type of grammaticalmeaning is expressed not by the dental morpheme in isolation, but by the verb (i.e. word) taken in the corresponding form (realized byits morphemic composition); the dental suffix is immediately related to the stem of the verb and together with the stem constitutes thetemporal correlation in the paradigmatic system of verbal categories.

Thus, in studying the morpheme we actually study the word in the necessary details of its composition and functions.

It is very difficult to give a rigorous and at the same time universal definition to the word, i.e. such a definition as would unambiguously apply to all the different word-units of the lexicon. This difficulty is explained by the fact that the word is an extremely complex and many-sided phenomenon. Within the framework of different linguistic trends and theories the word is defined as the minimal potential sentence, the minimal free linguistic form, the elementary component of the sentence, the articulate sound-symbol, the grammatically arranged combination of sound with

meaning, the meaningfully integral and immediately identifiable lingual unit, the uninterrupted string of morphemes, etc., etc. None of these definitions, which can be divided into formal, functional, and mixed, has the power to precisely cover all the lexical segments of language without a residue remaining outside the field of definition.

The said difficulties compel some linguists to refrain from accepting the word as the basic element of language. In particular,American scholars - representatives of Descriptive Linguistics founded by L. Bloomfield - recognized not the word and the sentence, but the phoneme and the morpheme as the basic categories of linguistic description, because these units are the easiest to be isolated in the continual text due to their "physically" minimal, elementary segmental character: the phoneme being the minimal formal segment of language, the morpheme, the minimal meaningful segment. Accordingly, only two segmental levels were originally identified in language by Descriptive scholars: the phonemic level and the morphemic level; later, a third one was added to these - the level of "constructions", i.e. the level of morphemic combinations.

In fact, if we take such notional words as, say, water, pass, yellow and the like, as well their simple derivatives, e.g. watery, passer, yellowness, we shall easily see their definite nominative function and unambiguous segmental delimitation, making them beyond all doubt into "separate words of language". But if we compare with the given one-stem words the corresponding composite formations, such as waterman, password, yellowback, we shall immediately note that the identification of the latter as separate words is greatly complicated by the fact that they themselves are decomposable into separate words. One could point out that the peculiar property distinguishing composite words from phrases is their linear indivisibility, i.e. the impossibility for them to be divided by a third word. But this would-be rigorous criterion is quite irrelevant for analytical word-forms, e.g.:has met - has never met; is coming - is not by any circumstancescoming. As for the criterion according to which the word is identified as a minimal sign capable of functioning alone (the word understood as the "smallest free form", or interpreted as the "potential minimal sentence"), it is irrelevant for the bulk of functional words which cannot be used "independently" even in elliptical responses (to say nothing of the fact that the very notion of ellipsis is essentially theopposite of self-dependence). In spite of the shown difficulties, however, there remains the unquestionable fact that each speaker has at his disposal a ready stock of naming units (more precisely, units standing to one another in nominative correlation) by which he can build up an infinite number of utterances reflecting the ever changing situations of reality. This circumstance urges us to seek the identification of the word as a lingual unit-type on other lines than the "strictly operational definition". In fact, we do find the clarification of the problem in taking into consideration the difference between the two sets of lingual phenomena: on the one hand, "polar" phenomena; on the other hand, "intermediary" phenomena. Within a complex system of interrelated elements, polar phenomena arc the most clearly identifiable, they stand to one another in an utterly unambiguous opposition.

Intermediary phenomena arc located in the system in between the polar phenomena, making up a gradation of transitions or the so-called "continuum". By some of their properties intermediary phenomena arc similar or near to one of the corresponding poles, while by other properties they are similar to the other, opposing pole. Either of the two poles together with the intermediary elements connected with it on the principle of gradation, forms a "field". The polar elements of this field constitute its"centre", the non-polar elements, respectively, its "periphery". The analysis of the intermediary phenomena from the point of view of their relation to the polar phenomena reveal their own status in the system. At the same time this kind of analysis helps evaluate the definitions of the polar phenomena between which a continuum is established. In this connection, the notional one-stem word and the morpheme should be described as the opposing polar phenomena amongthe meaningful segments of language; it is these elements that can be defined by their formal and functional features most precisely andunambiguously. As for functional words, they occupy intermediarypositions between these poles, and their very intermediary status is gradational. In particular, the variability of their status is expressed in the fact that some of them can be used in an isolated response position (for instance, words of affirmation and negation, interrogative words, demonstrative words, etc.), while others cannot (such as prepositions or conjunctions).

The nature of the element of any system is revealed in the character of its function. The function of words is realized in their nominative correlation with one another. On the basis of this correlation a number of functional words are distinguished by the "negative delimitation" (i.e. delimitation as a residue after the identification of the co-positional textual elements),' e.g.: the/people;to/speak; by/way/of.

The "negative delimitation" immediately connects these functionalwords with the directly nominative, notional words in the system.Thus, the correlation in question (which is to be implied by the conventional term "nominative function") unites functional words notional words, or "half-words" (word-morphemes) with "full words". On the other hand, nominative correlation reduces the morheine as a type of segmental signcmc to the role of an element in the composition of the word.

As we see, if the elementary character (indivisibility) of the mornheme (as a significative unit) is established in the structure of words, the elementary character of the word (as a nominative unit) is realized in the system of lexicon.

Summing up what has been said in this paragraph, we maypoint out some of the properties of the morpheme and the word which are fundamental from the point of view of their systemic status and therefore require detailed investigations and descriptions.

The morpheme is a meaningful segmental component of the word; the morpheme is formed by phonemes; as a meaningful component of the word it is elementary (i.e. indivisible into smaller segments as regards its significative function).

The word is a nominative unit of language; it is formed by morphemes; it enters the lexicon of language as its elementary component (i.e. a component indivisible into smaller segments as regards its nominative function); together with other nominative units the word is used for the formation of the sentence - a unit of information in the communication process.

In traditional grammar the study of the morphemic structure of the word was conducted in the light of the two basic criteria: positional criterion (the location of the marginal morphemes in relation to the central ones) and semantic or functional criterion (the correlative contribution of the morphemes to the general meaning of the word). The combination of these two criteria in an integral description has led to the rational classification of morphemes that is widely used both in research linguistic work and in practical lingual tuition.

In accord with the traditional classification, morphemes on the upper level are divided into root-morphemes (roots) and affixal morphemes (affixes). The roots express the concrete, material" part of the meaning of the word, while the affixes express the specificational part of the meaning of the word, the specifications being of lexicoscmantic and ammatico-semantic character. The roots of notional words are classical lexical morphemes. The affixal morphemes include prefixes, suffixes, and inflexions (in the tradition of the English school, grammatical inflexions are tommonly referred to as "suffixes"). Of these, prefixes and lexical suffixes have word-building functions, together with the root they form the stem of the word; inflexions (grammatical suffixes) expressdifferent morphological categories. The root, according to the positional content of the term (i.e. the border-area between prefixes and suffixes), is obligatory for any word, while affixes are not obligatory. Therefore one and the same morphemic segment of functional (i.e. non-notional) status, depending on various morphemic environments, can in principle be used now as an affix (mostly, a prefix), now as a root. Cf:. out - a root-word (preposition, adverb, verbal postposition, adjective, noun, verb); throughout - a composite word, in which -out serves as one of the roots (the categorial status of the meaning of both morphemes is the same);outing - a two-morpheme word, in which out- is a root, and -ing is a suffix; outlook, outline, outrage, out-talk, etc. - words, in which out- serves as a prefix;look-out, knock-out, shut-out, time-out, etc. - words (nouns), in which -out serves as a suffix.

The morphemic composition of modern English words has a wide range of varieties; in the lexicon of everyday speech the preferable morphemic types of stems are root stems (one-root stems or two-root stems) and one-affix stems. With grammatically changeable words, these stems take one grammatical suffix (two "open" grammatical suffixes are used only with some plural nouns in the possessive case, cf:. the children's toys, the oxen's yokes).

Thus, the abstract complete morphemic model of the common English word is the following: prefix + root + lexical suffix + grammatical suffix. The syntagmatic connections of the morphemes within the model form two types of

hierarchical structure. The first is characterized by the original prefixal stem (e.g. prefabricated), the second is characterized by the original suffixal stem (e.g. inheritors). If we use the symbols St for stem, R for root, Pr for prefix, L for lexical suffix, Gr for grammatical suffix, and, besides, employ three graphical symbols of hierarchical grouping - braces, brackets, and parentheses, then the two morphemic word-structures can be presented as follows:

W1 = {[Pr + (R + L)] + Gr};

W2 = {[(Pr + R) + L] + Gr}

Further insights into the correlation between the formal A functional aspects of morphemes within the composition of the word may be gained in the light of the so-called "allo-emic" theoryiit forward by Descriptive Linguistics and broadly used in the current linguistic research.

In accord with this theory, lingual units are described by means of two types of terms: a/to-terms and erne-terms. Erne-terms denote the generalized invariant units of language characterized by a certain functional status: phonemes, morphemes. Allo-terms denote the concrete manifestations, or variants of the generalized units dependent on the regular co-location with other elements of language: allonhones, allomorphs. A set of iso-functional allo-units identified in the text on the basis of their cooccurrence with other lingual units (distribution) is considered as the corresponding erne-unit with its fixed systemic status.

The allo-emic identification of lingual elements is achieved by means of the so-called "distributional analysis". The immediate aim of the distributional analysis is to fix and study the units of language in relation to their textual environments, i.e. the adjoining elements in the text. The environment of a unit may be either "right" or "left", e.g.:un-pardon-able.

In this word the left environment of the root is the negative prefix un; the right environment of the root is the qualitative suffix -able. Respectively, the root -pardon- is the right environment for the prefix, and the left environment for the suffix.

The distribution of a unit may be defined as the total of all its environments; in other words, the distribution of a unit is its environment in generalized terms of classes or categories. In the distributional analysis at the morphemic level, phonemic distribution of morphemes and morphemic distribution of morphemes are discriminated. The study is conducted in two stages. At the first stage, the analysed text (i.e. the collected lingual materials, or "corpus") is divided into recurrent segments consisting oi phonemes. These segments are called "morphs", i.e. morphemicmilts distributionally uncharacterized, e.g.: the/boat/s/were/gain/ing/ speed. At the second stage, the environmental features of the morphes established and the

corresponding identifications are effected. Three main types df distribution are discriminated in the distributional analysis, namely, contrastive distribution, non-contrastivedistribution, and complementary distribution. Contrastive and non-contrastive distributions concern identical environments of different morons. The morphs are said to be in contrastive distribution if their meanings (functions) are different. Such morphs constitute different morphemes. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -ing in the verb-forms returned, returning. The morphs are said to be in non-contrastive distribution (or free alternation) if their meaning (function) is the same. Such morphs constitute "free alternants", or "free variants" of the same morpheme. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -t in the verb-forms learned, learnt. As different from the above, complementary distribution concerns different environments of formally different morphs which are united by the same meaning (function). If two or more morphs have the same meaning and the difference in their form is explained by different environments, these morphs are said to be in complementary distribution and considered the allomorphs of the same morpheme. Cf. the allomorphs of the plural morpheme /-s/, /-z/, /-iz/ which stand in phonemic complementary distribution; the plural allomorph en in oxen, children, which stands in morphemic complementary distribution with the other allomorphs of the plural morpheme. As we see, for analytical purposes the notion of complementary distribution is the most important, because it helps establish the identity of outwardly altogether different elements of language, in particular, its grammatical elements. As a result of the application of distributional analysis to the morphemic level, different types of morphemes have been discriminated which can be called the "distributional morpheme types". It must be stressed that the distributional classification of morphemes cannot abolish or in any way depreciate the traditional morpheme types. Rather, it supplements the traditional classification, showing some essential features of morphemes on the principles of environmental study.

We shall survey the distributional morpheme types arranging them in pairs of immediate correlation.

On the basis of the degree of self-dependence, "free" morphemes and "bound" morphemes are distinguished. Bound morphemes cannot form words by themselves, they are identified only as component segmental parts of words. As different from this, free nhenies can build up words by -themselves, i.e. can be used"freely"' For instance, in the word handful the root hand is a free mornheme, while the suffix -ful is a bound morpheme. There are very few productive bound morphemes in the morphological system of English. Being extremely narrow, the list of them is complicated by the relations of homonymy. These morphemes are the following:

1) the segments -(e)s [-z, -s, -iz]: the plural of nouns, the possessive case of nouns, the third person singular present of verbs;

2) the segments -(e)d [-d, -t, -id]: the past and past participle of verbs;

3) the segments -ing: the gerund and present participle;

4) the segments -er, -est the comparative and superlative degrees of adjectives and adverbs.

The auxiliary word-morphemes of various standings should be interpreted in this connection as "semi-bound" morphemes, since, being used as separate elements of speech strings, they form categorial unities with their notional stem-words.

On the basis of formal presentation, "overt" morphemes and "covert" morphemes are distinguished. Overt morphemes are genuine, explicit morphemes building up words; the covert morpheme is identified as a contrastive absence of morpheme expressing a certain function. The notion of covert morpheme coincides with the notion of zero morpheme in the oppositional description of grammatical categories (see further).

For instance, the word-form clocks consists of two overt morphemes: one lexical (root) and one grammatical expressing the plural. The outwardly one-morpheme word-form clock, since it expresses the singular, is also considered as consisting of two morphemes, i.e. of the overt root and the covert (implicit) grammatical suffix of the singular. The usual symbol for the covert morpheme employed by linguists is the sign of the empty set: 0.

On the basis of segmental relation, "segmental" morphemes and "supra-segmental" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as supra segmental morphemes in distributional terms are intonation contours, accents, pauses.

The said elements of language, as we have stated elsewhere, should beyond dispute be considered signemic units of language, ""се they are functionally bound. They form the secondary line of speech, accompanying its primary phonemic line (phonemic complexes). On the other hand, from what has been stated about the morpheme proper, it is not difficult to see that the morphemic interpretation of supra-scgmental units can hardly stand to reason. Indeed, these units are functionally connected not with morphemes, but with larger elements of guage: words, word-groups, sentences, supra-sentential constructic. On the basis of grammatical alternation, "additive" morphemes and "replacive" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as additivemorphemes are outer grammatical suffixes, since, as a rule, they are opposed to the absence of morphemes in grammatical alternation. Cf. look + ed, small + er, etc. In distinction to these, the root phonemes of grammatical interchange are considered as replacive morphemes, since they replace one another in the paradigmatic forms. Cf. dr-i-ve - dr-o-ve - dr-i-ven; m-a-n - m-e-n; etc.

It should be remembered that the phonemic interchange is utterly unproductive in English as in all the Indo-European languages.If it were productive, it might rationally be interpreted as a sort of replacive "infixation" (correlated with "exfixation" of the additive type). As it stands, however, this type of grammatical means can be understood as a kind of suppletivity (i.e. partial suppletivity).

On the basis of linear characteristic,"continuous" (or "linear") morphemes and "discontinuous" morphemes are distinguished.

By the discontinuous morpheme, opposed to the common, i.e. uninterruptedly expressed, continuous morpheme, a two-element grammatical unit is meant which is identified in the analytical grammatical form comprising an auxiliary word and a grammatical suffix. These two elements, as it were, embed the notional stem; hence, they are symbolically represented as follows:

be ... ing - for the continuous verb forms (e.g. is going);

have ... en - for the perfect verb forms (e.g. has gone);

be ... en - for the passive verb forms (e.g. is taken).

It is easy to see that the notion of morpheme applied to the analytical form of the word violates the principle of the identificationof morpheme as an elementary meaningful segment: the analytical"framing" consists of two meaningful segments, i.e. of two

different morphemes. On the other hand, the general notion "discontinuous constituent", "discontinuous unit" is quite rational and can be help fully used in

linguistic description in its proper place.

TYPES OF MORPHEME

Free and bound morphemes Overt and covert morphemes Segmental and supra-segmental morphemes Additive and replacive morphemes Continuous and discontinuous morphemes


Free and bound morphemes:On the basis of the degree of self-dependence, "free" morphemes and "bound" morphemes are distinguished. Bound morphemes cannot form words by themselves, they are identified only as component segmental parts of words. As different from this, free nhenies can build up words by -themselves, i.e. can be used "freely"'

For instance, in the word handful the root hand is a free mornheme, while the suffix -ful is a bound morpheme.

There are very few productive bound morphemes in the morphological system of English. Being extremely narrow, the list of them is complicated by the relations of homonymy. These morphemes are the following:






Overt and covert morphemes: On the basis of formal presentation, "overt" morphemes and "covert" morphemes are distinguished. Overt morphemes are genuine, explicit morphemes building up words; the covert morpheme is identified as a contrastive absence of morpheme expressing a certain function. The notion of covert morpheme coincides with the notion of zero morpheme in the oppositional description of grammatical categories (see further).

For instance, the word-form clocks consists of two overt morphemes: one lexical (root) and one grammatical expressing the plural. The outwardly one-morpheme word-form clock, since it expresses the singular, is also considered as consisting of two morphemes, i.e. of the overt root and the covert (implicit) grammatical suffix of the singular. The usual symbol for the covert morpheme employed by linguists is the sign of the empty set: Segmental and supra-segmental morphemes:On the basis of segmental relation, "segmental" morphemes and "supra-segmental" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as supra segmental morphemes in distributional terms are intonation contours, accents, pauses.

The said elements of language, as we have stated elsewhere, should beyond dispute be considered signemic units of language, ""се they are functionally bound. They form

the secondary line of each, accompanying its primary phonemic line (phonemic complexes). On the other hand, from what has been stated about the morpheme proper, it is not difficult to see that the morphemic interpretation of supra-scgmental units can hardly stand to reason. Indeed, these units are functionally connected not with morphemes, but with larger elements of guage: words, word-groups, sentences, supra-sentential constructic. Additive and replacive morphemes:On the basis of grammatical alternation, "additive" morphemes and "replacive" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as additive morphemes are outer grammatical suffixes, since, as a rule, they are opposed to the absence of morphemes in grammatical alternation. Cf. look + ed, small + er, etc. In distinction to these, the root phonemes of grammatical interchange are considered as replacive morphemes, since they replace one another in the paradigmatic forms. Cf. dr-i-ve - dr-o-ve - dr-i-ven; m-a-n - m-e-n; etc.

It should be remembered that the phonemic interchange is utterly unproductive in English as in all the Indo-European languages.If it were productive, it might rationally be interpreted as a sort of replacive "infixation" (correlated with "exfixation" of the additive type). As it stands, however, this type of grammatical means can be understood as a kind of suppletivity (i.e. partial suppletivity). Continuous and discontinuous morphemes:On the basis of linear characteristic, "continuous" (or "linear") morphemes and "discontinuous" morphemes are distinguished.





It is easy to see that the notion of morpheme applied to the analytical form of the word violates the principle of the identificationof morpheme as an elementary meaningful segment: the analytical "framing" consists of two meaningful segments, i.e. of two differentmorphemes. On the other hand, the general notion "discontinuousconstituent", "discontinuous unit" is quite rational and can be help fully used in linguistic description in its proper place.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp. 13-20 2. Гатилова В.К. Теоретическая грамматика английского языка. часть 1.- Алма-Ата, 1993. cc.12-19

The grammatical meaning

The grammatical meaning is the significance of a certain relation expressed by a dependent part of a word (inflexion) or a significance of a certain arrangement of elements.

Notional words, first of all verbs and nouns, possess some morphemic features expressing grammatical (morphological) meanings.

The grammatical form

These features determine the grammatical form of the word. Therefore the grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics. The word form is the juncture of the stem ( a root and an affix) of the word with a word-change morpheme (inflexion)



The morphological system of language reveals its properties through the morphemic structure of words. It follows from this that morphology as part of grammatical theory faces the two segmental units: the morpheme and the word. But, as we have already pointed out, the morpheme is not identified otherwise than part of the word; the functions of the morpheme are effected only as the corresponding constituent functions of the word as a whole. For instance, the form of the verbal past tense is built up by means of the dental grammatical suffix: train-erf [-d]; publish-ed [-t]; meditat-ed [-id]. However, the past tense as a definite type of grammaticalmeaning is expressed not by

the dental morpheme in isolation, but by the verb (i.e. word) taken in the corresponding form (realized byits morphemic composition); the dental suffix is immediately related to the stem of the verb and together with the stem constitutes thetemporal correlation in the paradigmatic system of verbal categories.


It is very difficult to give a rigorous and at the same time universal definition to the word, i.e. such a definition as would unambiguously apply to all the different word-units of the lexicon. This difficulty is explained by the fact that the word is an extremely complex and many-sided phenomenon. Within the framework of different linguistic trends and theories the word is defined as the minimal potential sentence, the minimal free linguistic form, the elementary component of the sentence, the articulate sound-symbol, the grammatically arranged combination of sound with meaning, the meaningfully integral and immediately identifiable lingual unit, the uninterrupted string of morphemes, etc., etc. None of these definitions, which can be divided into formal, functional, and mixed, has the power to precisely cover all the lexical segments of language without a residue remaining outside the field of definition.


In fact, if we take such notional words as, say, water, pass, yellow and the like, as well their simple derivatives, e.g. watery, passer, yellowness, we shall easily see their definite nominative function and unambiguous segmental delimitation, making them beyond all doubt into "separate words of language". But if we compare with the given one-stem words the corresponding composite formations, such as waterman, password, yellowback, we shall immediately note that the identification of the latter as separate words is greatly complicated by the fact that they themselves are decomposable into separate words. One could point out that the peculiar property distinguishing composite words from phrases is their linear indivisibility, i.e. the impossibility for them to be divided by a third word. But this would-be rigorous criterion is quite irrelevant for analytical word-forms, e.g.:has met - has never met; is coming - is not by any circumstancescoming. As for the criterion according to which the word is identified as a minimal sign capable of functioning alone (the word understood as the "smallest free form", or

interpreted as the "potential minimal sentence"), it is irrelevant for the bulk of functional words which cannot be used "independently" even in elliptical responses (to say nothing of the fact that the very notion of ellipsis is essentially theopposite of self-dependence). In spite of the shown difficulties, however, there remains the unquestionable fact that each speaker has at his disposal a ready stock of naming units (more precisely, units standing to one another in nominative correlation) by which he can build up an infinite number of utterances reflecting the ever changing situations of reality. This circumstance urges us to seek the identification of the word as a lingual unit-type on other lines than the "strictly operational definition". In fact, we do find the clarification of the problem in taking into consideration the difference between the two sets of lingual phenomena: on the one hand, "polar" phenomena; on the other hand, "intermediary" phenomena. Within a complex system of interrelated elements, polar phenomena arc the most clearly identifiable, they stand to one another in an utterly unambiguous opposition. Intermediary phenomena arc located in the system in between the polar phenomena, making up a gradation of transitions or the so-called "continuum". By some of their properties intermediary phenomena arc similar or near to one of the corresponding poles, while by other properties they are similar to the other, opposing pole. Either of the two poles together with the intermediary elements connected with it on the principle of gradation, forms a "field". The polar elements of this field constitute its"centre", the non-polar elements, respectively, its "periphery". The analysis of the intermediary phenomena from the point of view of their relation to the polar phenomena reveal their own status in the system. At the same time this kind of analysis helps evaluate the definitions of the polar phenomena between which a continuum is established. In this connection, the notional one-stem word and the morpheme should be described as the opposing polar phenomena amongthe meaningful segments of language; it is these elements that can be defined by their formal and functional features most precisely andunambiguously. As for functional words, they occupy intermediarypositions between these poles, and their very intermediary status is gradational. In particular, the variability of their status is expressed in the fact that some of them can be used in an isolated response position (for instance, words of affirmation and negation, interrogative words, demonstrative words, etc.), while others cannot (such as prepositions or conjunctions).


The "negative delimitation" immediately connects these functionalwords with the directly nominative, notional words in the system.Thus, the correlation in question (which is to be implied by the conventional term "nominative function") unites functional words notional words, or "half-words" (word-morphemes) with "full

words". On the other hand, nominative correlation reduces the morheine as a type of segmental signcmc to the role of an element in the composition of the word.






In accord with the traditional classification, morphemes on the upper level are divided into root-morphemes (roots) and affixal morphemes (affixes). The roots express the concrete, material" part of the meaning of the word, while the affixes express the specificational part of the meaning of the word, the specifications being of lexicoscmantic and ammatico-semantic character. The roots of notional words are classical lexical morphemes. The affixal morphemes include prefixes, suffixes, and inflexions (in the tradition of the English school, grammatical inflexions are tommonly referred to as "suffixes"). Of these, prefixes and lexical suffixes have word-building functions, together with the root they form the stem of the word; inflexions (grammatical suffixes) expressdifferent morphological categories. The root, according to the positional content of the term (i.e. the border-area between prefixes and suffixes), is obligatory for any word, while affixes are not obligatory. Therefore one and the same morphemic segment of functional (i.e. non-notional) status, depending on various morphemic environments, can in principle be used now as an affix (mostly, a prefix), now as a root. Cf:. out - a root-word (preposition, adverb, verbal postposition, adjective, noun, verb); throughout - a composite word, in which -out

serves as one of the roots (the categorial status of the meaning of both morphemes is the same);outing - a two-morpheme word, in which out- is a root, and -ing is a suffix; outlook, outline, outrage, out-talk, etc. - words, in which out- serves as a prefix;look-out, knock-out, shut-out, time-out, etc. - words (nouns), in which -out serves as a suffix.


Thus, the abstract complete morphemic model of the common English word is the following: prefix + root + lexical suffix + grammatical suffix. The syntagmatic connections of the morphemes within the model form two types of hierarchical structure. The first is characterized by the original prefixal stem (e.g. prefabricated), the second is characterized by the original suffixal stem (e.g. inheritors). If we use the symbols St for stem, R for root, Pr for prefix, L for lexical suffix, Gr for grammatical suffix, and, besides, employ three graphical symbols of hierarchical grouping - braces, brackets, and parentheses, then the two morphemic word-structures can be presented as follows:

W1 = {[Pr + (R + L)] + Gr};

W2 = {[(Pr + R) + L] + Gr}


In accord with this theory, lingual units are described by means of two types of terms: a/to-terms and erne-terms. Erne-terms denote the generalized invariant units of language characterized by a certain functional status: phonemes, morphemes. Allo-terms denote the concrete manifestations, or variants of the generalized units dependent on the regular co-location with other elements of language: allonhones, allomorphs. A set of iso-functional allo-units identified in the text on the basis of their cooccurrence with other lingual units (distribution) is considered as the corresponding erne-unit with its fixed systemic status.



The distribution of a unit may be defined as the total of all its environments; in other words, the distribution of a unit is its environment in generalized terms of classes or categories. In the distributional analysis at the morphemic level, phonemic distribution of morphemes and morphemic distribution of morphemes are discriminated. The study is conducted in two stages. At the first stage, the analysed text (i.e. the collected lingual materials, or "corpus") is divided into recurrent segments consisting oi phonemes. These segments are called "morphs", i.e. morphemicmilts distributionally uncharacterized, e.g.: the/boat/s/were/gain/ing/ speed. At the second stage, the environmental features of the morphes established and the corresponding identifications are effected. Three main types df distribution are discriminated in the distributional analysis, namely, contrastive distribution, non-contrastivedistribution, and complementary distribution. Contrastive and non-contrastive distributions concern identical environments of different morons. The morphs are said to be in contrastive distribution if their meanings (functions) are different. Such morphs constitute different morphemes. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -ing in the verb-forms returned, returning. The morphs are said to be in non-contrastive distribution (or free alternation) if their meaning (function) is the same. Such morphs constitute "free alternants", or "free variants" of the same morpheme. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -t in the verb-forms learned, learnt. As different from the above, complementary distribution concerns different environments of formally different morphs which are united by the same meaning (function). If two or more morphs have the same meaning and the difference in their form is explained by different environments, these morphs are said to be in complementary distribution and considered the allomorphs of the same morpheme. Cf. the allomorphs of the plural morpheme /-s/, /-z/, /-iz/ which stand in phonemic complementary distribution; the plural allomorph en in oxen, children, which stands in morphemic complementary distribution with the other allomorphs of the plural morpheme. As we see, for analytical purposes the notion of complementary distribution is the most important, because it helps establish the identity of outwardly altogether different elements of language, in particular, its grammatical elements. As a result of the application of distributional analysis to the morphemic level, different types of morphemes have been discriminated which can be called the "distributional morpheme types". It must be stressed that the distributional classification of morphemes cannot abolish or in any way depreciate the traditional morpheme types. Rather, it supplements the traditional classification, showing some essential features of morphemes on the principles of environmental study.








On the basis of formal presentation, "overt" morphemes and "covert" morphemes are distinguished. Overt morphemes are genuine, explicit morphemes building up words; the covert morpheme is identified as a contrastive absence of morpheme expressing a certain function. The notion of covert morpheme coincides with the notion of zero morpheme in the oppositional description of grammatical categories (see further).

For instance, the word-form clocks consists of two overt morphemes: one lexical (root) and one grammatical expressing the plural. The outwardly one-morpheme word-form clock, since it expresses the singular, is also considered as consisting of two morphemes, i.e. of the overt root and the covert (implicit) grammatical suffix of the singular. The usual symbol for the covert morpheme employed by linguists is the sign of the empty set: 0.

On the basis of segmental relation, "segmental" morphemes and "supra-segmental" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as supra segmental morphemes in distributional terms are intonation contours, accents, pauses.

The said elements of language, as we have stated elsewhere, should beyond dispute be considered signemic units of language, ""се they are functionally bound. They form the secondary line of speech, accompanying its primary phonemic line (phonemic

complexes). On the other hand, from what has been stated about the morpheme proper, it is not difficult to see that the morphemic interpretation of supra-scgmental units can hardly stand to reason. Indeed, these units are functionally connected not with morphemes, but with larger elements of guage: words, word-groups, sentences, supra-sentential constructic. On the basis of grammatical alternation, "additive" morphemes and "replacive" morphemes are distinguished. Interpreted as additivemorphemes are outer grammatical suffixes, since, as a rule, they are opposed to the absence of morphemes in grammatical alternation. Cf. look + ed, small + er, etc. In distinction to these, the root phonemes of grammatical interchange are considered as replacive morphemes, since they replace one another in the paradigmatic forms. Cf. dr-i-ve - dr-o-ve - dr-i-ven; m-a-n - m-e-n; etc.

It should be remembered that the phonemic interchange is utterly unproductive in English as in all the Indo-European languages.If it were productive, it might rationally be interpreted as a sort of replacive "infixation" (correlated with "exfixation" of the additive type). As it stands, however, this type of grammatical means can be understood as a kind of suppletivity (i.e. partial suppletivity).

On the basis of linear characteristic,"continuous" (or "linear") morphemes and "discontinuous" morphemes are distinguished.





It is easy to see that the notion of morpheme applied to the analytical form of the word violates the principle of the identificationof morpheme as an elementary meaningful segment: the analytical"framing" consists of two meaningful segments, i.e. of two

different morphemes. On the other hand, the general notion "discontinuous constituent", "discontinuous unit" is quite rational and can be help fully used in

linguistic description in its proper place.

WORDS

Thus, in studying the morpheme we actually study the word in the necessary details of its composition and functions. It is very difficult to give a rigorous and at the same time universal definition to the word, i.e. such a definition as would unambiguously apply to all the different word-units of the lexicon. This difficulty is explained by the fact that the word is an extremely complex and many-sided phenomenon. Within the framework of different linguistic trends and theories the word is defined as the minimal potential sentence, the minimal free linguistic form, the elementary component of the sentence, the articulate sound-symbol, the grammatically arranged combination of sound with meaning, the meaningfully integral and immediately identifiable lingual unit, the uninterrupted string of morphemes, etc., etc. None of these definitions, which can be divided into formal, functional, and mixed, has the power to precisely cover all the lexical segments of language without a residue remaining outside the field of definition.

The said difficulties compel some linguists to refrain from accepting the word as the basic element of language. In particular,American scholars - representatives of Descriptive Linguistics founded by L. Bloomfield - recognized not the word and the sentence, but the phoneme and the morpheme as the basic categories of linguistic description, because these units are the easiest to be isolated in the continual text due to their "physically" minimal, elementary segmental character: the phoneme being the minimal formal segment of language, the morpheme, the minimal meaningful segment. Accordingly, only two segmental levels were originally identified in language by Descriptive scholars: the phonemic level and the morphemic level; later, a third one was added to these - the level of "constructions", i.e. the level of morphemic combinations. In fact, if we take such notional words as, say, water, pass, yellow and the like, as well their simple derivatives, e.g. watery, passer, yellowness, we shall easily see their definite nominative function and unambiguous segmental delimitation, making them beyond all doubt into "separate words of language". But if we compare with the given one-stem words the corresponding composite formations, such as waterman, password, yellowback, we shall immediately note that the identification of the latter as separate words is greatly complicated by the fact that they themselves are decomposable into separate words. One could point out that the peculiar property distinguishing composite words fromphrases is their linear indivisibility, i.e. the impossibility for them to be divided by a third word. But this would-be rigorous criterion is quite irrelevant for analytical word-forms, e.g.:has met - has never met; is coming - is not by any circumstancescoming. As for the criterion according to which the word is identified as a minimal sign capable of functioning alone (the word understood as the "smallest free form", or interpreted as the "potential minimal sentence"), it is irrelevant for the bulk of functional words which cannot be used "independently" even in elliptical responses (to say nothing of the fact that the very notion of ellipsis is essentially theopposite of self-dependence). In spite of the shown difficulties, however, there remains the unquestionable fact that

each speaker has at his disposal a ready stock of naming units (more precisely, units standing to one another in nominative correlation) by which he can build up an infinite number of utterances reflecting the ever changing situations of reality. This circumstance urges us to seek the identification of the word as a lingual unit-type on other lines than the "strictly operational definition". In fact, we do find the clarification of the problem intaking into consideration the difference between the two sets of lingual phenomena: on the one hand, "polar" phenomena; on the other hand, "intermediary" phenomena.

Grammatical category

o The grammatical meaning o The grammatical form o The grammatical category o The opposition o Synthetical forms o Analytical forms o Referent relation

Language is capable to express different meanings. Most general meanings rended by language are grammatical meanings. Grammatical meanings are very abstract, very general. The grammatical meaning is the significance of a certain relation expressed by a dependent part of a word (inflexion) or a significance of a certain arrangement of elements. Notional words, first of all verbs and nouns, possess some morphemic features expressing grammatical (morphological) meanings. These features determine thegrammatical form of the word. Therefore the grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics. The word form is the juncture of the stem ( a root and an affix) of the word with a word-change morpheme (inflexion)

The most general notions reflecting the most general properties of phenomena are referred to in logic as "catcgorial notions", or "categories". The most general meanings rendered by language and expressed by systemic correlations of word-forms are interpreted in linguistics as categorial grammatical meanings. The forms themselves are identified within definite paradigmatic series.

The categorial meaning (e.g. the grammatical number) unites the individual meanings of the correlated paradigmatic forms (e.g. singular - plural) and is exposed through them; hence, the meaning of the grammatical category and the meaning of the

grammatical form are related to each other on the principle of the logical relation between the categorial and generic notions.

As forthe grammatical category itself, it is a system of expressing a generalized grammatical meaning by means of paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms.

The ordered set of grammatical forms expressing a catcgorialfunction constitutes a paradigm.

The paradigmatic correlations of grammatical forms in a category arc exposed by the so-called "grammatical oppositions".

The opposition (in the linguistic sense) may be denned as a generalized correlation of lingual forms by means of which a certain function is expressed. The correlated elements (members) of the opposition must possess two types of features: common features and differential features. Common features serve as the basis of contrast, while differential features immediately express the function in question.

In various contextual conditions, one member of an opposition can be used in the position of the other, counter-member. This phenomenon should be treated under the heading of "oppositional reduction" or "oppositional substitution". The first version of the term ("reduction") points out the fact that the opposition in this case is contracted, losing its formal distinctive force. The second version of the term ("substitution") shows the very process by which the opposition is reduced, namely, the use of one member instead of the other.

The means employed for building up member-forms of categorial oppositions are traditionally divided into synthetical and analytical; accordingly, the grammatical forms themselves are classed into synthetical and analytical, too.

Synthetical grammatical forms are realized by the inner morphemic composition of the word, while analytical grammatical forms are built up by a combination of at least two words, one of which is a grammatical auxiliary (word-morpheme), and the other, a word of "substantial" meaning.

Synthetical grammatical forms are based on inner inflexion, outer inflexion, and suppletivity; hence, the forms are referred to as inner inflexional, outer-inflexional, and suppletive.

Inner inflexion, or phonemic (vowel) interchange, is not productive in modern Indo-European languages, but it is peculiarly employed in some of their basic, most ancient lexemic elements. By this feature, the whole family of Indo-European languages is identified in linguistics as typologically "inflexional".

Inner inflexion (grammatical "infixation", see above) is used in English in irregular verbs (the bulk of them belong to the Germanic strong verbs) for the formation of the past indefinite and past participle; besides, it is used in a few nouns for the formation of the .Suppletivity, like inner inflexion, is not productive as a purely morphological

type of form. It consists in the grammatical interchange of word roots, and this, as we pointed out in the foregoing chapter, unites it in principle with inner inflexion (or, rather, makes the latter into a specific variety of the former).

Suppletivity is used in the forms of the verbs be and go, in the irregular forms of the degrees of comparison, in some forms of personal pronouns. Cf.: be - am - are - is - was - were; go-went;

good - better; bad - worse; much - more; little - less; I - me; we - us; she-her.

In a broader morphological interpretation, suppletivity can be recognized in paradigmatic correlations of some modal verbs, some indefinite pronouns, as well as certain nouns of peculiar categorial properties Cf.: can - be able; must-have (to), be obliged (to); may-be allowed (to); one - some; man - people; news - items of news; information - pieces of information; etc.

The shown unproductive synthetical means of English morphologyare outbalanced by the productive means of affixation (outer inflexion), which amount to grammatical suffixation (grammatical prefixation could only be observed in the Old English verbal system).

In the previous chapter we enumerated the few grammatical suffixes possessed by the English language. These are used to build up the number and case forms of the noun; the person-number, tense, participial and gerundial forms of the verb; the comparison forms of the adjective and adverb. In the oppositional correlations of all theseforms, the initial paradigmatic form of each opposition is distinguished by a zero suffix. Cf.: boy+0-boys; go + 0-goes;

work +0- worked; small+0-smaller; etc.

Taking this into account, and considering also the fact that each grammatical form paradigmatically correlates with at least one other form on the basis of the category expressed (e.g. the form of the singular with the form of the plural), we come to the conclusion that the total number of synthetical forms in English morphologically, though certainly not very large, at the same time is not so small as it is commonly believed. Scarce in English are not the) synthetical forms as such, but the actual affixal segments on which the paiadigmatic differentiation of forms is based.

As for analytical forms which are so typical of modern English that they have long made ibis language into the "canonized" representative of lingual analytism, they deserve some special comment on their substance. The traditional view of the analytical morphological form recognizes two lexemic parts in it, stating that it presents a combination of an auxiliary word with a basic word. However, there is a tendency with some linguists to recognize as analytical not all such grammatically significant combinations, but only those of them that are "grammatically idiomatic", i.e. whose relevant grammatical meaning is not

immediately dependent on the meanings of their component elements taken apart. Considered in this light, the form of the verbal perfect where the auxiliary have has utterly lost itsoriginal meaning of possession, is interpreted as the most standard. and indisputable analytical form in English morphology. Its opposite is seen in the analytical degrees of comparison which, according to the cited interpretation, come very near to free combinations of words by their lack of "idiomatism" in the above sense.

Moreover, alongside the standard analytical forms characterized by the unequal ranks of their components (auxiliary element-basic element), as a marginal analytical form-type grammatical repetition should be recognized, which is used to express specific categorial semantics of processual intensity with the verb, of indefinitely highdegree of quality with the adjective and the adverb, of indefinitelylarge quantity with the noun. Cf:. He knocked and knocked and knocked without reply (Gr. Greene). Oh, I feel I've got such boundless, boundless love to give to somebody (K. Mansfield). Two white-haired severe women were in charge of shelves and shelves of knitting materials of every description (A. Christie).

The grammatical categories which are realized by the described types of forms organized in functional paradigmatic oppositions, can either be innate for a given class of words, or only be expressed on the surface of it, serving as a sign of correlation with some other class.

For instance, the category of number is organically connectedwith the functional nature of the noun: it directly exposes the number of the referent substance, e.g. one ship - several ships. The category of number in the verb, however, by no means gives a natural meaningful characteristic to the denoted process: the process is devoid of numerical features such as are expressed by the grammatical number. Indeed, what is rendered by the verbal number is not a quantitative characterization of the process, but a numerical featuring of the subject-referent. Cf.:The girl is smiling. - The girls are smiling. The ship is in the harbour. - The ships are in the harbour.

Thus, from the point of view of referent relation, grammatical categories should be divided into "immanent" categories, i.e. categories innate for a given lexemic class, and "reflective" categories,i.e. categories of a secondary, derivative semantic value. Categorial forms based on subordinative grammatical agreement (such as the verbal person, the verbal number) are reflective, while categorial forms stipulating grammatical agreement in lexemes of a contiguous word-class (such as the substantive-pronominal person, the substan-live number) are immanent. Immanent are also such categories and their forms as are confined within a word-class, i.e. do not transgress its borders; to these belong the tense of the verb, the comparison of tie adjective and adverb, etc.

Another essential division of grammatical categories is based on the changeability factor of the exposed feature. Namely, the feature of the referent expressed by the

category can be either constant (unchangeable, 'derivational"), or variable (changeable, "demutative").

An example of constant feature category can be seen in the category of gender which divides the class of English nouns into non-human names, man male names, human female names, and human common render names. This division is represented by the system of the third person pronouns serving as gender-indices (see further). C/.:

It (non-human): mountain, city, forest, cat, bee, etc. He (malehuman): man, father, husband, uncle, etc. She (female human): woman, lady, mother, girl, etc. He or she (common human): person, parent, child, cousin, etc.

Variable features categories can be exemplified by the substantivenumber (singular - plural) or the degrees of comparison(positive - comparative - superlative).

Constant feature categories reflect the static classifications of phenomena, while variable feature categories expose various connections between phenomena. Some marginal categorial forms may acquire intermediary status, being located in-between the corresponding categorial poles, for instance, the nouns singularia tantum and pluralia tantum present a case of hybrid variable-constant formations, since their variable feature of number has become "rigid", or "lexicalized". C/'.: news, advice, progress; people, police; bellows, tongs; colours, otters; etc.

In distinction to these, the gender word-building pairs should be considered as a clear example of hybrid constant-variable formations, since their constant feature of gender has acquired some changeability properties, i.e. has become to a certain extent "grammaticalized". Cf:. actor - across, author - authoress, lion - lioness, etc.

Literature:

1. Л.С. Бархударов, Д.А. Штелинг Грамматика английского языка М., 1973, сс. 17-22

2. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar . -M., 1994, pp.27-36



The morphological system of language reveals its properties through the morphemic structure of words. It follows from this that morphology as part of grammatical theory

faces the two segmental units: the morpheme and the word. But, as we have already pointed out, the morpheme is not identified otherwise than part of the word; the functions of the morpheme are effected only as the corresponding constituent functions of the word as a whole. For instance, the form of the verbal past tense is built up by means of the dental grammatical suffix: train-erf [-d]; publish-ed [-t]; meditat-ed [-id]. However, the past tense as a definite type of grammaticalmeaning is expressed not by the dental morpheme in isolation, but by the verb (i.e. word) taken in the corresponding form (realized byits morphemic composition); the dental suffix is immediately related to the stem of the verb and together with the stem constitutes thetemporal correlation in the paradigmatic system of verbal categories.


It is very difficult to give a rigorous and at the same time universal definition to the word, i.e. such a definition as would unambiguously apply to all the different word-units of the lexicon. This difficulty is explained by the fact that the word is an extremely complex and many-sided phenomenon. Within the framework of different linguistic trends and theories the word is defined as the minimal potential sentence, the minimal free linguistic form, the elementary component of the sentence, the articulate sound-symbol, the grammatically arranged combination of sound with meaning, the meaningfully integral and immediately identifiable lingual unit, the uninterrupted string of morphemes, etc., etc. None of these definitions, which can be divided into formal, functional, and mixed, has the power to precisely cover all the lexical segments of language without a residue remaining outside the field of definition.


In fact, if we take such notional words as, say, water, pass, yellow and the like, as well their simple derivatives, e.g. watery, passer, yellowness, we shall easily see their definite nominative function and unambiguous segmental delimitation, making them beyond all doubt into "separate words of language". But if we compare with the given one-stem words the corresponding composite formations, such as waterman, password, yellowback, we shall immediately note that the identification of the latter as separate

words is greatly complicated by the fact that they themselves are decomposable into separate words. One could point out that the peculiar property distinguishing composite words from phrases is their linear indivisibility, i.e. the impossibility for them to be divided by a third word. But this would-be rigorous criterion is quite irrelevant for analytical word-forms, e.g.:has met - has never met; is coming - is not by any circumstancescoming. As for the criterion according to which the word is identified as a minimal sign capable of functioning alone (the word understood as the "smallest free form", or interpreted as the "potential minimal sentence"), it is irrelevant for the bulk of functional words which cannot be used "independently" even in elliptical responses (to say nothing of the fact that the very notion of ellipsis is essentially theopposite of self-dependence). In spite of the shown difficulties, however, there remains the unquestionable fact that each speaker has at his disposal a ready stock of naming units (more precisely, units standing to one another in nominative correlation) by which he can build up an infinite number of utterances reflecting the ever changing situations of reality. This circumstance urges us to seek the identification of the word as a lingual unit-type on other lines than the "strictly operational definition". In fact, we do find the clarification of the problem in taking into consideration the difference between the two sets of lingual phenomena: on the one hand, "polar" phenomena; on the other hand, "intermediary" phenomena. Within a complex system of interrelated elements, polar phenomena arc the most clearly identifiable, they stand to one another in an utterly unambiguous opposition. Intermediary phenomena arc located in the system in between the polar phenomena, making up a gradation of transitions or the so-called "continuum". By some of their properties intermediary phenomena arc similar or near to one of the corresponding poles, while by other properties they are similar to the other, opposing pole. Either of the two poles together with the intermediary elements connected with it on the principle of gradation, forms a "field". The polar elements of this field constitute its"centre", the non-polar elements, respectively, its "periphery". The analysis of the intermediary phenomena from the point of view of their relation to the polar phenomena reveal their own status in the system. At the same time this kind of analysis helps evaluate the definitions of the polar phenomena between which a continuum is established. In this connection, the notional one-stem word and the morpheme should be described as the opposing polar phenomena amongthe meaningful segments of language; it is these elements that can be defined by their formal and functional features most precisely andunambiguously. As for functional words, they occupy intermediarypositions between these poles, and their very intermediary status is gradational. In particular, the variability of their status is expressed in the fact that some of them can be used in an isolated response position (for instance, words of affirmation and negation, interrogative words, demonstrative words, etc.), while others cannot (such as prepositions or conjunctions).


The "negative delimitation" immediately connects these functionalwords with the directly nominative, notional words in the system.Thus, the correlation in question (which is to be implied by the conventional term "nominative function") unites functional words notional words, or "half-words" (word-morphemes) with "full words". On the other hand, nominative correlation reduces the morheine as a type of segmental signcmc to the role of an element in the composition of the word.






In accord with the traditional classification, morphemes on the upper level are divided into root-morphemes (roots) and affixal morphemes (affixes). The roots express the concrete, material" part of the meaning of the word, while the affixes express the specificational part of the meaning of the word, the specifications being of lexicoscmantic and ammatico-semantic character. The roots of notional words are classical lexical morphemes. The affixal morphemes include prefixes, suffixes, and inflexions (in the tradition of

the English school, grammatical inflexions are tommonly referred to as "suffixes"). Of these, prefixes and lexical suffixes have word-building functions, together with the root they form the stem of the word; inflexions (grammatical suffixes) expressdifferent morphological categories. The root, according to the positional content of the term (i.e. the border-area between prefixes and suffixes), is obligatory for any word, while affixes are not obligatory. Therefore one and the same morphemic segment of functional (i.e. non-notional) status, depending on various morphemic environments, can in principle be used now as an affix (mostly, a prefix), now as a root. Cf:. out - a root-word (preposition, adverb, verbal postposition, adjective, noun, verb); throughout - a composite word, in which -out serves as one of the roots (the categorial status of the meaning of both morphemes is the same);outing - a two-morpheme word, in which out- is a root, and -ing is a suffix; outlook, outline, outrage, out-talk, etc. - words, in which out- serves as a prefix;look-out, knock-out, shut-out, time-out, etc. - words (nouns), in which -out serves as a suffix.


Thus, the abstract complete morphemic model of the common English word is the following: prefix + root + lexical suffix + grammatical suffix. The syntagmatic connections of the morphemes within the model form two types of hierarchical structure. The first is characterized by the original prefixal stem (e.g. prefabricated), the second is characterized by the original suffixal stem (e.g. inheritors). If we use the symbols St for stem, R for root, Pr for prefix, L for lexical suffix, Gr for grammatical suffix, and, besides, employ three graphical symbols of hierarchical grouping - braces, brackets, and parentheses, then the two morphemic word-structures can be presented as follows:

W1 = {[Pr + (R + L)] + Gr};

W2 = {[(Pr + R) + L] + Gr}


In accord with this theory, lingual units are described by means of two types of terms: a/to-terms and erne-terms. Erne-terms denote the generalized invariant units of language characterized by a certain functional status: phonemes, morphemes. Allo-terms denote the concrete manifestations, or variants of the generalized units dependent on the regular co-location with other elements of language: allonhones,

allomorphs. A set of iso-functional allo-units identified in the text on the basis of their cooccurrence with other lingual units (distribution) is considered as the corresponding erne-unit with its fixed systemic status.



The distribution of a unit may be defined as the total of all its environments; in other words, the distribution of a unit is its environment in generalized terms of classes or categories. In the distributional analysis at the morphemic level, phonemic distribution of morphemes and morphemic distribution of morphemes are discriminated. The study is conducted in two stages. At the first stage, the analysed text (i.e. the collected lingual materials, or "corpus") is divided into recurrent segments consisting oi phonemes. These segments are called "morphs", i.e. morphemicmilts distributionally uncharacterized, e.g.: the/boat/s/were/gain/ing/ speed. At the second stage, the environmental features of the morphes established and the corresponding identifications are effected. Three main types df distribution are discriminated in the distributional analysis, namely, contrastive distribution, non-contrastivedistribution, and complementary distribution. Contrastive and non-contrastive distributions concern identical environments of different morons. The morphs are said to be in contrastive distribution if their meanings (functions) are different. Such morphs constitute different morphemes. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -ing in the verb-forms returned, returning. The morphs are said to be in non-contrastive distribution (or free alternation) if their meaning (function) is the same. Such morphs constitute "free alternants", or "free variants" of the same morpheme. Cf. the suffixes -(e)d and -t in the verb-forms learned, learnt. As different from the above, complementary distribution concerns different environments of formally different morphs which are united by the same meaning (function). If two or more morphs have the same meaning and the difference in their form is explained by different environments, these morphs are said to be in complementary distribution and considered the allomorphs of the same morpheme. Cf. the allomorphs of the plural morpheme /-s/, /-z/, /-iz/ which stand in phonemic complementary distribution; the plural allomorph en in oxen, children, which stands in morphemic complementary distribution with the other allomorphs of the plural morpheme.

As we see, for analytical purposes the notion of complementary distribution is the most important, because it helps establish the identity of outwardly altogether different elements of language, in particular, its grammatical elements. As a result of the application of distributional analysis to the morphemic level, different types of morphemes have been discriminated which can be called the "distributional morpheme types". It must be stressed that the distributional classification of morphemes cannot abolish or in any way depreciate the traditional morpheme types. Rather, it supplements the traditional classification, showing some essential features of morphemes on the principles of environmental study.








THE NOUN

Classification of nouns Number Pluralia Tantum and Singularia Tantum Collective Nouns and Nouns of Multitude

Case Mutual relartions of number and case

Noun - is characterised by the following features : semantically - it has the meaning of substance, morphologically - a) the category of number, case and gender, b) certain word-building suffixes, syntactically - a)performs the function of a subject, object, predicative, attribute, adverbial modifier, b) has specific combinability.

Classification of nouns: - on the basis of type of nomination - proper and common (Mary, sister) - on the basis of form of existance - animate and inanimate (dog, desk) - on the basis of personal quality - human and non-human (boy, fish) - on the basis of a qualitative structure - countable and uncountable (pencil,water)

The noun in Modern English has only two main grammatical categories, number and case. The existence of case appears to be doubtfuland has to be carefully analysed.

The Modern English noun certainly has not got the categoryof grammatical gender, which is to be found, for example, in Russian, French, German and Latin. Not a single noun in Modern English shows any peculiarities in its morphology due to its denoting a male or a female being. Thus, the words husband and wife do not show any difference in their forms due to the peculiaritiesof their lexical meanings.This category is expressed by the obligatory correlation of nouns with the personal pronouns of the third person. There are only several suffixes which show the gender : actor - actress, widow - widower.

NUMBERThe grammatical meaning of the category is oneness and more than oneness. Modern English, as most other languages, distinguishes between two numbers,singular and plural., The essential meaning of singular and plural seems clear enough: the singular number shows that one object is meant, and the plural shows that more than one object is meant. Thus, the opposition is "one — more than one". This holds good for many nouns: table —tables, pupil — pupils, dog — dogs, etc. However, language facts are not always so simple as that. The category of number in Englishnouns gives rise to several problems which claim special attention.

First of all, it is to be noted that there is some difference between, say, three houses and three hours. Whereas three houses are three separate objects existing side by side, three hours are a continuous period of time measured by a certain agreed unit of duration. The same, of course, would apply to such expressions as three miles, three acres, etc.

If we now turn to such plurals as waters (e. g. the waters of the Atlantic), or snows (e. g. " Daughter of the Snows", the title of a story by Jack London), we shall see that we are drifting further away from the original meaning of the plural number. In the first place, no numeral could be used with nouns of this kind. We could not possibly say three waters, от three snows. We cannot say how many waters we mean when we use this noun in the plural

number. What, then, is the real difference in meaning between water and waters, snow and snows, etc.? It is fairly obvious that the plural form in every case serves to denote a vast stretch of water (e. g. an ocean), or of snow, or rather of ground covered by snow (e. g. in the arctic regions of Canada), etc. In the case of water and waters we can press the point still further and state that the water of the Atlantic refers to its physical or chemical properties (e. g. the water of tfie Atlantic contains a considerable portion of salt), whereas the waters of the Atlantic refers to a geographical idea: it denotes a seascape and has, as such, a peculiar stylistic value which the water of the Atlantic certainly lacks. So we see that between the singular and the plural an additional difference of meaning has developed. Now, the difference between the two numbers may increase to such a degree that the plural form develops a completely new meaning which the singular has not got at all. Thus, for example, theplural form colours has the meaning 'banner' which is restricted to the plural (e. g. to serve under the colours of liberty). In a similar manner, the plural attentions has acquired the meaning wooing (pay attentions to, a young lady). A considerable amountof examples in point have been collected by 0. Jespersen. Since, in these cases, a difference in lexical meaning develops between the plural and the singular, it is natural to say that the plural form has been lexicalized. It is not our task here to go into details about the specific peculiarities of meaning which may develop in the plural form of a noun. This is a matter of lexicology rather than of grammar. What is essential from the grammatical viewpoint is the very fact that a difference in meaning which is purely grammatical in its origins is apt under certain conditions to be vershadowed by a lexical difference.

Pluralia Tantum and Singularia TantumWe must also consider here two types of nouns differing fromall others in the way of number: they have not got the usual two number forms, but only one form. The nouns which have only a plural and no singular are usually termed "pluralia tantum" (which is the Latin for "plural only"), and those which have only a singular and no plural are termed "singularia tantum" (the Latinfor "singular only"). Among the pluralia tantum are the nouns trousers, scissors, tongs, pincers, breeches; environs, outskirts, dregs. As is obvious from these examples, they include nouns of two types. On the one hand, there are the nouns which denote material objects consisting of two halves (trousers, scissors, etc.); on the other, there are thosewhich denote a more or less indefinite plurality (e. g. environs'areas surrounding some place on all sides'; dregs 'various smallthings remaining at the bottom of a vessel after the liquid has been poured out of it', etc.). If we compare the English pluralia tantum with the Russian, we shall find that in some cases they correspond to each other (e. g., trousers — брюки, scissors — ножницы, environs — окрестности, etc.), while in others they do not (деньги — money, etc.). This seems to depend on a different view of the objects in question reflected by the English and the Russian language respectively. The reason why a given object is denoted by a plurale tantum noun in this or that language is not always quite clear. Close to this group of pluralia tantum nouns are also some names; of sciences, e. g. mathematics, physics, phonetics, also politics, and some names of diseases, e. g. measles, mumps, rickets. The reason for this seems to be that, for example,

mathematics embrace a wholeseries of various scientific disciplines, and measles are accompanied by the appearance of a number of separate inflamed spots on the skin (rash). However, the reasons are less obvious in the case of phonetics, for instance. Now, it is typical of English that some of these pluralia tantum may, as it were, cease to be plural. Theymay occasionally, or even regularly, be accompanied by the indefinite article, and if they are the subject of a sentence the predicateverb may stand in the singular. This way of treating pluralia tantum, which would be unthinkable in Russian, is of course connected with the structure of English as a whole. The possibility of treating a plural form as if it were singular is also seen in the use of the phrase the United Nations, which may, when it is the subject of a sentence, have the predicate verb in the singular, e. g. the United Nations is a world organization. Examples of a phrase including a noun in the plural being modified by a pronoun in the singular and thus shown to be apprehended as a singular are by no means rare. Here are a few typical examples. / myself still wonder at that six weeks of calm madness. (CARY) The unity of the period of time, measured in the usual units of months, weeks, and days, is thus brought out very clearly. Bessie, daring that twenty-four hours, had spent a nightwith Alice and a day with Muriel... (CARY) The unity of the space of time referred to is even more obvious in this example than in the preceding one; twenty-four hours is a commonly received unit of measurement of time (in Russian this would be expressed by a single noun—сутки). The variant those twenty-four hours would be inappropriate here, as it would imply that the statement wasreferring to every single hour of the twenty-four taken separately. This way of showing the unity of a certain quantity of space or time by modifying the phrase in question by a pronoun in the singular, and also (if the phrase be the subject of the sentence) by using the predicate verb in the singular, appears to be a very common thing in present-day English. The direct opposite of pluralia tantum are the singularia tantum, i. e. the nouns which have no plural form. Among these wemust first note some nouns denoting material substance, such as milk, butter, quicksilver, etc., and also names of abstract notions,such as peace, usefulness, incongruity, etc. Nouns of this kind express notions which are, strictly speaking, outside the sphere of number: e. g. milk, or fluency. But in the morphological and syntactical system of the English language a noun cannot stand outside the category of number. If the noun is the subject of a sentence, the predicate verb (if it is in the present tense) will have to be either singular or plural. With the nouns just mentioned the predicate verb is always singular. This is practically the only externalsign (alongside of the absence of a plural inflection in the noun itself) which definitely shows the noun to be singular. Some nouns denoting substance, or material, may have a plural form, if they are used to denote either an object made of the material or a special kind of substance, or an object exhibiting the quality denoted by the noun. Thus, the noun wine, as well as the noun milk, denotes a certain substance, but it has a plural form wines used to denote several special kinds of wine. The noun iron, as well as the noun quicksilver, denotes a metal, but it may be used in theplural if it denotes several objects made of that metal (утюги).The noun beauty, as well as the noun ugliness, denotes a certainquality presented as an object, but it may be used in the plural to denote objects exhibiting

that quality, e. g. the beauties of nature;His daughters were all beauties. Many more examples of a similarkind might be found. Accordingly, the nouns wine, iron, and beautycannot be called singularia tantum, although in their chief application they no more admit of a plural form than milk, quicksilver,or ugliness.

Collective Nouns and Nouns of MultitudeCertain nouns denoting groups of human beings (family, government, party, clergy, etc.) and also of animals (cattle, poultry, etc.) can be used in two different ways: either they are taken to denote the group as a whole, and in that case they are treated as singulars, and usually termed "collective nouns" (in a restricted sense of the term); or else they are taken to denote the group as consisting of a certain number of individual human beings (or animals), and in that case they are usually termed "nouns of multitude".The difference between the two applications of such nouns may be briefly exemplified by a pair of examples: My family is small and My family are good speakers It is quite obvious here that inthe one sentence the characteristic "small" applies to the family as a whole, while in the other sentence the characteristic "good speakers" applies to every single member of the family ("everyone of them is a good speaker" is what is meant, but certainly not "everyone of them is small"). The same consideration would also apply to such sentences as The cattle were grazing in the field, itis also quite lossible to say, Many cattle were grazing in the field, where the use of many (not much) clearly shows that cattle is apprehended as a plural. The following bit of dialogue is curious, as the noun board which is the subject of the first sentence, is here connected with a predicate verb in the singular, but is replaced by a plural pronoun in the second sentence: "Does the Board know of this?" "Yes," said John, "they fully approve the scheme." (A. WILSON) With the noun people the process seems to have gone further than with any other noun of this kind. There is, on the one hand, the noun people, singular, with its plural peoples (meaning 'nations'), and there is, on the other hand, the noun people apprehended asa plural (There were fifty people in the hall) and serving as a kindof plural to the noun person (There was only one person in the hall). People can of course be modified by the words many and few and by cardinal numerals (twenty people).In the following sentence the word people is even modified by the phrase attribute one or two, although the numeral one in itself could not possibly be an attribute to the noun people in this sense:the phrase One or two people looked at him curiously, but no one said anything. (A. WILSON) Strictly speaking we might expect one man or two people, however, this variant does not appear to be used anywhere. The perfect possibility of the phrase two people appears to be sufficient ground for making the phrase one or two people possible as well. Recently a peculiar view of the category of number was put forward by A. Isachenko. According to this. view, the essential meaning of the category (in nouns) is not that of quantity, but of discreteness (расчлененность). The plural, in this view, expresses fundamentally the notion of something consisting of distinguishable parts, and the meaning of quantity in the usual sense would then appear to be a result of combining the fundamental meaning of the category as such with the lexical meaning of the noun used in the plural. Thus, in scissors the category of plural number, which, in Isachenko's view, expresses discreteness, combines with the lexical meaning of the

noun, which denotes an object consisting of two halves, whereas in houses the same meaning of the grammatical category combines with the lexical meaning of the noun, which denotes separate objects- not coalescing together, as in the case of scissors. Accordingly, the resulting meaning is that of anumber of separate objects, i. e. the plural number in the usual sense of the term. These views put forward by A. Isachenko throw a new light on the problem of number in nouns and certainly deserve close attention. It is yet too early to say whether they can provide a final solution to the complex problem of number in nouns.

CASECase is the category of noun expressing relation between the thing denoted by the noun and other things. The problem of case in Modern English nouns is one of the most vexed problems in English grammar. This can be seen from the fact that views on the subject differ widely. The most usual view is that English nouns have two cases: a common case (e. g. father) and a genitive (or possessive) case (e. g. father's). Side by side with this view there are a number of other views, which can be roughly classified into two main groups: (1) the number of cases in English is more than two, (2) there are no cases at all in English nouns. The first of these can again be subdivided into the views that the number of cases in English nouns is three, or four, or five, or even an indefinite quantity. Among those who hold that there are no cases in English nouns there is again a variety of opinions as to the relations between the forms father and father's, etc.Before embarking on a detailed study of the whole problem it is advisable to take a look at the essence of the notion of case. It is more than likely that part, at least, of the discussions and misunderstandings are due to a difference in the interpretation of case as a grammatical category. It seems therefore necessary to give as clear and unambiguous a definition of case as we can. Case is the category of a noun expressing relations between the thing denoted by the noun and other things, or properties, or actions, and manifested by some formal sign in the noun itself. This sign is almostalways an inflection, and it may also be a "zero" sign, i. e. The absence of any sign шау be significant as distinguishing one particular case from another. It is obvious that the minimum number of cases in a given language system is two, since the existence оftwo correlated elements at least is needed to establish a category (In a similar way, to establish the category of tense in verbs, at least two tenses are needed, to establish the category of mood two moods, etc.). Thus case is part of the morphological system of a language.Approaching the problem of case in English nouns from this angle, we will not recognize any cases expressed by non-morphological means. It will be therefore impossible to accept the theories of those who hold that case may also be expressed by prepositions (i. e. by the phrase "preposition + noun") or by word order. Such views have indeed been propounded by some scholars, mainly Germans. Thus, it is the view of Max Deutschbein that Modern English nouns have four cases, viz. nominative, genitive, dative and accusative, of which the genitive can be -expressed by the -s inflection and by the preposition of, the dative by the preposition to and also by word order, and the accusative is stinguished from the dative by word order alone. It should be recognized that once we admit prepositions, or word order, or indeed any

non-morphological means of expressing case, the number of cases is bound to grow indefinitely. Thus, if we admit that of the pen is a genitive case, and to the pen a dative case, there would seem no reason to deny that with the pen is an instrumental case, in the pen a locative case, etc., etc. Thus the number of cases in Modern English nouns would become indefinitely large. This indeed is the conclusion Academician I. I. Meshchaninov arrived at. That view would mean abandoning all idea of morphology and confusing forms of a word with phenomena of a completely different kind. Thus, it seems obvious that the numberof cases in Modern English nouns cannot be more than two (father and father's). The latter form, father's, might be allowed to retain its traditional name of genitive case, while the former (father)may be termed common case. Of course it must be borne in mind that the possibility of forming the genitive is mainly limited to a certain class of English nouns, viz. those which denote living beings (my father's room, George's sister, the clog's head) and a few others, notably those denoting units of time (a week's absence, thisyear's elections), and also some substantivized adverbs (to-day's newspaper, yesterday's news, etc.). It should be noted, however, that this limitation does not appear be too strict and there even seems to be some tendency at work to use the -'s-forms more extensively. Thus, we can come across such phrases as, a work's popularity, the engine's overhaul life, which certainly are not stock phrases, like at his fingers' ends, or at the water's edge, but freely formed phrases, and they would seemto prove that it is not absolutely necessary for a noun to denote aliving being in order to be capable of having an -'s-form. The more exact limits of this possibility have yet to be made out. The essential meaning of this case would seem to require an exact definition. The result of some recent investigations into the nature of the -'s form shows that its meaning is that of possessivity in a wide sense of the term. Alongside of phrases like my father's room, the young man's friends, our master's arrival, etc., we also find such examples as nothing could console Mrs Birch forher daughter" s loss, where the implied meaning of course is, 'MrsBirch lost her daughter'. The real relation between the notionsexpressed by the two nouns may thus depend on the lexical meaning of these nouns, whereas the form in -'s merely denotes thepossessive relation. Up to now we have seen the form in -'s as a genitive case, and in so far we have stuck to the conception of a two-case system in Modern English nouns. There are, however, certain phenomena which give rise to doubts about the existence of such a system — doubts, that is, about the form in -'s being a case form at all. We will now consider some of these phenomena. In the first place, there are the expressions of the type Smith and Brown s office. This certainly means 'the officebelonging to both Smith and Brown'. Not only Brown, whose name is immediately connected with the -'s, but also Smith, whose name stands somewhat apart from it, is included in the possessive relation. Thus we may say that the -'s refers, not to Brown alone, butto the whole group Smith and Brown. An example of a somewhat different kind may be seen in the expression the Chancellor of theExchequer's speech, or the Oxford professor of poetry's lecture.These expressions certainly mean, respectively, 'the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer', and 'the lecture of the Oxford professor of poetry. Thus, the -'s belongs to the groups the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Oxford professor of poetry. The same of course applies to the groups the Duke of Edinburgh's speech, the King of England's

residence, and many others. A further step away from the category of case is taken in the groups somebody else's child, nobody else's business, etc. Here the word immediately preceding the -'s is an adverb which could not by itself stand in the genitive case (there is an obvious difference between somebody else's child and, e. g., to-day's news, or yesterday's paper). The -'s belongs here to the group somebody else as a whole. It cannot, then, be an inflection making an integral part of a word: it is here part of a whole phrase, and, accordingly, a syntactical, not a morphological, element. Formations of this kind are by no means rare, especially in colloquial style. Thus, in the following sentence the -'s is joined on to a phrase consisting of a noun and a prepositional phrase serving as attribute to it: This girl in. my class's mother took us [to the movies] (SALINGER), which of course is equivalent to the mother,of this girl (who is) in my class. It is only the lexical meaning ofthe words, and in the first place the impossibility of the phrase my class's mother, that makes the syntactical connection clear.Compare also: . . .and constantly aimed to suggest a man of the world's outlook and sophistication... (The Pelican Guide to EnglishLiterature)The -'s is still farther away from its status as an inflection insuch sentences as the following: The blonde I had been dancingwith's name was Bernice something — Crabs or Krebs. (SALINGER); Inever knew the woman who laced too tightly's name was Mathson. (FORSTER) This is the type usually illustrated by Sweet's famous example,the man I saw yesterday's son, that is, the type "noun + attributive clause + -'s".Let us have a look at J. D. Salinger's sentence. It is obvious that the -'s belongs to the whole group, the blonde I had been dancing with (it is her name he is talking about). It need hardly be emphasized that the preposition with cannot, by itself, be in the genitive case. Such constructions may not be frequent but they do occur and they are perfectly intelligible, which means that they fit into the pattern of the language.All this seems to prove definitely that in the English languageof to-day the -'s can no longer be described as a case inflection innouns without, at least, many reservations. This subject has been variously treated and interpreted by a number of scholars, both in this country and elsewhere. The following views have been put forward: (1) when the -'s belongs to a noun it is still the genitive ending, and when it belongs to a phrase (including the phrase "noun + attributive clause") it tends to become a syntactical element, viz, a postposition; (2) since the -s can belong to a phrase (as described above) it is no longer a case inflection even when itbelongs to a single noun; (3) the -'s when belonging to a noun, no longer expresses a case, but a new grammatical category, viz. the category of "possession", for example, the possessive form father'sexists in contradistinction to the non-possessive form father. An essential argument in favour of this view is, that both the form without -'s and the form with -'s can perform the same syntactic functions; for instance, they can both be subject of the sentence (cf. My father was a happy man and My father's was a happy life). Itshould be noted that the views listed under (2) and (3) lead to the conclusion that there are no eases in the Modern English noun. Though the question is still under discussion, and a final agreement on it may have to wait some time, we must recognize that there is much to be said in favour of this view. We will, then, conclude the discussion by saying that apparently the original case system in the English nouns,

which has undergone a systematic reduction ever since the earliest times in the history of the language, is at presentextinct, and the only case ending to survive in the modern language has dveloped into an element of a different character —possibly a particle denoting possession.Different views have also been expressed concerning the scope of meaning of the -'s. Besides phrases implying possession in the strict sense of the term (my father's books, etc.), the -'s is also found inother contexts, such as my father's friends, my father's arrival, my father's willingness, etc. The question now arises how wide this scope may be. From this point of view it has been customary to point out that the relation expressed by the collocation "noun + + -'s + noun" is often a subjective relation, as in my father's arrival: my father's expresses the subject of the action, cf. my father arrives. This would then correspond to the so-called subjective genitive of inflected languages, such as Russian or Latin. It would, however, not do to say that the noun having the -'s could never indicate the object of the action: cf. the example Doughty's famoustrial and execution, where the implied meaning of course is, 'Doughty was tried and executed'. This would correspond to the so-called objective genitive of inflected languages. Now, though this particular use would seem to be far less frequent than the subjective, it is by no means impossible or anomalous. Thus it would not be correct to formulate the meaning of the -'s in a way that wouldexclude the possible objective applications of the -'s-formation.My father was a happy man and My father's was a happy life). It should be noted that the views listed under (2) and (3) lead to the conclusion that there are no cases in the Modern English noun. ' Though the question is still under discussion, and a final agreement on it may have to wait some time, we must recognize that there is much to be said in favour of this view. We will, then, conclude the discussion by saying that apparently the original case system in the English nouns, which has undergone a systematic reduction ever since the earliest times in the history of the language, is at present extinct, and the only case ending to survive in the modern language has dveloped into an element of a different character — possibly a particle denoting possession. Parallel use of the -'s-form and the preposition of is seen in the following example: In the light of this it was Lyman's belief and it is mine — that it is a man's duty and the duty of his friends to see to it that his exit from this world, at least, shall be made with all possible dignity. (TAYLOR) It should also be noted in this connection that, if both the subject of an action and its object are mentioned, the former is expressed by a noun .with -'s preceding the name of the action, and the latter by an o/-phrase following it, as in Coleridge's praise of Shakespeare, etc. The same of course applies to the phrases in which the object is not a living being, as in Einstein's theory ofrelativity, or Shakespeare's treatment of history. The -'s form can also sometimes be used in a sense which may be termed qualitative. This is best illustrated by an example. The phrase an officer s cap can be interpreted in two different ways.For one thing, it may mean 'a cap belonging to a certain officer', and that, of course, is the usual possessive meaning (фуражка офицера). For another thing, it may mean 'a cap of the type worn by officers', and this is its qualitative meaning (the Russian equivalent for this is офицерская фуражка). Only the context will showwhich is meant. Here are a few examples of the qualitative meaning; it is only the context that makes this clear: if it were not for thecontext the usual possessive meaning might be ascribed to the form.

She perceived with all her nerves the wavering of Amanda's confidence, her child's peace of mind, and she understood how fragile it was. (CARY)'The meaning of the phrase her child's peace of mind is in itself ambiguous. Taken without the context, it may mean one of two .things: (1} 'the peace of mind of her child' (the usual possessive meaning), or (2)her peace of mind, which was like a child's' (the qualitative meaning). Outside the context both interpretations would be equally justified. In the sentence as it stands in the text the surrounding words unmistakably point to the second,that is, the qualitative interpretation: the whole sentence deals only with Amanda herself, there is no question of any child of hers, so that the usual possessive meaning is not possible here. A somewhat similar expression is found in the phrase, a small cupid's mouth,which might mean, either the mouth of a small cupid, or a small mouth, like that of a cupid. The context also confirms that the intended meaning is the qualitative one. A special use of the -'s-forms has also to be mentioned, which may be illustrated by such examples as, I went to the baker's; we spent a week at our uncle's, etc. Yes, Mary, I was going to write toMacmillan's and suggest a biography... (GR. GREENE)

The older view was based on the assumption that the -'s-form was an attribute to some noun supposed to be "understood", namely I went to the baker's shop, we spent a week at our uncle's house, etc. However, this interpretation is doubtful. It cannot be proved that a noun following the -'s-form is "understood". It seems more advisable, therefore, to take the facts for what they are and tosuppose that the -'s is here developing into a derivative suffix, used to form a noun from another noun. This is also seen in the fact that the famous cathedral in London is very often referred to as St. Paul's. A historical novel by the nineteenth-century English writer W. Harrison Ainsworth bears the title "Old St. Paul's", and itappears to be quite impossible here to claim that this is an attribute to the noun cathedral which is "understood": if we were to restore the word which is supposed to be omitted, we should get Old St. Paul's Cathedral, where the adjective old would seem to modify St. Paul, rather than Cathedral, just as in any other phrase of this type: old John's views, young Peter's pranks, etc.

MUTUAL RELATIONS OF NUMBER AND CASEIn Old English, the notions of number and case were alwaysexpressed by one morpheme. Thus, in the Old English form stdna the ending -a expressed simultaneously the plural number andthe genitive case. That was typical of an inflected language. A change came already in Middle English, and in Modern English the two notions have been entirely separated. This is especially clear in the nouns which do not form their plural in -s: in the forms men's,children's number is expressed by the root vowel and the inflection -ren, while the -'s expresses case alone. But this applies to nouns forming their plural in -s as well. E. g. in father s the -'s expressespossessivity, whereas the notion of singular has no material expression. In the plural fathers' the -s expresses the plural number,whereas the notion of possessivity has no material expression in pronunciation (in the written language it is expressed by the apostrophe standing after the -s). In spoken English the two forms may of course be confused. Thus, in the phrase [ 'boiz buks) is impossible to tell whether one or

more boys are meant (in written English these variants would be distinguished by the place of the apostrophe: the boy's books as against the boys' books}, unless the context gives a clue. It is natural, therefore, that ambiguity is better avoided by using the of-phrase instead of the possesive, e. g. the opinions of our mothers, etc. Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M,.2000. pp.48-61 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L.,71. pp.39-52 3. Гатилова В.К. Методические рекомендации для самостоятельной работы студентов по курсу Теоретическая грамматика английского языка. часть 1. Алма-Ата, 1993. сс36-40

Verb

The verb is a lexico-grammatical class of words, having the categorial meaning of process presented dynamically, that is developing in time.

Classification of verbs:

According to their meaning - terminative (to open, bring) and durative (to carry, live);

According to their relation to the continuous form - dynamic (he is eating) and stative (she wishes);

According to the type of object they take - transitive ( to tell the truth) and intransitive (they live here);

According to their meaning and function in the sentence - notional (to live, sit) and functional (auxiliary, modal and link verbs);

According to their function in the sentence - finite (sit, speak) and non- finite (infinitive, gerund and participle).

FINITE

The finite forms of the verb express the processual relations of substances and phenomena making up the situation reflected in the sentence. These forms are associated with one another in an extremely complex and intricate system. The peculiar aspect of the complexity of this system lies in the fact that, as we have stated before, the finite verb is directly connected with the structure of the sentence as a whole. Indeed, the finite verb, through the working of its categories, is immediately related to such sentence-constitutive factors as morphological forms of predication, communication purposes, subjective modality, subject-object relation, gradation of probabilities, and quite a few other factors of no lesser importance. As has been mentioned elsewhere, the complicated character of the system in question has given rise to a lot of controversies about the structural formation of the finite verb categories, as well as the bases of their functional semantics. It would be not an exaggeration to say that each fundamental type of grammatical expression capable of being approached in terms of generalized categories in the domain of the finite verb has created a subject for a scholarly dispute. For instance, taking as an example the sphere of the categorial person and number of the verb, we are faced with

the argument among grammarians about the existence or non-existence of the verbal-pronominal forms of these categories. In connection with the study of the verbal expression of time and aspect, the great controversy is going on as to the temporal or aspective nature of the verbal forms of the indefinite, continuous, perfect, and perfect-continuous series. Grammatical expression of the future tense in English is stated by some scholars as a matter-of-fact truth, while other linguists are eagerly negating any possibility of its existence as an element of grammar. The verbal voice invites its investigators to exchange mutually opposing views regarding both the content and the number of its forms. The problem of the subjunctive mood may justly be called one of the most vexed in the theory of grammar: the exposition of its structural properties, its inner divisions, as well as its correlation with the indicative mood vary literally from one linguistic author to another. On the face of it, one might get an impression that the morphological study of the English finite verb has amounted to interminable aimless exchange of arguments, ceaseless advances of opposing "points of view", the actual aim of which has nothing to do with the practical application of linguistic theory to life. However, the fallacy of such an impression should be brought to light immediately and uncompromisingly. As a matter of fact, it is the verb system that, of all the spheres of morphology, has come under the most intensive and fruitful analysis undertaken by contemporary linguistics. In the course of these studies the oppositional nature of the categorial structure of the verb was disclosed and explicitly formulated; the paradigmatic system of the expression of verbal functional semantics was described competently, though in varying technical terms, and the correlation of form and meaning in the composition of functionally relevant parts of this system was demonstrated explicitly on the copious material gathered. Theoretical discussions have not ceased, nor subsided. On the contrary, they continue and develop, though on an ever more solid scientific foundation; and the cumulative descriptions of the English verb provide now an integral picture of its nature which the grammatical theory has never possessed before. Indeed, it is due to this advanced types of study that the structural and semantic patterning of verbal constructions successfully applied to teaching practices on all the stages of tuition has achieved so wide a scope.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp.119-122

VERBALS Meaning Form Combinability Function Infinitive Participle Gerund

Besides the features common to the English verb as a whole the verbals (or verbids (Rogovskaya p.183) have certain features of their own distinguishing them from the finite verb Meaning

Their lexico-grammatical meaning is dual nature. The verbal meaning of ‘action, process’ is presented as some kind of ‘substance’ (gerund, infinitive) or ‘quality’ (participle).

The gerund and infinitive denote an action partially treated as a substance. E.g.: Going there put an end to her anxiety. To tempt Providence was the practice of Modernity. The participle denotes a”qualifying action’, i.e. an action presented as a property of some substance (like an adjective) or a circumstance of another action (like an adverb). E.g.: He looked at his son with twinkling eyes.

Form

They have peculiar morphemes: -ing (gerund and participle I), -e(d), -(e)n (participle II, to (infinitive)

Morphological features. The verbals have special morpheme distinguishing them from the finite verbs. They are not lexical or lexico-grammatical morphemes because they do not characterize all the words of the verb lexeme. Gerund .The -ing morpheme differs from grammatical morphemes as well. Grammatical morphemes are used to form grammatical opposemes. Cf.: asks -asked -will ask. The suffix -ing in gerund is not used to form any grammatical opposemes but to oppose all the gerunds to all the non-gerunds. Participle. Two additional remark are necessary to mention speaking about the homonymous -ing suffix of the participle: 1) The participle -ing morpheme does not unite all the system of the paticiple. The so-called participle II (written, asked) has different suffixes. 2) The -ing suffix of the participle is a grammatical morpheme of the finite verb as well. Infinitive. ‘To’ is a word-morpheme because it has only the form of a separate word, but not the content, and its functions as part of a word. It is not used as a grammatical morpheme. Like other word-morphemes, to can be separated from the rest of the analytical word by some other word or words, in which case the linguists speak about the split infinitive e.g.: In order to fully appreciate .... .

Grammatical categories.

The verbals do not possess many of the categories of the finite verb , such as number, person, tense, mood.

Infinitive. Here is a table presenting the paradigms of the infinitive:

time-correlation and aspect

Active voice Passive voice

non-perfect,

non-continuous

to write to be written

non-perfect,

continuous

to be writing -

perfect,

non-continuous

to have written to have been written

perfect,

continuous

to have been writing -

Gerund. The paradigm of the Gerund:

time correlation Active voice Passive voice

non-perfect writing being written

perfect having written having been written

Participle. The paradigm of the Participle I:

time correlation Active voice Passive voice

non-perfect writing being written

perfect having written having been written

Participle II has no paradigm.

Combinability

Their is a duality in their combinabiltiy, they form connections with adverbs , nouns, pronouns (denoting objects of action) like finite verbs, and with finite verbs like nouns and adverbs.

Gerund like a noun may be preceded by:

A. a preposition. E.G.: They went on talking. B. a possessive pronoun. E.g.: One could see that without his even

speaking. Sir Pitt Crawley was not aware of Becky’s having married Rawdon.

Like a verb may go together with:

A. adverbs, e.g.: You may rely on my setting matters right. B. nouns , e.g.: I was always afraid of losing his goodwill. C. pronouns, denoting an object, e.g: Excuse my leaving you in the dark a

moment.

The participle like a finite verb may be connected with:A. adverbs, e.g: Arriving there the visitor found everything that should be found at

all manors. B. nouns, e.g.: It was the entrance to a large family vault, extending under the

north aisle. C. pronouns, e.g.: Having closed the drawing-room door on him, Isabel awaited a

little, absorbed in her own thoughts.

Like an adjective it is regularly connected with nouns: E.g.: My forgotten friend ... Marlow was dead and buried.

Like an adverb it is connected with verbs, e.g.: The effect of her words was terrifying.

Infinitive. Like a verb the infinitive is associated with :

A. adverbs, e.g. to speak fluently. B. with nouns denoting the doer or the object of the action. e.g.: We expected

you to bring the book.

Like a noun the infinitive may be associated with a finite verb: To land seemed impossible.

Function.

Their syntactical function are quite different from those of the finite verb. They are very rarely used as predicates (except secondary ones), but they are used in almost any other function in the sentence.Infinitive.

A. the subject ,e.g.:. To doubt, under the circumstances, is almost to insult B. the predicative, e.g.: My intention is to get into parliament. part of a

compound verbal predicate, e.g.: We must not leave him by himself any longer an object Leila had learned to dance at boarding school.

C. a part of a complex object , e.g.: I never saw you act this way before. attribute , e.g.:I have not had time to examine this room yet.

D. an adverbial modifier a) purpose, b) of result, c) comparison, e.g.: a) To pacify her, I held the window ajar a few seconds b) I was too busy to see anyone. C) She moved her hand to his lips as if to stop him. D) She can driven away, never to revisit this place.

Participle:A. Attribute, e.g.: The gate-keeper surveyed the retreating vehicle. B. Adverbial modifier a) of time, b) of cause, c) of manner, d) of attendant

circumstances, e) of comparison e.g.: a) Having closed the room on him, Isabel awaited a little . absorbed in her own thoughts . B)Having been a little in that line myself, I understood it. C) She balanced herself on the curbstone and began to walk carefully, setting heels to toe, heel to toe, and counting her steps. D) Gwendolen was silent, again looking at her hands. E) This was said as if thinking aloud. predicative, e.g.: The whole damned day had been humiliating. part of a compound verbal predicate, e.g.: The horse was seen descending the hill. part of a complex object , e.g.: I heard my wife coming. parenthesis, e.g.: Generally speaking, I don’t like boys.

Participle II:A. Attribute They turned into the large conservatory beautifully lit up with

Chinese lamps. adverbial modifier, e.g.: a) of time , b) of condition, c) of comparison, d) of concession, e) of attendant circumstances A) She is a terror when roused. B) He did not usually utter a word unless spoken to. C) “Does he know it?” said David Ruin, as though surprised. D) ... her spirit, though crushed, was not broken. E) We sat silent, her eyes still fixed on mine.

B. Predicative, e.g.: In spite of himself, Val was impressed Part of a complex object, e.g.: She has found me unaltered, but I found her unchanged.

Gerund.A. Subject - Talking mends no holes. B. Predicative - The only remedy for such a headache as mine is going to

bed. C. Part of a compound verbal predicate - Joseph could not help admiring

the man.

D. Object - I simply love riding . E. Attribute - She had a feeling of having been worsted. F. Adverbial modifier a) of time ( after, before, on, in, at) , b) of manner

(by, in), c) of attendant circumstances (without), d) of purpose (for), of condition (without), f) of cause (for fear of, for, owing to), g) of concession (in spite of)

a) On reaching Casterbridge he left the horse and the trap at an inn. B) She startled her father by bursting into tears. C) She was not brilliant, not active, but rather peaceful and statuesque without knowing it. D) ... one side of the gallery was used for dancing. E) He has no right to come bothering you and papa without being invited. F) I dared not attend the funeral for fear of making a fool of myself. G) In spite of being busy, he did all he could to help her.

MODAL verbs

Background Semantics Morphological properties Mustn't and don't have to Can/could May – might Will, Would, Shall, Should Need Syntactic properties

Background

The class of verbs falls into a number of subclasses distinguished by different semantic and lexico-grammatical features: verbs of full nominative value (notional verbs) and verbs of partial nominative value (semi-notional and functional verbs.) Semi-notional verbs serve as markers of predication in the proper sense. These “predicators” include auxiliary verbs, modal verbs, link-verbs. Palmer, Modality and the English Modals, Longman 1979, says of the modals: “There is no doubt that the overall picture of the modals is extremely "messy" and untidy and that the most the linguist can do is to impose some order, point some regularities, correspondences, parallelisms”. (1) The modal auxiliaries form a closed class. If we list a number of examples the pattern is quickly observed: (1) He shouldn't have done that. (2) They must've missed the train. (3) He might not know yet. (4) It couldn't have been easier. (5) I think she may be pulling your leg! In each of these statements the first place of the verb phrase is occupied by a modal auxiliary. If such an auxiliary occurs in a sentence, it is always the first element of the verb phrase, following the subject in statements. As a closed class they share certain characteristics of meaning and are reciprocally exclusive ( I must can ask him) is impossible, although once more two of the closed class may be linked by and in the same

sentence: You could and should have checked first. (1) The complete list of modal verbs : Can, shall, may, will, must, could, should, might, would .

Semantic characteristics

Modal verbs denote various modal meanings: obligation, physical ability, possibility, permission, prediction, doubt, certainty and etc. The modality expressed by modal verbs may be of two types:

The modal verb indicates the relation of the speaker (writer) to the event denoted by the notional verb – the speaker may present events as possible (can, may), necessary (must, should, ought, be, have) or desirable (shall, will, would) without indicating whether the event really takes, took or will take place.

The modal verb indicates the relation of the event denoted by the notional verb to reality - the speaker (writer)may present events as realizable, attainable, indicating that they possible, probably take, took or will take place in actual reality. (3)

Morphological characteristicsForms –Simple – can, should, must. Grammatical categories - Modal verbs do not have a complete paradigm and are called defective verbs. Some modal verbs have the categories of:

1. Tense (can – could, may –might, have – had, be- was/were). 2.Mood (can, may)

A. Indicative Can - He can do it. May – He may be doing it. B. Subjunctive Can – He could do it if he tried. May – He might have done it.

3. Number (be, have)

All of these share a number of important characteristics: 1. They occupy the first place in a complex verb phrase. 2. They do not co-occur. 3. They are used as operators in the formation of, for example, questions, negatives etc. 4. They share important semantic similarities. For the moment, we will concentrate on this basic group and relegate those auxiliaries, which sometimes "misbehave" to the group of marginal modals. What primary semantic characteristics do the modal auxiliaries in the basic group share? With the choice of a pure tense form the speaker expresses the factual elements of a situation; with aspect the speaker provides an interpretation of the temporal features of an action. Modal auxiliaries allow the speaker to express an attitude to the non-factual and non-temporal elements of the situation. This means (s)he can introduce elements of possibility, necessity, desirability, morality, doubt, certainty, etc. Most modals have more than one meaning. For example, may is sometimes used to express permission, and sometimes to express possibility. Usually the meaning is clear from the situation or context.

Must

The necessity may be of different kinds, for example, legal, moral, practical or logical: You mustn't leave the car there after six. You mustn't say things like that to Mrs. Wilson.

You must be careful with your money there. They must have got the letter by now.

Mustn't and don't have to

Although: You have to get the 8 о 'clock train and You must get the 8 о 'clock train - seem similar in meaning, the negatives are quite different: You mustn't get the 8 о 'clock train. You don't have to get the 8 о 'clock train. We now see why this is. You have to... = It is necessary for you to... You don't have to... = It is not necessary for you to... (Have) to is about objective necessity, the opposite of which is objective non-necessity. The negation belongs to the necessity. The negation does not belong to the necessity, but to what follows. We may summarize: Don't have to = it is not necessary that... You don't have to ask first. Mustn't = It is necessary not to... You mustn't forget to phone. Interestingly, the distinction accounts for the existence of the form had to, and the fact that this appears to be the "past tense" equivalent of both has/ have to and must. If the speaker looks back on a past event and refers to necessity, that necessity will be objective, not the subjective necessity "in the present circumstances", expressed by a modal auxiliary. Talking of tomorrow I may say / must catch the 8.30 but referring factually to yesterday, when the necessity is objectified, / had to catch the 8.30 will be obligatory. Many students over-use must and avoid have to completely. This is partly because teachers frequently give examples beginning I must and, as we have seen there is little difference between the meaning of / must and / have to. Teachers can make the distinction clearer by presenting a wider range of examples — choosing some with an obvious outside agency, for example, traffic signs, and making sure they introduce examples with subjects other than "I".Students are unlikely to be misunderstood if they confuse must and have to but they do need to know (have) to in order to make such sentences as / had to wait 3 hours, and the difference between mustn't and don't have to is essential. It is confusing to teach that the positive sentences are "almost the same" and the negatives "completely different". It is better to make the distinction clear from a relatively early stage in the teaching. It is also essential to avoid statements about either of must and have to being "stronger" than the other. (I have seen the statement made both ways round in textbooks!). The "strength" of either form will depend upon its communicative meaning — this in turn depends on factors other than a simple choice of verb form. It is possible that "objective necessity" may be stronger if applied to "I" than any necessity I impose upon myself, using must. Equally, however, if must is given a heavy stress in speech, it is possible the necessity I impose upon myself appears stronger than any external necessity. The considerations are slightly different with second or third person subjects, but it still remains true that the communicative force ("strength") of the form is not constant.

Can/could

These are best dealt with as a pair, and we may state simple paraphrases as follows: Can = I assert that it is possible that... Could =• I assert that it is "remotely" possible that...These are the general, underlying meanings of can and could. Different kinds of "possibility" exist, and will be interpreted in different contexts. Uses of could are invariably possibilities of a more remote kind than uses of can. The "remoteness" may be remoteness in time, social relationship, or likelihood: / could ride a bike when I was a kid but I haven't done it for years. (Time) Could you pass the salt please ? (Relationship)

He could be a foreigner, but I don't think so. (Likelihood) Can always refers to different kinds of possibility. Could is also about possibility, but is more remote than can.

May - might

He may come may imply the granting of permission, or a prediction. In contemporary English it is much more likely to be the latter. Nonetheless, if we contrast He can come and He may come it becomes clear that the meanings may be paraphrased // is possible for him to come and / suppose it is possible that he will come. The difference is apparent; the may example involves the speaker explicitly in the possibility. It is this which is the defining contrast between may and can — the fact that the speaker is explicitly involved in the "creation" of the possibility. We may paraphrase may as: May = If I have anything to do with it, it is possible that... This paraphrase is cumbersome, but does, as we shall see, reflect an important distinction common to several definitions within the group of modal auxiliaries. The definition of might is similar, with the additional idea of remoteness.

Will, Would, Shall, Should

We turn now to the area of greatest potential confusion. We have already seen that the will/shall distinction has been confused by misguided teaching and that the whole problem of will/shall as "the future" has been misrepresented. With all of these modal auxiliaries a further problem arises; there is a contrast between the reduced and non-reduced form in statements: I'll be going. I'd be surprised. I will be going. I would be surprised. 1 shall be going. I should be surprised. The question forms with the reduced form are not, however, possible. There are occasions when we cannot be sure if a reduced form ('II or 'd) represents shall/will or should/would, or even whether it may be an independent form. In language teaching, contrasts such as should/would have frequently been taught. This has often created further confusion.

Will

Will is not uniquely associated with Future Time, although most uses do refer to Future Time. Here are some examples: (1) I'll see him on Sunday. (2) It's warm in here, I think I'll open the window. (3) We'll have to do something about it. (4) I'm sure they'll be home by now. (5) What will you do if that doesn't work. (6) It'll soon be 7 o'clock. (7) He will keep ringing me early in the morning. (8) Medicine will have taken great strides before the end of the century. We know that one common characteristic of the modals is shared by will; it relates to a state which is not factual for the speaker at the moment of speaking. It is, however, psychologically immediate for the speaker at the moment of speaking. The meaning may be loosely expressed as "given the present situation, and my perception of it, the situation to which I am referring must inevitably also be true". Two states are relevant — that pertaining at the moment of speaking, and a second one to which the speaker is referring;

the two are, as the speaker sees them, inevitably linked. We see immediately why will is strongly associated with reference to Future Time; the speaker refers to two states — that pertaining at the moment of speaking, and a second which is seen as non-factual. If two states are involved, there is a difference between them. The most common reason for that difference will be difference in time. If the state referred to is not seen by the speaker as factual, it is unlikely (though not impossible) for it to be in Past Time or Present Time; almost always it will be in Future Time. If it is not in Future Time the second state must be something of which the speaker does not have direct factual knowledge. Verb phrases of this kind containing will refer to logical inevitability, as in examples like They will be there by now (given the present time, the time they left, and my knowledge of the journey, the statement They are there must, inevitably, be true). It is clear that questions with Will I. . .? will be unusual; their meaning would be Do you assert, given the present circumstances, that it is inevitable that I... ? In general the person addressed is unlikely to see the speaker's actions as inevitable. Shall/will be common in statements about the speaker, or about objective fact, but relatively rare in the construction You will. . . This usage does, however, exist: (1) You will be met at the airport and taken direct to our office. (2) You will be there by 7 o'clock.

(1) suggests "Don't worry, arrangements have been made, you can rely on them". The person is reassured of the inevitability, and therefore reliability, of the arrangement. Shall has the meaning of will and the additional meaning "if it's anything to do with me (the speaker)". In questions, of course, the implication becomes "if it's anything to do with you (the listener)". Shall is a relatively uncommon word in modem spoken English, although common in the constructions: Shall I get one for you ? Shall we go tomorrow evening? It is also common (usually in its archaic form) in the Ten Commandments: Thou shall not kill. The pattern is clear — shall is appropriate (for those British native speakers of English who use both shall and will) when the speaker's direct involvement in the creation of the inevitability is involved. The shall/will contrast is clearly shown by the pair:What time will we arrive ? What time shall we arrive ? The first invites the listener's opinion of what, given the present circumstances, is inevitable. As we noted shall is rare in modem spoken English. For most school students it will be sufficient for them to know the shall in first person questions and perhaps in the fixed phrase Let's. . . , shall we. In all other cases they can, almost without risk, use will. The shall/will distinction is certainly not a matter which deserves more than a few moments of classroom time during a student's whole school career.

Would

At first sight there is little to link usages such as: / wouldn't think so. I would if I could. We would always go there picnicking, when I was a child. “Would” is clearly related to “will “and the relationship is by now a familiar one — would is "a remote form" of will. This is clearly the case with examples such as:

Would you open the window please ? (remoteness of relationship) / will if I can. I would if I could, (remoteness of likelihood/possibility). Like the other modal auxiliaries, would involves a non-factual interpretation of the situation. As we have seen, will expresses a state which is psychologically immediate for the speaker, and arises out of a perception of the present circumstances. We might then expect would to express an event, which is psychologically remote for the speaker. This is exactly the use of would. This emerges clearly in examples such as / would be surprised, or / would never have expected that to happen. The distinction between the factual quality of the remote form, and the non-factuality of would is further demonstrated by contrasts such as: / didn't realize he was here. I didn't realize he would be here. Was suggests my knowledge was wrong, whereas would be suggests my imagination or judgment of the situation was inaccurate. It is the psychological element in the semantic characteristics of would which is the source of this distinction. The meaning of would is clear; it has the association of "inevitability" which we saw with will but with an important difference; will is based on two situations — one which is psychologically immediate for the speaker at the moment of speaking, and the second, the event or state which is seen as "inevitably" linked. In the case of would, the first perceived state is, at the moment of speaking, remote from the speaker, in a non-factual way. This cumbersome expression is seen to be equivalent to the fact that the speaker, at the moment of speaking, conceptualises the action as hypothetical, i.e. non-factually remote. Would = Given the (hypothetical) situation which I perceive at the moment of speaking, the action described is also inevitably true. English does not possess a "conditional tense". It is, however, common for would to occur in sentences containing conditionals and not unusual for it to be presented in textbooks under headings such as "the conditional". Once more it is necessary to remind ourselvesof the Principle of General Use. Would is not "the conditional". It does, however, frequently co-occur with conditions. It is easy to see why this is so. Would is associated with events which are "hypothetical" for the speaker; in this context "hypothetical" means "true in certain circumstances, not those currently prevailing". This immediately suggests the question In what circumstances? The speaker, anticipating this implied question, frequently makes those circumstances explicit in the form of a clause beginning with such words as when, if, or unless. The fundamental meaning of would is such that it naturally occurs in sentences containing explicit conditions. Examples such as: / would expect him to be very pleased to see you. I would expect so.

Should

We come now to a much less tidy modal auxiliary. Palmer said that the area is messy, and that any attempt to argue for a single central meaning is doomed to failure. Swan has remarked that any attempt to find a single meaning results in cases of special pleading. With should, this is definitely so. There is no doubt that should have more than one use:

(1) Should it rain, the game will be postponed until Saturday. (2) It doesn't seem fair that he should get away without paying. It's funny you should say that. (3) How should I know! (4) It's about 5 miles, I should think. It must be about quarter past four, I should say. (5) If you should bump into him, please tell him I'm looking for him. If one green bottle should accidentally fall.... (a popular song). (6) We were just talking about it when who should come along but Sandra. (7) You should have taken your coat. I don't think he should have done that.

It is immediately clear than any attempt to identify the primary semantic characteristics of all uses of should is doomed to failure. Some of these examples at least must be "a different should". This should not surprise us. Such closed-class grammatical items as there and one evidently have more than one use. (There is both an adverb of place, and, quite distinctly, a pronoun). The contention of this book is not that the language is totally regular, but that within the verb the majority of forms are part of a basic and completely regular structure. Returning to should, we expect it to form some kind of relationship with would and will/shall. We might expect should: With this in mind it is easy to see why I don't think you ought to do that is closer in meaning to You shouldn't do that than to You oughtn't to do that. The sentence containing should involves the speaker's judgment through the modal auxiliary; when ought to is used, the speaker can introduce personal judgment through the use of a form such as / think.

(Have) to

We have already discussed these forms. There is not complete agreement among native speakers about the formal characteristics but there is a tendency not to treat (have) to as an operator. Although sentences like Had you to show your ticket? are acceptable, most native speakers probably prefer Did you have to show your ticket? In a similar way, tags with (have) to tend to be made with (do) but not invariably:

You have to be careful these days, don't you ? I'm afraid they had to do it, hadn't they.

(Have) to and ought to are sometimes treated as operators, sometimes not. In contemporary English ought to is usually treated as an auxiliary and used as operator; usage with (have) to is more variable. Semantically (have) to and ought to share an important characteristic — they are associated with objective rather than subjective perception of, respectively, necessity and desirability.

Occasionally ought to and have to can be combined:

They broke the fence down — they ought to have to fix it.

This sentence is about something as far from the speaker as the morality of the law, and contrasts strongly with They should fix it in which the speaker expresses a personal view about what should be done about the fence.

Need

Clearly, need is about necessity, and necessity is a modal concept. There are two forms in contemporary British English which it is easy to confuse. Need to is treated as a full verb: Do I need to bring my own ? We don't need to pay, do we ? In a small number of items which are now almost lexical items or "linguistic fossils" need (without to) is still used as an operator: Need I ask? You needn't bring yours, you can borrow one from us.

From a classroom point of view it is certainly easier to treat need to as an ordinary verb, and introduce the operator (modal auxiliary) use of need as a lexical item.

Syntactic characteristics

Combinability – Modal verbs mainly combine with an infinitive Functions – Modal verbs perform a function of a part of a compound modal

predicate, e.g.: He may go there tomorrow.

Literature: 1. R.Quirk S Greenbaum G Leech J. Svartvik A comprehensive grammar of the English Language. - Longman, London and new York 1994 2. M.Y. Blokh A course in theoretical English Grammar M., 2000, pp.87, 122-123, 156, 170 3. Reznik R.V., T.S.Sorokina, Kazaritskaya T.A. A grammar of modern English. M., 1999,71-76

Link

Link-verbs introduce the nominal part of the predicate (the predicative) which is commonly expressed by a noun, an adjective, or a phrase of a similar semantico-grammatical character. It should be noted that link-verbs, although they are named so, are not devoid of meaningful content. Performing their function of connecting ("linking") the subject and the predicative of the sentence, they express the actual semantics of this connection, i.e. expose the relational aspect of the characteristics ascribed by the predicative to the subject. The linking predicator function in the purest form is effected by the verb be; therefore be as a link-verb can be referred to as the "pure link-verb". It is clear from the above that even this pure link-verb has its own relational semantics, which can be identified as "linking predicative ascription". All the link-verbs other than the pure link be express some specification of this general predicative-linking semantics, so that they should be referred to as "specifying" link-verbs. The common specifying link-verbs fall into two main groups: those that express perceptions and those that express non-perceptional, or "factual" link-verb connection. The main perceptional link-verbs are

seem, appear, look feel, taste; the main factual link-verbs are become, get, grow, remain, keep. As is to be seen from the comparison of the specifying link-verbs with the verbid introducer predicators described above, the respective functions of these two verbal subsets are cognate, though not altogether identical. The difference lies in the fact that the specifying link-verbs combine the pure linking function with the predicator function. Furthermore, separate functions of the two types of predicators are evident from the fact that specifying link-verbs, the same as the pure link, can be used in the text in combination with verbid introducer predicators. E.g.: The letter seemed to have remained unnoticed. I began to feel better. You shouldn't try to look cleverer than you are. C,{. the use of verbid introducer predicators with the pure link-verb: The news has proved to be true. The girl's look ceased to be friendly. The address shown to us seemed to be just the one we needed. Besides the link-verbs proper hitherto presented, there are some notional verbs in language that have the power to perform the function of link-verbs without losing their lexical nominative value. In other words, they perform two functions simultaneously, combining the role of a full notional verb with that of a link-verb. C/.: Fred lay awake all through the night. Robbie ran in out of breath. The moon rose red. Notional link-verb function is mostly performed by intransitive verbs of motion and position. Due to the double syntactic character of the notional link-verb, the whole predicate formed by it is referred to as a "double predicate".

Grammatical categories

Grammatical category Grammatical meaning Grammatical form Synthetic way of form-change Meaning and form connection Peculiarity of the grammatical categories

The most general notions reflecting the most general properties of phenomena are referred to in logic as "categorial notions", or "categories". The most general meanings rendered by language and expressed by systemic correlations of word-forms are interpreted in linguistics as categorial grammatical meanings. The forms themselves are identified within definite paradigmatic series. The categorial meaning (e.g. the grammatical number) unites the individual meanings of the correlated paradigmatic forms (e.g. singular - plural) and is exposed through them; hence, the meaning of the grammatical category and the meaning of the grammatical form are related to each other on the principle of the logical relation between the categorial and generic notions. (2) So, language is capable to express different meanings. Most general meanings rendered by language are grammatical meanings. Grammatical meanings are very abstract, very general. The grammatical meaning is the significance of a certain relation expressed by a dependent part of a word (inflexion) or a significance of a certain arrangement of elements.

Notional words, first of all verbs and nouns, possess some morphemic features expressing grammatical (morphological) meanings. These features determine the grammatical form of the word. Therefore the grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics. The word form is the juncture of the stem ( a root and an affix) of the word with a word-change morpheme (inflexion). (3)

Grammatical categoryAs for the grammatical category itself, it is a system of expressing a generalized grammatical meaning by means of paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms. (2). The ordered set of grammatical forms expressing a categorial function constitutes a paradigm. The so-called "grammatical oppositions" expose the paradigmatic correlations of grammatical forms in a category. The opposition (in the linguistic sense) may be defined as a generalized correlation of lingual forms by means of which a certain function is expressed. The correlated elements (members) of the opposition must possess two types of features: common features and differential features. Common features serve as the basis of contrast, while differential features immediately express the function in question. In various contextual conditions, one member of an opposition can be used in the position of the other, counter-member. This phenomenon should be treated under the heading of "oppositional reduction" or "oppositional substitution". The first version of the term ("reduction") points out the fact that the opposition in this case is contracted, losing its formal distinctive force. The second version of the term ("substitution") shows the very process by which the opposition is reduced, namely, the use of one member instead of the other. (2)

Types of form-change

The change in the form of the word to convey different grammatical meanings can be achieved in different ways: synthetically and analytically. 1. Synthetical grammatical forms are realized by the inner morphemic composition of the word, while analytical grammatical forms are built up by a combination of at least two words, one of which is a grammatical auxiliary (word-morpheme), and the other, a word of "substantial" meaning. Synthetical grammatical forms are based on inner inflexion, outer inflexion, and suppletivity.

Inner inflexion, or phonemic (vowel) interchange, is not productive in modern Indo-European languages, but it is peculiarly employed in some of their basic, most ancient lexemic elements. By this feature, the whole family of Indo-European languages is identified in linguistics as typologically "inflexional". Inner inflexion is used in English in irregular verbs (the bulk of them belong to the Germanic strong verbs) for the formation of the past indefinite and past participle; besides, it is used in a few nouns for the formation of the .

Suppletivity, like inner inflexion, is not productive as a purely morphological type of form. It consists in the grammatical interchange of word roots, and this, as we pointed out in the foregoing chapter, unites it in principle with inner inflexion (or, rather, makes the latter into a specific variety of the former). Suppletivity is used in the forms of the verbs be and go, in the irregular forms of the degrees of comparison, in some forms of personal pronouns. Cf.: be - am - are - is - was - were; go-went; good - better; bad - worse; much - more; little - less; I - me; we - us; she-her.In a broader morphological interpretation, suppletivity can be recognized in paradigmatic correlations of some modal verbs, some indefinite pronouns, as well as certain nouns of peculiar categorical properties Cf.: can - be able; must-have (to), be

obliged (to); may-be allowed (to); one - some; man - people; news - items of news; information – pieces of information; etc. The shown unproductive synthetical means of English morphology are outbalanced by the productive means of affixation (outer inflexion), which amount to grammatical suffixation (grammatical prefixation could only be observed in the Old English verbal system).

Outer inflexion – is the meaningful replacement of phonemes within one and the same morpheme. These are used to build up the number and case forms of the noun; the person-number, tense, participial and gerundial forms of the verb; the comparison forms of the adjective and adverb. In the oppositional correlations of all these forms, the initial paradigmatic form of each opposition is distinguished by a zero suffix. Cf.:boy+0 - boys; go + 0 -goes; work +0 - worked; small+0 - smaller; etc.

2. As for analytical forms, which are so typical of modern English that they have long made this language into the "canonized" representative of lingual analytism, they deserve some special comment on their substance. The traditional view of the analytical morphological form recognizes two lexemic parts in it, stating that it presents a combination of an auxiliary word with a basic word. However, there is a tendency with some linguists to recognize as analytical not all such grammatically significant combinations, but only those of them that are "grammatically idiomatic", i.e. whose relevant grammatical meaning is not immediately dependent on the meanings of their component elements taken apart. Considered in this light, the form of the verbal perfect where the auxiliary have has utterly lost its original meaning of possession, is interpreted as the most standard. And indisputable analytical form in English morphology. Its opposite is seen in the analytical degrees of comparison which, according to the cited interpretation, come very near to free combinations of words by their lack of "idiomatism" in the above sense. (1,2) Moreover, alongside the standard analytical forms characterized by the unequal ranks of their components (auxiliary element-basic element), as a marginal analytical form-type grammatical repetition should be recognized, which is used to express specific categorial semantics of processual intensity with the verb, of indefinitely high degree of quality with the adjective and the adverb, of indefinitely large quantity with the noun. Cf: He knocked and knocked and knocked without reply (Gr. Greene). Oh, I feel I've got such boundless, boundless love to give to somebody (K. Mansfield). Two white-haired severe women were in charge of shelves and shelves of knitting materials of every description (A. Christie).

Meaning and form connection

On the one hand, the grammatical form and the grammatical meaning of any linguistic unit are inseparably connected. There is no meaning without a form, i.e. some material means of expression. On the other hand, the connection between the form and the meaning is very complex.

One form may express several meanings, for example the form “s” can denot: A habitual action (He wakes up at 7.); Plurality (boys, toys); Possessiveness (A daughter’s book). One meaning may be expressed by several form, for example the meaning of

futurity is expressed by:

o Combination “shall/will + verb”, e.g.: He will open the door.

o Continuous form, e.g.: I’m leaving tomorrow.

o Simple form, e.g.: The train leaves at 5 o’clock. o Combination with modal verbs and modal expressions, e.g.: He can come

anytime. o Combination with “to be going to do something”, e.g.: It’s going to rain.

Peculiarity of the grammatical categoriesThe grammatical category is reveled on the basis of opposition of forma and meanings. Not every relation between grammatical forms presents a grammatical category, Cf.: to see – seeing - seen. These are the forms of one and the same word ‘see’, but there is no any opposition. (1) The grammatical categories which are realized by the described types of forms organized in functional paradigmatic oppositions, can either be innate for a given class of words, or only be expressed on the surface of it, serving as a sign of correlation with some other class.

For instance, the category of number is organically connected with the functional nature of the noun: it directly exposes the number of the referent substance, e.g. one ship - several ships. The category of number in the verb, however, by no means gives a natural meaningful characteristic to the denoted process: the process is devoid of numerical features such as are expressed by the grammatical number. Indeed, what the verbal number renders are not a quantitative characterization of the process, but a numerical featuring of the subject-referent. Cf.: The girl is smiling. - The girls are smiling. The ship is in the harbor. - The ships are in the harbor. (2)

Literature: 1.Л.С. Бархударов, Д.А. ШтелингГрамматика английского языка-М., 1973, сс. 17-22 2.Blokh M.Y. A course in Theoretical English grammar. - M., 2000, pp.27-37 3.В.К.Гатилова Теоретическая грамматика английского языка. Часть 1. Алма-ата,1993, С.21-26

Tense

Tense is the category of the verb, which indicates the time of the action. There exist two main points of view on this category:

1. Three-fold system. Representatives of this theory are professors Smirnitsky and Ilyish. They distinguish three tenses - Present, Past and Future. They consider the Future tense to be an analytical form of the verb because it combines an auxiliary verb - shall/will and an infinitive.

2. Two fold system. Representatives of this theory are O.Jesperson, L.S.Barhudarov, Quirk. According to their theory the category of Tense in English is expressed through the opposition "Past" and Non-past" (Present).The Future tense is not considered to be a tense form opposem as: the combination "shall/will +Infinitive" as a whole has a modal meaning, that of certainty; "shall/will + Infinitive" is not the only construction in English to express the future action; there is Future-in-the-past. If tense is a system of opposems, one of the opposems "Future" cannot belong to two different tenses simultaneously.

The combinations of thе verbs shall and will with thе infinitive have of late become subject of renewed discussion. The codtroversial point about thеm is whether these combinations really constitute, together with the forms of the past and present, Thе categorial expression of verbal tense, or are just modal phrases, whose expression of thе future time does not differ in essence from thе general future orientation of other combinations of modal verbs with the infinitive. The view that shall and will retain their modal meanings in all their uses was defended by such a recognized authority on English grammar of the older generation of the twentieth century linguists as O. Jespersen. In our times, quite a few scholars, among them the successors of Descriptive Linguistics, consider these verbs as part of the general set of modal verbs, "modal auxiliaries", expressing the meanings of capability, probability, permission, obligation, and thе like.

A well-grounded objection against the inclusion of the construction shall/will + Infinitive in thе tense system of the verb on the same basis as the forms of the present and past has been advanced by L. S. Barkhudarov . His objection consists in the demonstration of the double marking of this would-be tense form by one and the same category: the combinations in question can express at once both the future time and the past time (the form "future-in-the-past"), which hardly makes any sense in terms of a grammatical category. Indeed, the principle of the identification of any grammatical category demands that the forms of the category in normal use should be mutually exclusive. The category is constituted by the opposition of its forms, not by their co-position!

However, reconsidering the status of the construction shall/will + Infinitive in the light of oppositional approach, we see that far from comparing with the past-present verbal forms as the third member-form of the category of primary time it marks its own grammatical category, namely, that of prospective time (prospect). The meaningful contrast underlying the category of prospective time is between an after-action and a non-after-action. The after-action, or the "future", having its shall/will-feature, constitutes the marked member of the opposition.

The category of prospect is also temporal, in so far as it is immediately connected with the expression of processual time, like the category of primary time. But the semantic basis of the category of prospect is different in principle from that of the category of primary time: while the primary time is absolutive, i.e. present-oriented, the prospective time is purely relative; it means that the future form of the verb only shows that the denoted process is prospected as an after-action relative to some other action or state or event, the timing of which marks the zero-level for it. The two times are presented, as it were, in prospective coordination: one is shown as prospected for the future, the future being relative to the primary time, either present or past. As a result, the expression of the future receives the two mutually complementary manifestations: one manifestation for the present time-plane of the verb, the other manifestation for the past time-plane of the verb. In other words, the process of the verb is characterised by the category of prospect irrespective of its primary time characteristic.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp.132-150 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L.,1971. pp.92-96.

Aspect

Aspect as a grammatical category has the aspective meaning, which reflects the inherent mode of the realisation of the process irrespective of its timing. There exist three main points of view on this problem: Aspect is interpreted as a category of semantics rather than that of grammar ( M.Deuthbein, A.G.Kennedy, G.Curme). According to this theory aspect system comprises 5 aspects - terminative, ingressive, effective, durative and iteratative. Aspect is treated as a tense form, expressing actions simultanious with some other actions or situations ( H.Sweet, O.Jesperson, L.L.Jofik). Aspect and tense are recognised as two distinct grammatical categories ( B.A.Ilyish, A.I.Smirnitsky, V.N.Yartseva), because the forms " wrote - was writing" are not opposed as tense forms and because the idea of simultaneity does not go very well with the Perfect Continuous forms, besides simultaneous actions are very often expressed by the non-continuous forms.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp.150-170 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L., 1971. pp. 82-92

THE PERFECT. BASIC QUALITIES OF THE PERFECT FORMS

The Modern English perfect forms have been the subject of a lengthy discussion which has not so far brought about a definite result. The difficulties inherent in these forms are plain enough and may best be illustrated by the present perfet. This form contains the present of the verb have and is called present perfect, yet it denotes an action which no longer takes place, and it is (almost always) translated into Russian by the past tense, e. g. has written — написал, has arrived — приехал, etc. The position of the perfect forms in the system of the English verb is a problem which has been treated in many different ways and has occasioned much controversy. Among the various views on the essence of the perfect forms in Modern English the following three main trends should be mentioned:

1. The category of perfect is a peculiar tense category, i. e. a category which should be classed in the same list as the categories "present" and "past". This view was held, for example, by 0. Jespersen.

2. The category of perfect is a peculiar aspect category, i. e. one which should be given a place in the list comprising "common aspect" and "continuous aspect". This view was held by a number of scholars, including Prof. G. Vorontsova. Those who hold this view have expressed different opinions about the particular aspect constituting the essence of the perfect forms. It has been variously defined as "retrospective", "resultative", "successive", etc.

3. The category of perfect is neither one of tense, nor one of aspect but a specific category different from both., It should accordingly be designated by a special term and its relations to the categories of aspect and tense should be investigated. This view was expressed by Prof. A. Smirnitsky. _He took the perfect to be a means of expressing the category of "time relation" (временная отнесенность).

This wide divergence of views on the very essence of a verbal category may seem astonishing. However, its causes appear to be clear enough from the point of view of present-day linguistics. These causes fall under the following three main heads:

1. Scholars have been trying to define the basic character of this category without paying sufficient attention to the system of categories of which it is bound to make a part. As we shall see presently, considerations of the system as a whole rule out some of the proposed solutions.

2. In seeking the meaning of the category, scholars have not always been careful to distinguish between its basic meaning (the invariable) and its modifications due to influence of context.

3. In seeking the basic meaning of the category, scholars have not always drawn a clear line of distinction between the meaning of the grammatical category as such and the meanings which belong to, or are influenced by, the lexical meaning of the verb (or verbs) used in one of the perfect forms.

If we carefully eliminate these three sources of error and confusion we shall have a much better chance of arriving at a true and objective solution. Let us now consider the views expressed by different scholars m 'the order in which we ' mentioned them above.

If we are to find out whether the perfect can be a tense category, i. e. a tense among other tenses, we must consider its relations to the tenses already established and not liable to doubts about their basic character, i. e. past, present, and future. There is no real difficulty here. We need only recollect that there are in Modern English the forms ' present perfect, past perfect, and future perfect. That present, past, and future are tense categories, is firmly established and has never been doubted by anyone. Now, if the perfect were also a tense category, the present perfect would be a union of two different tenses (the present and the perfect), the past perfect would likewise be a union of two different tenses (the past and the perfect) and the future perfect, too, would be a union of two different tenses (the future and the perfect). This is clearly impossible. If a form already belongs to a tense category (say, the present) it cannot simultaneously belong to another tense category, since two tense categories in one form would, as it were, collide and destroy each other. Hence it follows that the category of perfect cannot be a tense category. We need not consider here various views expressed by those who thought that the perfect

was a tense, since their views, whatever the ' details may be, are shown to be untenable by the above consideration. So the view that the perfect is a special tense category has been disproved.

In order to find out whether the perfect can be an aspect category, We must consider its relations to the aspects already established, viz. the common and the continuous aspects. This problem does not present any particular difficulty, either. We need only recollect that there are in Modern English such pairs as is writing — has been writing, was writing — had been writing, will be writing — will have been writing, i. e. present continuous and present perfect continuous, past continuous and past perfect continuous, future continuous and future perfect continuous. All of these forms belong to the continuous aspect, so the difference between them cannot possibly be based on any aspect category. For example, since both was writing and had been writing belong to the continuous aspect (as distinct from wrote and had written), they cannot be said to differ from each other on an aspect line; otherwise they would at the same time belong to- one aspect and to different aspects, which is obviously impossible. Hence the conclusion is unavoidable that the perfect is not an aspect. The views of those who consider the perfect to be an aspect need not therefore be discussed here in detail. Since the perfect is neither a tense nor an aspect, it is bound to be some special grammatical category, different both from tense and from aspect. This view, though not quite explicitly stated, was first put forward by Prof. A. Smirnitsky in a posthumous article.

It is in complete harmony with the principle of distributive analysis, though Prof. Smirnitsky did not, at the time, use the term "distributive analysis".

The essence of the grammatical category expressed by the perfect, and differing both from tense and from aspect, is hard to define and to find a name for. Prof. Smirnitsky proposed to call it "the category of time relation", which is not a very happy term, because it seems to bring us back to the old view that the perfect is a special kind of tense — a view which Prof. Smirnitsky quite rightly combatted. Later it was proposed to replace his term of "time relation" by that of "correlation" (соотнесенность), which has the advantage of eliminating the undesirable term "time". This is decidedly the term to be preferred. As to the opposition in such pairs as writes — has written, wrote — had written, will write — will have written, is writing — has been writing, was writing — had been writing, will be writing — will have been writing. Prof. Smirnitsky proposed to denote it by the correlative terms "non-perfect" and "perfect". While this Jatter proposal may be fully accepted, the definition of the meaning of the category presents considerable difficulty. Its essence appears to be precedence: an action expressed by a perfect form precedes some moment in time. We cannot say that it always precedes an other action: the present perfect form is most commonly used in sentences which contain no mention of any other action.

On the other hand, the use of a non-perfect form does not necessarily imply that the action did not precede some moment in time. It may, or it may not, have preceded it. To find this out, the reader or hearer has to take into account some other feature of the context, or, possibly, the situation, that is, an extralinguistic factor. Thus, the opposition between perfect and non-perfect forms is shown to be that between a marked and an unmarked item, the perfect forms being marked both in meaning (denoting precedence) and in morphological characteristics (have + second participle), and the non-perfect forms unmarked both in meaning (precedence not implied) and in morphological characteristics (purely negative characteristic: the collocation "have + second participle" not used). On the whole, as a general term to denote the basic meaning of the perfect the term '^correlation" in the above-mentioned meaning seems quite acceptable and we propose to make use of it until a better term is found, which may take some time to happen.

If this view is taken, the system of verbal categories illustrated by the forms writes, is writing, has written, has been writing, wrote, was writing, had written, had been writing, will write, will be writing, will have written, will have been writing, — is based on three groups of notions, viz. tense: present vs. past vs. future; aspect: common vs. continuous; correlation: non-perfect vs. perfect. As is seen from this list, the latter two of the three oppositions are double (or "dichotomic"), i. e. they consist of only two items each, whereas the first (the tense opposition) is triple (or "trichotomic"), i. e. it consists of three items.

We will accept this state of things without entering into a discussion of the question whether every opposition must necessarily be dichotomic, i. “. consist of two members only. Thus, the opposition between writes and wrote is one of tense, that between wrote and was writing one of aspect, and that between wrote and had written one of correlation. It is obvious that two oppositions may occur together; thus, between writes and was writing there are simultaneously the oppositions of tense and aspect; between wrote and will have written there are simultaneously the oppositions of tense and correlation, and between wrote and had been writing there are simultaneously the oppositions of aspect and correlation. And, finally, all three oppositions may occur together: thus, between writes and had been writing there are simultaneously the oppositions of tense, aspect, and correlation.

Literature: 1. Blikh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp.151-170 2. Ilyish B.A. The atructure of Modern English. - L.,1971. pp.96-105

THE VERB: PERSON AND NUMBER. OTHER MORPHOLOGICAL ATEGORIES

The categories of person and number must be considered in close connection with each other, since in languages of the IndoEuropean family they are expressed simultaneously, i. e. a morpheme expressing person also expresses number, e. g. in Latin the morpheme -nt in such forms as amant, habent, legunt, amabant, habebunt, legerunt, etc., expresses simultaneously the 3rd person and the plural number. We shall, however, start by considering the meaning of each of these categories, and then proceed to the analysis of their state in Modern English. The category of person in verbs is represented by the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person, and it expresses the relation between the speaker, the person or persons addressed, and other persons and things. The 1st person, of course, expresses the speaker or a group of which the speaker makes a part; the 2nd person, the person or persons spoken to, and the 3rd, that person or thing .(or those persons or things) which are neither the speaker nor the person (s) spoken to. The category of number expresses the quantity of the subjects (one or more than one). However, this system does not hold good for the Modern English verb, and this for two reasons. First, there is no distinction of persons in the plural number. Thus, the form live may, within the plural -number, be connected with a subject of any person (1st, 2nd, or 3rd). Second, there is no distinction of numbers in the 1st or 2nd person. Thus, the form live in these persons may refer both to one and to more than one subject.

So what we actually find in the Modern English verb is this: 3rd person singular — lives All the rest — live

If we analyse this state of things in the Modern English verb in exact terms we shall reach the following conclusion. The opposition lives /live, or, in general terms, stem + s / stem + 0, expresses the relation: 3rd person singular/any person of both numbers except 3rd person singular. It is quite clear that the first item of the opposition is marked both in meaning (3rd person sing.) and in form (-s), whereas the second item is unmarked both in meaning (everything except the 3rd person sing.) and in form (zero-inflection). We ought to add that the category of mood is implied in this opposition, the form lives belonging to the indicative mood only, whereas live may also be any person of both numbers in the subjunctive mood (as far as we recognize its existence at all). Another consequence of this analysis is, that the -s-inf lection in verbs conveys 4 meanings: 1) 3rd person, 2) singular number, 3) present tense, 4) indicative mood. The present tense is of course characterized by other signs as well: by the absence of the -d (or -t) morpheme denoting the past tense in regular verbs, and by alternation of the root vowel (e. g. [i] in drinks as against [ae] in drank) in irregular verbs. But in verbs of the type put the -s is the only distinctive sign of the present. The ending -s having four meanings to express simultaneously is of course a synthetic feature, standing rather by itself in the general structure of Modern English. Some verbs do not fit into the system of person and number described above

and they must be mentioned separately both in a practical study of-the language and in theoretical analysis. We will limit ourselves to the verb can (the verbs may, shall, and some others sharing some of its features) and the verb be, which stands quite apart and, of course, is very widely used. The verb can, as is well known, takes no -s-inflection parallel to such forms as lives, writes, takes, etc. Hence it follows that this verb has no category of person or number at all.

The verb be has a system of its own both in the present indicative and in the past. Its system in the present indicative is as follows: 1st person singular — am 3rd person singular — is 2nd person (without distinction of number) --are Plural (without distinction of person) - are

In the past tense the system is: 1st and 3rd person singular — was 2nd person (without distinction of number) --were Plural (without distinction of person)- were

In analysing the system of person and number we have so far bypassed the forms of the type livest, takest, livedst, tookest. These forms are associated with the personal pronoun thou .and are only used in religions and occasionally in poetical texts and among Quakers. As they stand outside the received grammatical system we can not go into details concerning them. Suffice it to say that with these forms the category of number appears within the category of the 2nd person a&d the whole system of person and number (including the past tense) must be presented in a different shape.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grannar. - M.,2000. pp.122-132 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L.,1971. pp.129-132

THE VERB: VOICE

THE PROBLEM OF A REFLEXIVE VOICE THE PROBLEM OF A RECIPROCAL VOICE THE PROBLEM OF A MIDDLE VOICE

The category of voice presents us with its own batch of difficulties. In their main character they have something in common with the difficulties of mood: there is no strict one-way correspondence between meaning and means of expression. Thus, for instance, in the sentence I opened the door and in the sentence the door opened the meaning is obviously different, whereas the form

of the verb is the same in both cases. To give another example: in the sentence he shaved the customer and in the sentence he shaved and went out the meaning is different (the second sentence means that he shaved himself), but no difference is to be found in the form of the verb. We are therefore bound to adopt a principle in distinguishing the voices of the English verb: what shall we take as a starting-point, meaning, or form, or both, and if both, in what proportion, or in what mutual relation? As to the definition of the category of voice, there are two main views. According to one of them this category expresses the relation between the subject and the action 0nly these two are mentioned in the definition. According to the other view, the category of voice expresses the relations between the subject and the object .of the action. In this case the object is introduced into the definition of voice. We will not at present try to solve this question with reference to the English language. We will keep both variants of the definition in mind and we will come back to them afterwards. Before we start on our investigation, however, we ought to define more precisely what is meant by the expression "relation between subject and action". Let us take two simple examples: He invited his friends and He was invited by his friends. The relations between the subject (he) and the action (invite) in the two sentences are different since in the sentence He invited his friends he performs the action, and may be said to be the doer, whereas in the sentence" He was invited by his friends he does not act and is not the doer but the object of the action. There may also be other kinds of relations, which we shall mention in due course. The obvious opposition within the category of voice is that be-tween active and passive. This has not been disputed by any scholar, however views may differ concerning other voices. This position may be illustrated by a number of parallel forms involving different categories of aspect, tense, correlation, and mood. We will mention only a few pairs of this kind, since the other possible pairs can be easily supplied:

invites — is invited is inviting — is being invited invited — was invited has invited — has been invited should invite — should be invited

From the point of view of form the passive voice is the marked member of the opposition: its characteristic is the pattern "be + second participle", whereas the active voice is unmarked: its characteristic is the absence of that pattern. It should be noted that some forms of the active voice find no parallel in the passive, viz. the forms of the future continuous, present perfect continuous, past perfect continuous, and future perfect continuous. Thus the forms will be inviting, has been inviting, had been inviting, and will have been inviting have nothing to correspond to them in the passive voice. With this proviso we can state that the active and the passive .constitute a complete system of oppositions within the category of voice.

The question now is, whether there are other voices in the English verb, besides active and passive. It is here that we find doubts much controversy.At various times, the following three voices have been suggested addition to the two already mentioned: (l)The reflexive, as in: he dressed himself, (2) the reciprocal, as in: they greeted each other, and (3) the middle voice, as in: the door opened (as distinct from: I opened the door). It is evident that the problem of voice is very intimately connected with that of transitive and intransitive verbs, which has also been variously treated by different scholars. It seems now universally agreed that transitivity is not in itself a voice, so we could not speak of a "transitive voice"; the exact relation between voice and transitivity remains, however, somewhat doubtful. It is far from clear whether transitivity is a grammatical notion, or a characteristic of the lexical meaning of the verb. In view of such constructions as he was spoken of, he was taken care of, the bed had not been slept in, etc., we should perhaps say that the vital point is the objective character of the verb, rather than its transitivity: the formation of a passive voice is possible if the verb denotes an action relating to some object. Last not least, we must mention another problem: what part are syntactic considerations to play in analysing the problem of voice? Having enumerated briefly the chief difficulties in the analysis of voice in Modern English, we shall now proceed to inquire into each of these problems, trying to find objective criteria as far as this is possible, and pointing out those problems in which any solution is bound to be more or less arbitrary and none can be shown to be the correct one by any irrefutable proofs.

THE PROBLEM OF A REFLEXIVE VOICE

Taking, then, first the problem of the reflexive voice, we will formulate it in the following way. Can the group "verb + self-рrоnoun" (i.e. myself, himself, ourselves, etc.) be the reflexive voice of a verb, that is, can the self-pronouns ever be auxiliary words serving to derive a voice form of the verb? This is putting the problem in purely morphological terms. But it also has a syntactical side to it. From the syntactical viewpoint it can be formulated in another way: does a self-pronoun coming after a verb always perform the function of a separate part of the sentence (the direct object), or can it (in some cases at least) be within the same part of the sentence as the verb preceding it (in the vast majority of cases this would be the predicate)? If we approach this question from the point of view of meaning, we shall see that different cases may be found here. For instance, in the sentence He hurt himself badly we might argue that himself denotes the object of the action and stands in the same relation to the verb as any other noun or pronoun: he hart himself badly would then be parallel to a sentence like he hurl me badly. On the other hand, in a sentence like He found himself in a dark room things are

different: we could not say that he found himself is analogous to he found me. We could not, indeed, say that he performed an action, that of finding, and the object of that action was himself. Here, therefore, doubt is at least possible as to whether himself is a separate part of the sentence, namely, a direct object, or whether it is part of the predicate. We might possibly have to class he hurt himself and he found himself (in a dark room) under different headings and this would influence our general conclusions on the category of voice. Considerations of this kind cannot, however, bring about a solution that would be binding and could not be countered by a different solution which might also be confirmed by more or less valid reasons. If we are to achieve some objective solution, we have to rely on objective data in this case, as in so many other cases. Objective investigation requires that we should find various syntactic contexts or patterns in which the group "verb + self- pronoun" can appear. For instance, we ought to look for examples of the pattern "verb + self-pronoun + and + noun or pronoun". If such examples can be found, they will argue in favour of the view that the self-pronouns standing after a verb are actually treated as standing in the same relation to the verb as any other noun or pronoun denoting the object of the action. If, on the other hand, no such example could be found, this would go some way towards proving that a self-pronoun is not apprehended as standing in the same relation to the verb as any other noun or pronoun following it and this would be an argument in favour of acknowledging a reflexive voice in the Modern English verb. Other considerations of a syntactical character might also influence our judgement on this question. The problem has been treated by 0. Ovchinnikova, who has collected some examples of the pattern "verb + self-pronoun + and + noun or pronoun", for instance, / see this man Meek doing everything that is natural to a complete man: carpentering, painting, digging, pulling and hauling, fetching and carrying, helping himself and everybody else ... (SHAW) and also examples of a noun functioning as apposition to the self-pronoun which comes after a verb, e. g. I am defending myself — an accused communist. (FOX) These cases, few as they are, show that a self-pronoun following a verb can at least be apprehended as a separate member of the sentence. If it were only part of the predicate it obviously could not have an apposition attached to it. So we may take it as proved that in some cases at least the self-pronoun following a verb is not an auxiliary word serving to express a voice category of the verb. But the question remains, what we are to make of cases such as the following: It was done, and Catherine found herself alone in the Gallery before the clocks had ceased to strike. (J. AUSTEN) Here the self-pronoun cannot either be joined by and to a noun (pronoun), or have a noun in apposition attached to it. Without going into many details concerning these cases, we can merely say that two ways are here open to us. One way is to say that, since in a number of cases the self-pionoun is not an auxiliary word used to form a verbal voice, it is never an auxiliary. Then we should have to treat such cases as he found himself ... etc. as phraseological

units and refer their peculiarities to the sphere of lexicology rather than of grammar. The other way would be to say that in some cases a self-pronoun does become an auxiliary of voice. Then to find oneself would be treated as a form of the reflexive voice of the verb find and the group (and, of course, other groups of a similar kind) would remain in the sphere of grammar and we should recognize a reflexive voice in English. There seems at present no binding argument in favour of one or the other solution. We shall have to leave the question open until such a solution can be found. The treatment of the problem would be incomplete if we did not mention the cases when a verb is used without a self-pronoun to denote an action which the doer performs on himself. Examples of this kind are not numerous. We can mention the verb dress, which may be used to mean 'dress oneself, and the verb wash, which may be used to mean 'wash oneself. This is seen, for example, in sentences like the following: At daybreak the next morning Home got up and dressed. (E.C ALDWELL) As we see, these verbs denote habitual everyday actions and this appears to be essential for the possibility of such a usage. It would not, for instance, be possible to use the verb hurt in the sense of 'hurt oneself, or the verb accuse in the sense of 'accuse oneself, etc. Since in the sentence he dressed quickly there is no self-pronoun and no other special sign to indicate that the doer is performing the action on himself, we cannot include such cases under the category of the reflexive voice even if we were to recognize the existence of such a voice, which, as we have seen, cannot be objectively established.

THE PROBLEM OF A RECIPROCAL VOICE

Under this heading we will consider formations like greeted each other, or loved each other, or praised one another. The problem is somewhat similar to that of the reflexive voice, and it is this: Does the group each other (and the group one another) make part of an analytical verb form, that is, is it an auxiliary element used for forming a special voice of the verb, the reciprocal voice, or is it always a separate secondary part of the sentence (though it is hard to tell exactly what part of the sentence it may be)? We might seek a solution to the question on the same lines as with the reflexive voice, that is, we might try to find out whether the group each other (or one another} is ever found to be co-ordinated with a noun or pronoun serving as object to the verb. We should have to see whether such a sentence is ever found as this one: They kissed each other and the child, etc. However, such a search would be very hard and not promising at all. Very possibly, we would not find a single example of that kind, but this could not be considered as a proof that each other (or one another) does serve as an auxiliary to form the reciprocal voice of the verb (kiss in this example). We will not go into this question any deeper and we will limit ourselves to the following conclusion. The solution of the question must remain to a certain extent arbitrary. But, putting together this Question and the question of the

reflexive voice as discussed above, we may state that the grounds for assuming a special reciprocal voice are weaker than those for assuming a reflexive voice. Therefore if we reject the reflexive voice, we will certainly reject the reciprocal voice as well. If, on the other hand, we accept the reflexive voice, the question about the reciprocal voice will remain open. As in the case of the reflexive voice, we must also mention the instances, which are rather few, when a verb denotes a reciprocal action without the help of the group each other or one another. For instance, in the sentence They kissed and parted, kissed is of course equivalent to kissed each other. Since there is no external sign of reciprocity, we cannot find here a reciprocal voice even if we should admit its existence in the language. These cases will also best be considered under the heading "middle voice".

THE PROBLEM OF A MIDDLE VOICE

This problem arises chiefly in connection with the possible double use of a number of verbs in Modern English. Compare, for instance, such pairs of sentences as these: I opened the door I burnt the paper I boiled the water We resumed the conference We apply the rule to many cases

First let us formulate what is established and does not depend on anybody's point of view or interpretation, and then we will proceed to analyse the questions which admit of different solutions. The facts, then, are these. In the sentences of the first and in those of the second column we have verb forms sounding alike but differing from each other in two important points: (1) In the first column, the verb denotes an action which is performed by the doer on an object in such a way that a change is brought about in that object, for instance,.the door was closed and then I acted in such a way that the door became open; the paper was intact, but I subjected it to the action of fire, and it was reduced to ashes, etc. In the second column a process is stated which is going en in the subject itself: the door opened (as if of its own will), the paperdisappeared in flames, etc. Compare, e. g., His camp had filled. (LINKLATEB) The teas making. (L. MITCHELL) This, of course, is a difference in the relation between the subject and the action (and, for the first column, the object). (2) In the first column, the verb is followed by a noun (or pronoun) denoting the thing which is subjected to the action denoted by the verb. In the second column, the verb is not followed by any noun (or pronoun). In the first column the verb is transitive, in the second column the verb is intransitive. What we have said so far is nothing but an objective description of the state of things found in these sentences, no matter what theory a scholar may prefer. Now we must turn our attention to the possible theoretical interpretation of these facts, and here the problem of voice will arise. One

possible interpretation is this. In every line we have in the two columns two different verbs which may be represented in some such way as: open1, verb transitive, open2, verb intransitive; burn1, verb transitive, burn 2, verb intransitive, etc. If this interpretation were adopted, the whole problem would be shifted into the sphere of lexicology, and from the grammatical viewpoint we should have to state that open1 here stands in the active voice (correlative with was opened), and open 2 has no voice distinction at all (since from the intransitive verb open no mutually opposed voice forms can be derived). Another interpretation would run something like this. In both columns we have the same verb open, the same verb burn, etc. and the difference between the two is a difference of voice: in the first column it is the active voice (showing an action performed by the doer on the object), while in the second column it is the middle voice, denoting a process going on within the subject, without affecting any object. The difference between the voices, though not expressed by any morphological signs, would then be a difference in meaning and in syntactical constrtiction, the active voice characterized by connection with a following noun or pronoun denoting the object of the action, and the middle voice characterized by the impossibility of connection with such a noun or pronoun. This interpretation would mean the admission of a special voice, the middle voice. Still another interpretation would be the following. The verb in both columns is the same and the voice is the same, too, since there is no morphological difference between the two columns, and differences of meaning and of syntactical construction are not sufficient reason for establishing a difference of voice. If this view is accepted, we should have to define the category of active voice in such a way that it should include both the first-column and the second-column examples. The choice between these interpretations depends on the principles which a scholar considers to be the most essential and the most likely to yield an adequate picture of language facts. If, for instance, it is considered essential that a difference in grammatical categories should find its outward expression by some morpheme, etc. the second of the three suggested interpretations will have to be rejected. If, on the other hand, it is considered possible for two morphological categories to be distinguished in meaning and syntactical use without any special morphemes to show the distinction, that second interpretation will be found acceptable. Without prejudice to the first or second interpretation, we will now follow up the third, which seems to present the greatest interest from a theoretical point of view. In doing so, we will assume that we do not accept either a reflexive or a reciprocal or a middle voice, so that only two voices are left, the active and the passive. If, then, we are to bring under the heading of the active voice such cases as the door opened, the paper burnt, the water boiled, etc., we shall have to give that voice a definition wide enough to include all uses of that kind as well (this may make it necessary to change the term for the voice, too). Let us now consider the opposition between the voices: opened (in any sense) was opened; burnt (in any sense) was burnt from the point of view of meaning. It should at once be clear that the second member of the opposition (was opened, etc.) has a much more definite meaning than the first: the meaning of the type was opened is that the subject is represented as acted upon, whereas the meaning of the first member

(opened, etc.) is much less definite. We could, then, say that opened is the unmarked, and was opened, the marked member of the opposition. The meaning of the unmarked member is, as has often been the case, hard to define. What seems the essential point in its meaning is, that the subject is represented as connected with the origin of the action, and not merely acted upon from the outside. Some such definition would seem to cover both the type he opened the door, and the type the door opened. Whether the subject produces a change in an object, or whether the action is limited to the sphere of the subject itself — all these and similar points would depend partly on the syntactical context (on whether the verb is followed by a noun / pronoun or not), partly on the lexical meaning of the verb and its relation to the lexical meaning of the noun expressing the subject (compare the old man opened... and the door opened), partly, probably, on a number of other factors which are yet to be studied. The question whether it is more advisable to keep the term "active voice" or to substitute another term for it would also have to be discussed.If this view is adopted, all the special cases considered above: he shaved (in the reflexive meaning), they kissed (in the reciprocal meaning) would fall under the heading of the active voice (if this term is kept) and their peculiarities would have to be referred to the context, the lexical meaning of the verb in question, etc. The following phenomena would also belong here: the book sells well, the figures would not add, the rule does not apply in this case (as different from we do not apply the rule), and a number of others, which have been variously treated as "absolute use", use of the active form in a passive meaning, etc. As to form, it has been already said above that the passive is the marked, and the active the unmarked member of the opposition. Thus, then, the passive is marked both in meaning and in form and the active as unmarked both in meaning and in form. This solution of the voice problem in Modern English appears to be convincing. However the other interpretations (mentioned above as first and second) ought also to be reasoned out to their logical conclusions.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theiretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp170-179

Functional parts of speech

Contrasted against notional parts of speech are words , which are called functional parts of speech:

1) of incomplete nominative meaning, 2) unchangeable

3) characterized by dependent functions in the sentence and specific comb inability.

THE PREPOSITION

The meanings of various prepositions in various contexts

The boundary line between a preposition and another part of speech

Use of prepositions Groups of words whose meaning and functions in the

sentence are the same as those of prepositions

It is common knowledge that prepositions are a most importantelement of the structure of many languages, particularly those which, like Modern English, have no developed case system in their nominal parts of speech.

We have briefly discussed the problem of the meaning of prepositions but here we shall have to consider it at some length.

It is sometimes said ' that prepositions express the relationsbetween words in a sentence, and this is taken as a definition of the meaning of prepositions. If true, this would imply that they do not denote any relations existing outside the language. However, this is certainly not true, and two or three simple examples will show it. If we compare the two sentences: The book is lying on the table,and The book is lying under the table, and ask ourselves, what do the prepositions express here, it will at once be obvious that they express relations (in space) between the book (the thing itself) and the table (the thing itself). The difference in the situations described in the two sentences is thus an extralinguistic difference expressed by means of language, namely, by prepositions. It would certainly be quite wrong to say that the prepositions merely express the relations between the word book and the word table, as thedefinition quoted above would imply. The same may be said about a number of other sentences. Compare, for instance, the two sentences, He will come before dinner, and He will come after dinner. It is absolutely clear that the prepositions denote relations between phenomena in the extralinguistic world (time relations between "his coming" and "dinner"), not merely relations between the word come and the word dinner.

We must add that there are cases in which a preposition does not express relations between extralinguistic phenomena but merely serves as a link between words. Take, for instance, the sentence This depends on you. Here we

cannot say that the preposition has any meaning of its own. This is also clear from the fact that no other preposition could be used after the verb depend (except thepreposition upon, which is to all intents and purposes a stylistic variant of on). Using modern linguistic terminology, we can say that the preposition on is here predicted by the verb depend. The same may be said about the expression characteristic of him. If the adjective characteristic is to be followed by any prepositional phraseat all the preposition of must be used, which means that it is predicted by the word characteristic. Returning now to our examples. The book is lying on the table and The book is lying under the table, we must of course say that neither the preposition ore nor the (' See, for instance, Грамматика русского языка, т. I, стр. 41.

preposition under is predicted by the verb lie. If we put the sentence like this: The book is lying ., . the table, the dots might be replaced by a number of prepositions: on, in, under, near, beside, above, etc.The choice of the preposition would of course depend on the actual position of the book in space with reference to the table. Similarly, if we are given the sentence He will. come ... the performance, the dots may be replaced by the prepositions before, during, after, according as things stand. Now, in defining the meaning of a preposition, we must of course start from the cases where the meaning is seen at its fullest, and not from those where it is weakened or lost,just as we define the meaning of a verb as a part of speech according to what it is when used as a full predicate, not as an auxiliary.

We need not go further into the meanings of various prepositions in various contexts, since that is a problem of lexicology rather than grammar. What we needed here was to find a definition based on the real meaning of prepositions.

The next point is, the syntactical functions of prepositions. Here we must distinguish between two levels of language: that phrases and that of the sentence and its parts. As far as phrases concerned, the function of prepositions is to connect words with each other. '(1 This statement will require some modification when we come to thefunction of prepositions in such cases as "Under the Greenwood Tree", etc. On this level there are patterns like "noun + preposition + noun", "adjective + preposition + noun", "verb + preposition + noun", etc., which may be exemplified by numerous phrases such as a letter from my friend, a novel by Galsworthy, fond children, true to life, listen to music, wait for an answer, etc.

On the sentence level: a preposition is never a part of a sentence by itself; it enters the part of sentence whose main centre is the following noun, or pronoun, or gerund. We ought not to say that prepositions connect parts of a sentence. They do not do that, as they stand within a part of the sentence, not between two parts.

The connection between the preposition, the word whichprecedes it, and the word which follows it requires special study. Different cases have to be

distinguished here. The question is, what predicts the use of this or that preposition. We have already noted the cases when it is the preceding word which determines it (or predicts it) In these cases the connection between the two is naturally strong. In the cases where the use of a preposition is not predicted by the preceding word the connection between them is looser, and the connection between the preposition and the following word may prove to be the stronger of the two. This difference more or less corresponds to that between objects and adverbial modifiers expressed by prepositional phrases. Thus, in a sentence like This depends on him the preposition is predicted by the verb and the phrase on him is of course an object, whereas in a sentence like The book is lying under the table the preposition is not predicted by the verb and the phrase is an adverbial modifier. However, this criterion does not bold good in all cases. The boundary line between a preposition and another part of speech

Sometimes the boundary line between a preposition and anotherpart of speech is not quite clear. Thus, with reference to the words like and near there may be doubtful cases from this viewpoint. For instance, there certainly is the adjective near, used in such phrases as the near future. On the other hand, there is the preposition near, found in such sentences as they live near me.

The adjective has degrees of comparison, and the prepositionof course has none. In this connection let us examine the following sentence, which presents us with a whole bundle of problems involving both that of parts of speech and that of subordinate clauses:

When they had finished their dinner, and Emma, her shawl trailing the floor, brought in coffee and set U down before them, Bone drew back the curtains and opened wide the window nearest where they sat. (BUECHNER) The question about the word nearest is closely connected with that about the ties between the where-clause and the main clause. As to the word nearest, there are obviously twoways of interpreting it: it is either an adjective in the superlative degree, or a preposition. Each of the two interpretations has its difficulties. If we take nearest as an adjective in the superlative degree, it will follow that this adjective (that is, the adjective near) can lake an object clause, in the same way as it takes an object within a clause, e. g. near our house, near midnight, etc., and this would mean that the subordinate clause where they sat is treated very much like a noun. If, on the other hand, we take nearest as a preposition, we should have to state that there is a special preposition nearest in Modern English: it would obviously not do to say that the preposition near has degrees of comparison. There would appear to be no valid reason to prefer the one or the other of the two views, and a third possibility seems to present itself, viz. sayingthat we have here a borderline case of transition between an adjective in the superlative degree and a preposition.

This is one more example of language phenomena requiringa careful and wholly undogmatic approach: it would be futile to expect that every single language fact would fit easily into one pigeonhole or another prepared for it in advance. Language phenomena have as it were no -obligation to fit into any such pigeonholes and it is the scholar's task to approach them with an open mind, to take into account their peculiarities, and to adjust his system as best he can to receive such "unorthodox" facts. Another example of this kind has been considered above: it concerned the status of we words many, much, few, and little (see pp. 71—72, B. Ilyish).

A special case must now be considered. In some phrases, which are not part of a sentence, a preposition does not connect two words because there is no word at all before it, and so its ties are one-sided: they point only forwards, not back.

As characteristic examples we may quote the titles of some poems and novels: "To a Skylark" (SHELLEY) ,"0n a Distant Prospect of Eton College" (GRAY), "Of Human Bondage" (MAUGHAM), "Under the Greenwood Tree" (TH. HARDY). The syntactical function of the prepositions in cases of this type is a peculiar one. Thepreposition either expresses a relation between the thing expressed by the noun and something not mentioned in the text (as in "To a Skylark"), or it gives the characteristic of the place where something not specified takes place ("Under the Greenwood Tree").

It is evident that in such cases the preposition has only a one- sided connection, namely with the noun following it, but we may ask whether it has not also some reference to something not expressed which may be imagined as standing before the preposition.

Let us, for instance, compare the actual title of W. SomersetMaugham's novel, "Of Human Bondage", with a possible variant "Human Bondage", without the preposition. In this way the meaning and function of the preposition become clear: the preposition of is here used as it is used in the phrases speak of something, think of something, etc. In the title as it stands, the prepositionimplies that the author is going to speak of human bondage, that is, human bondage is going to be discussed. '

We shall arrive at a similar conclusion if we compare the actual title of Th. Hardy's novel, "Under the Greenwood Tree", with the possible variant "The Greenwood Tree". The preposition implies that we shall be reading about something happening under the tree, rather than about the tree itself. So it will probably be right to say that something is implied (very vaguely, it must be admitted).

Use of prepositions

We should especially note some peculiar uses of the prepositionabout, namely in such sentences as, There were about twenty people in the room, which of course means that the number is given approximately. The preposition here has only a one-sided

connection, namely with the numeral, and has no connection at all with the preceding verb. It certainly does not express any relation between were and twenty. Syntactically, it makes an element of the subject group (about twenty people). Indeed we may be inclined to doubtwhether the word about is a preposition at all in such a case. It rather approaches the status of a particle.

This is still more confirmed by examples in which the group introduced by about stands after another preposition, as in the sentence, This happened at about three o'clock. The group about three o'clock here follows the preposition at in quite the same way as the group three o'clock would follow it in the sentence This happened at three o'clock. The group about three o'clock is a designation of a certain time as much as the group three o'clock, and to establish its relation with the verb happened it also requires the preposition at to be used.

We also find two prepositions close to each other in differentcontexts. Compare, for instance, the following sentence: He sat until past midnight in the darkness while grief and sorrow overcame him. (E. CALDWELL) Here also belongs the phrase from under in a sentence like The cat stretched its paw from under the table. It seems quite possible to take this in the same way as we took at about in the preceding example, and to say that under the table denotes a certain place and from indicates movement from that place. However, it is also possible to view this case in a somewhat different way, namely to suppose that from under is a phrase equivalent to a preposition, and then we should not have two prepositions following one another here. This problem should be further investigated.

Prepositions can sometimes be followed by adverbs, which apparently become partly substantivized when so used. The groups from there, from where, since then, since when are too widely known to require illustrative examples. Another case in point is the following: She is beautiful with that Indian summer renewal ofphysical charm. which comes to a woman who loves and is loved particularly to one who has not found that love until comparatively late in life. (O'NEILL)

Prepositions in English are less closely connected with the word or phrase they introduce than, say, in Russian. It would be impossible in English for a preposition to consist of a consonant only that is, to be non-syllabic, which is the case with the three Russian prepositions в, к, с. This greater independence of English prepositions manifests itself in various ways.

There is the possibility of inserting, between a "preposition and the word or phrase it introduces, another phrase, which can, in its turn, be introduced by a preposition. Here is an example of this kind: The first of these, "The Fatal Revenge", appeared in 1807, and was followed by, among other, "The Milesian Chief" ... (COUSIN) The two

prepositions, by and among, stand one after the other, but there is certainly no syntactic connection between them, and probably there is a pause, corresponding to the comma of the written text. The connection between followed and by appears tobe closer than that between by and the phrase which it introduces, namely, "The Milesian Chief". Unless it were so, the preposition by would come after the inserted phrase among others, rather than.

But that variant, though perhaps not impossible would certainly be less idiomatic than that in the text. This way of making one preposition come immediately after another, showing the independence of the first preposition, is seen in some cases where the status of the second preposition may be doubted, that is, it may be doubted whether the word is really a preposition in that context (compare what has been said on p. 152, B. Ilyish)). The following sentence, which is fairly characteristic of modern usage, will show the essence of the phenomenon: His industrywas marvellous, and its results remain embodied in about 40 books, of which about 25 are commentaries on books of Scripture (COUSIN). Of course all this is made possible by the fact that prepositions in English do not require the word they introduce to have a specified case form.

Sometimes even a parenthetical clause come between the preposition and the noun it introduces, e. g. Some weeks ago Mr Blessington came down to me in, as it seemed to me, a state of considerable agitation. (CONAN DOYLE)

The looseness of the tie between the preposition and the following noun can be offset by a closer tie between the preposition and the preceding word. This may be seen, for instance, in some passive constructions with the phrase "verb + noun + preposition" acting as a kind of transitive unit. Examples of this use are well known. Compare the following sentence: Their conference was put an end to by the anxious young lover himself, who came to breathe his parting sigh before he set off for Wiltshire. (J. AUSTEN) The active construction would have been, The young lover put an end to their conference, where an end would be a non-prepositional, and to then conference a prepositional object. It might be argued, however, that pat an end is something of a phraseological unit and should therefore be treated as the predicate. Be that as it may, the fact remains that the noun end is included into the passive form of the verb, and the subject of the passive construction is the noun which, in the active construction, would have been part of the prepositional object.

It should also be noted that a preposition does not necessarilyconnect the word which immediately precedes it with the one that follows. Cases are frequent enough in which there is no connection at all between the preposition and the preceding word. For instance, in the sentence, This beauty is a trifle dimmed now by traces of recent illness (O'NEILL) there is no connection between the words now and by. The preposition by is of course connected with the passive participle dimmed and the adverb now could be left out without affecting the connections and the

functions of the preposition: This beauty is dimmed by traces of recent illness. The same may be said about the sentence I get the same tale of woe from every one in our part of the country (Idem): the preposition from every is not connected with the noun woe which precedes it, it is connected with the verb get, which is separated from it by five other words. Many more examples of this kind might be given. This should warn us against an oversimplified understanding of the tactical function of a preposition.

Groups of words whose meaning and functions in the sentence are the same as those of prepositions

Special attention must be given to groups of words whose meaningand functions in the sentence are the same as those of prepositions. Here belong the groups out of, as to, as for, instead of, in spite of, etc. We cannot term these groups prepositions, since a preposition is a word, not a word group, and it is essential to keep up the distinction between words and word groups; neglect of it would bring about a muddle both in grammar and in lexicology. The current haziness in the treatment of such groups and the vague terms "compound preposition" and the like are not conducive to a clear and consistent grammatical theory. Since much the same can be said about phrases equivalent in meaning and function to conjunctions, we will return to this problem after having considered the conjunctions(B. Ilyish p150-155)

THE CONJUNCTION

DEFINITION PREPOSITIONS AND CONJUNCTIONS

Taking up the definition of a conjunction given above in general survey of parts of speech, we must first of all, just as we have done with prepositions, consider the question of the meaning of conjunctions. Many authors, in defining a conjunction, limit themselves to indicating that they serve to connect words (or parts of the sentence) and clauses.(B Ilyish, p.156, Грамматика русского языка, т. I, стр. 665.) This would seem to imply that theconjunctions have no meaning of their own, that is, that they do not themselves express any phenomena of the extralinguistic world This is untenable, as may be very easily shown by the simplest examples. Compare, for instance, the two sentences, He came because it was late, and He came though it was late. The different conjunctions obviously express different real relations between two extralinguistic phenomena: his coming and its being late. The causal connection between them exists outside the language, and so does the concessive relation expressed in the latter of the two sentences. There is no difference whatever in the grammatical structure of the two sentences: the difference lies only in the meanings of the two conjunctions. The same

observation can be made on comparing the two sentences, We will come to see you before he comesback, and We will come to see you after he comes back, and also in a number of other cases. All this goes to prove that every conjunction has its own meaning, expressing some connection or other existing between phenomena in extralinguistic reality.

So far our reasoning and our conclusions have been the same as in the case of prepositions. Now, however, comes a point in which conjunctions are different from prepositions. When discussing prepositions, we noted that in a certain number of cases the use of a given preposition is predicted by the preceding word: thus the verb depend can only be followed by the preposition on (or upon}, the adjective characteristic only by the preposition of, etc. In such cases the preposition has no meaning of its own. Conjunctions in this respect are entirely different. The use of a conjunction is never predicted by any preceding word. We will no longer inquire into the meanings of conjunctions, as this is a question of lexicology rather than grammar.

In studying the syntactical functions of conjunctions, we have, just as with prepositions, to distinguish between two levels — that of phrases and that of sentences.

On the phrase level it must be said that conjunctions connect words and phrases. It is the so-called coordinating conjunctions that are found here, and only very rarely subordinating ones. On the sentence level it must be said that conjunctions connect clauses (of different kinds). Here we find both so-called coordinating conjunctions and so-called subordinating conjunctions. The division of conjunctions into coordinating and subordinating is one that can hardly be dealt with outside syntax: coordinating conjunctions imply coordination of clauses, and subordinating conjunctions imply subordination of clauses. So we shall have again into this question when we come to syntax.(B.Ilyish, p157) Here it will be sufficient to say that there is nothing in the conjunction itself to show whether it is coordinating or subordinating, and even "the structure of the clauses there is no unmistakable sign of this (as is the case, for instance, with word order in Modern German). Conjunctions can sometimes lose their connecting function, as is the case with the conjunction if in sentences expressing wish, like the following: If only she might play the question loud enough to reach the ears of this Paul Steitler. (BUECHNER) Probably we shall have to say that if here is no longer a conjunction but a particle. We will consider such cases in Syntax as well. (B. Ilyish, p.157)

PREPOSITIONS AND CONJUNCTIONS

In comparing prepositions with coordinating and subordinatingconjunctions we cannot fail to notice that while prepositions have nothing in common with coordinating conjunctions, some prepositions are very close in meaning to subordinating conjunctions, and in some cases a preposition and a subordinating conjunction soundexactly the same. As examples of similarity in meaning we may

give, for instance, such phrases and clauses: during his illness = while he was ill; examples of complete identity in meaning and sound are the words before, after, since.

All this presents us with intricate problems. On the one hand, it seems doubtful whether we are right in uniting subordinating conjunctions (that is, words like when, as, after, before, since) together with coordinating conjunctions (that is, words like and, but, or} into one part of speech and separating them from prepositions (that is, words like of, from, after, before, since), with which they obviously have much more in common. On the other hand, it remains doubtful how we should treat the relations between the Reposition after and the conjunction after (and similarly, before .... since}. None of the treatments so far proposed seems satisfactory.

One way is to say, there is the word after, which may function both as a preposition and as a conjunction. But then the question arises what part of speech is after? If it can only function as a Position and as a conjunction, this would mean that it is neither the one nor the other,

Another way is to say that after the preposition and after the conjunction are homonyms. This will not do either, since .homonymy, by definition, supposes complete difference of meaning between saw ‘instrument for sawing' and saw 'old saying', where the meaning of after tie preposition and after the conjunction is absolutely the same.

These considerations apply as well to the words before and since and here the question further complicated by the fact that they can also be adverbs. '

The difficulty with the word after would be overcome if we. were to unite prepositions and conjunctions into one part of speech (as hinted above, p. 33\ which would then have to be given a new name. The difference between what we now call the preposition after and the conjunction would then be reduced to different syntactical uses of one word. But the difficulty with the adverbs and preposition-conjunctions before and since would not be solved by this: it would not do to say hat an adverb and a word uniting the qualities of preposition and conjunction are the same word.

A fully convincing solution of this problem has yet to be found. As to the relation between prepositions, coordinating conjunctions, and subordinating conjunctions, it must be said that on the ground of the peculiarities which have been pointed out a completely different treatment of the three types of words is possible. An ideato this effect was put forward by the French scholar L. Tesnierein a book on general participles of syntax. Tesniere classes what are usually called coordinating conjunctions as a type for itself: he calls them ‘jonctifs’(that is , junctives), whereas prepositions and what we call subordinating conjunctions come together under the name of ‘translatifs’ (translatives) and are distinguished from each other as subclasses of this large class: prepositions are called "translatifs, premier degre" (translatives, first degree) and subordinating. conjunctions, "translatifs, second degre" (second degree). This is quite natural iii a book on syntax,

in which things are looked at from a synta;tical angle and words classified according to their functions in the sentence.

It should also be noted that the difference between prepositionsand conjunctions is much less pronounced in Modern English than .in Russian, where prepositions are closely connected with cases, while conjunctions have nothing whatever to do with them. In English with its almost complete absence of cases, this different prepositions and conjunctions is very much obliterated. While in Russian the substitution of a conjunction for a preposition makes it necessary to change the case of the following noun, in English no such change is necessary or, indeed, possible. So the distinction between preposition and conjunction is based here only on semantic criteria and also on the use of these words in other contexts, where they are not interchangeable.

In discussing prepositions, we noted that there are in English, as well as in Russian and in other languages, certain phrases which cannot be termed prepositions, since they are not words, but which are similar to prepositions in meaning and in syntactical function. The same is true of conjunctions. A certain number of phrases (consisting of two or three words) are similar in meaning and in function conjunctions. Among them we can quote such phrases as inother. that, as soon as, as long as, notwithstanding that, etc. Just as prepositional phrases, these will be analyzed in a special chapter in Syntax (B. Ilyish, p.158-159)

ARTICLES

Definition Semantic properties (meaning) Morphological properties (form) Syntactic properties (function) USES of the DEFINITE ARTICLE USES of the INDEFINITE ARTICLE USES of the ZERO ARTICLE

Definition: Article is determining unit of specific nature accompanying the noun in communicative collocation.

The peculiar feature of the article is that the use of the article with the noun is obligatory. Taking into consideration these particular feature of the article, the linguist is called to make a sound statement about its segmental status in the system of morphology.

The English article differs greatly from the article in such languages as German and French where it has gender distinctions. Not being connected with the gender and case (as in German) the English article appears to be more independent of the noun. Consequently, semantically and functionally it acquires an exceptionally wide use in speech. The status of the article in the system of the languages one of the most difficult and controversial problem.

Some linguists treat the article as a morpheme on the ground that it has no lexical meaning of its own and that it is nothing but a structural element marking a word as a noun. M.Y. Blokh qualifies the article as a special type of a grammatical auxiliary, stating that combination of the article and the noun has the status of the analytical form. J.Opdicke, J.Morell and some other representative of the traditional approach refer the article to the class of adjectives. B.A.Ilyish is of the opinion that the problem of the status of the article is impossible to solve because of the lack of objective criteria. Still we think that it is possible to distinguish three main criteria of an article to prove that its status is that of a part of speech. (semantic, morphological and syntactic characteristics)

a. the lexico-grammatical meaning of '(in)definiteness', b. the morphological destination is its being a structural marker.

b) the right-hand combinability with nouns,

c) the function of noun specifiers.

Semantic properties: The lexical meaning of a(n) in Modern English is a very weak reminder of its original meaning (OE. an = one). In spite of the long process of weakening there remains enough of the original meaning in a(n) to exclude the possibility of its being attached to a 'plural' noun. The lexical meaning of the in Modern English is a pale shadow of its original demonstrative meaning. The general lexico-grammatical meaning of these words, as usual, is not identical with their individual lexical meanings. It abstracts itself from the meaning of 'oneness' in a(n) and the 'demonstrative' meaning in the. Perhaps, the names of the article? ('definite', 'indefinite') denote the nearest approach to this lexico-grammatical meaning, which, for lack of a better term, might be defined as that of 'definiteness — indefiniteness'. The definite article the and the indefinite article a/an at once discloses not two but three meaning characterizations of the nounal referent achieved by their correlative functioning. The definite article expresses the identification or individualization of the referent of the noun The indefinite article is commonly interpreted as referring the object denoted by the noun to a certain class of similar objects; in other words, the indefinite article expresses a classifying generalization of the nounal referent. As for the various uses of nouns without an article, from the semantic point of view they all should be divided into two types. In the first place, there are uses where the articles are deliberately omitted out of stylistical considerations. We see such uses in telegraphic style in titles, in headlines. Alongside free elliptical constructions there are cases of the semantically unspecified non-use of the article in various combinations of fixed type, such as prepositional phrases (on fire, at hand, in debt), fixes verbal

collocations (take place, make use, cast anchor) descriptive coordinative groups and repetition groups (man and wife, dog and gun, day by day)

Morphologicalproperties: Not only the status but also the number of the article in English has been debated for a long time. Obviously there are two material articles that accompany the noun in English: the definite and the indefinite. One might be tempted to regard the two articles as members of an opposeme, and the meanings of 'definiteness', 'indefiniteness' as the particular meanings of some grammatical category. Language facts, however, contradict such views. As we know, the members of an opposeme must belong to the same lexeme and have identical meanings (barring those opposed). Now a(n) and the do not belong to one lexeme and their meanings are not identical. Besides the meaning of 'indefiniteness' a(n) possesses the meaning of 'oneness' not found in the. The 'demonstrative' meaning of the is alien to a(n).

For similar reasons a hook — the hook are not analytical members of some noun opposeme, and the, a(n) are not grammatical word-morphemes.

1) A(n) and the are not devoid of lexical meaning as grammatical word-morphemes are.

2) Their meanings are not relative. The has the meaning of 'definiteness' not only when opposed to a(n). Cf. snow—the snow , books — the books.

All this corroborates the view that the articles are individual words with individual lexical meanings united by the general lexico-grammatical meaning of '(in)definiteness'. Some grammarians speak of the 'zero article' l or the 'zero form of the indefinite article' 2. Rogovskaya B.I. and Haimovich B.S. are definitely against these terms, as a grammatical zero morpheme is created in an opposeme owing to the relative nature of grammatical meanings. As shown above, the articles are not grammatical morphemes and their meanings are not relative. They are words, and the absence of a word cannot be regarded as a zero word. They do not speak of zero prepositions or zero particles. But if the article is a word, the notion “zero word” cannot be accepted as logical and grounded, if it is a morpheme the notion “zero morpheme” is no less illogical. Majority of scholars and foreign scholars as well distinguish the zero morpheme.

Syntactic properties:

Combinability:

The common features in the combinability of the articles are due to their belonging to the same part of speech, in other words, the lexico-grammatical combinability of the articles is the same. Both of them have right-hand connections with the same part of speech, nouns.

The difference in their combinability can be explained by the difference in their lexical meanings.

1. Identical nounal positions for the pair “the definite-the indefinite article : eg: the train hooted (that train) - A train hooted (some train)

2. correlative nounal positions for the pair ‘the indefinite article - the absence of article” Be careful there is a puddle under you feet (a kind of puddle). _ Be careful, there is mud on the ground. (as different from clean space) (Blokh, p.72-81)

The use of the article in a sentence: In discussing the use of articles , we must distinguish between specific and generic

reference (Quirk. P. 265-286). Compare sentences 1 and 2:

1. A lion and two tigers are sleeping in the cage. (specific) 2. Tigers are dangerous animals. (generic)

The reference is specific when we have in mind particular specimens of the class “tiger”, the reference is generic when we are thinking of the class “tiger” without specific reference to particular tigers. The distinction between definite and indefinite, and between singular and plural , are important for specific reference.

USES of the DEFINITE ARTICLE.

The definite article is used to mark the phrase it introduces as definite, ie as referring to something which can be identified uniquely in the contextual or general knowledge shared by speaker and hearer. There are several ways in which the identity of the referent may be determined or ‘recovered’ by the hearer.

Immediate situation

general knowledge

Anaphoric reference:

Cataphoric reference

Sporadic reference

The ‘logical’ use of ‘the’

The use of ‘the’ with reference to body parts

extralinguistic situation 1

unique denotation - 3

direct: the noun head has already occurred in the text - 5

the modification of the noun phrase restricts the

reference to an institution of human society - 9

uniqueness of the referent is explained by appeal to the logical

“the” is often used instead of pronouns my,

reference of the noun - 7

interpretation of certain word

your, her, their, etc. - 12

which - or what-questions 2

the larger situation which speaker and hearer share - 4

indirect: inference from what has already been mentioned - 6

the whole phrase may have unique denotation -8

modern transport and communication - 10

- 11 first, same, only, sole, next, last, best, largest

1. The roses are very beautiful . /said in a garden/

Have you visited the castle? ?/ said in a given town/

Have you fed the cat? /said in a domestic context/

2. Have you fed the cat? /which cat?/

Aren’t the red roses lovely? /what red roses?/ 3. The North Pole the Equator the earth

the moon the sea the sky

the cosmos the Renaissance

4. the prime Minister the airlines the last war 1. Felicity bought a TV and a video recorder, but she returned the video recorder

because it was defective. 2. John bought a new bicycle, but found that one of the wheels was defective.

I lent Bill a valuable book, but when he returned it , the cover was filthy, and the pages were torn.

3. The President of Mexico is to visit China.

The girls sitting over there are my cousins. 8. The parents of Elvis Prestly, the height of Mont Blanc 1. My sister goes to the theater every month.

Did you hear the ten o’clock news?

What’s on the radio this evening?

10. Mary took the bus/the train to Landon. 1. When is the first flight to Chicago tomorrow?

This is the only remaining copy . 12. They pulled her by the hair.

My mother complains of a pain in the/her hip.

It will improve your tennis if you keep the back straight when you serve.

b. The use of the definite article with nouns in set expressions (Kayshanskaya, p.36-37):

it is out of the question, to take the trouble to do something, in the original, to play the piano, to keep the house, on the whole, the other day, on the one hand ... on the other hand, to tell the truth

USES of the INDEFINITE ARTICLE

The indefinite article in contrast to the definite article, makes no assumptions about an earlier mention. There are two possible uses of the indefinite article:

1. Non-referring uses of the indefinite article. The indefinite article is strongly associated with the complement function in a clause, or more generally with noun phrases in a copular relationship:

eg. Paganini was a great violinist.

We found Lisbon (to be) a delightful city.

Sometimes a/an is non-referring in a stronger sense; it may not refer to anything in reality at all: Leonard wants to marry a princess who speaks five languages.

2. The indefinite article and the numeral one. The indefinite article derives historically from the unstressed form of one, and in present-day English there are still many contexts in which this numeral is uppermost: a mile or two cf: one or two miles; a foot and a half of water cf: one and half feet..

1. the use of the indefinite article with nouns in set expressions ( Kayshanckaya, p 36):

in a hurry, to have a mind to do something, to flu into a passion, to get into a fancy to, in a low voice, a great many, a great deal, it is a pity (shame), as a result, to have a good time, to be at a loss, at a glance.

3. Phrases :

USES of the ZERO article1. The zero article compared with unstressed some.

a. with plural countable nouns b. with uncountable nouns

2. Phrases without article

a. some institutions of human life and society: be in town, be in bed, be in prison, go to hospital, be at school, be at church and etc.

b. means of transport and communication: travel by bicycle, leave by bus, come by boat, go by train.

c. times of day and night: at sunrise, by night, after nightfall, day by day, all day and etc.

d. seasons :in spring, in summer; winter is coming e. meals: stay for breakfast, have brunch, before tea, after dinner, for supper f. illnesses :appendicitis, influenza, diabetes, anaemia. g. parallel structures: arm in arm, face to face, day by day, hand in hand, eye to

eye, from right to left, husband and wife. h. fixed phrases involving prepositions: on foot, in turn, out of step, on top of, by

way of, set fire to, take advantage of

Uses of the articles in generic reference

1. The generic use of a/an picks out ANY REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER OF THE CLASS.

e.g. The best way to learn a language is to live among its speakers.

Generic a/an is therefore restricted in that it cannot be used in attributing properties which belong to the class or species as a whole. Thus: The tiger is becoming almost extinct. Tigers are becoming almost extinct.

2. The generic use of the zero article identifies the class considered as an UNDIFFERENTIATED WHOLE

e.g.: Cigarettes are bad for your health

3. a) with singular noun phrases it is often formal or literary in tone, indicating THE CLASS AS REPRESENTED BY ITS TYPICAL SPECIMEN

e.g.: A great deal of illness originated in the mind

b. with plural noun phrases when they refer to the people of a nationality or ethnic group : the Chinese, the English

a. with plural noun phrases with an adjective head referring to a group of people, eg: the unemployed, the blind, the rich

Literature: 1. B.A. Ilyish The structure of modern English. L., 1971, pp.49-58 2. Blokh M.Y. A course of theoretical English grammar. M., 1994 , pp.72-83 3. Rogovskaya B.I., Haimovich B.S. Theoretical English grammar . M., !967 ,

pp.214-217 4. Kayshanskaya B.L. and others The grammar of the English language. L.1967,

pp.25-47 5. R.Quirk S. Greenbaum G. Leech J. Svartvik A comprehensive grammar of the

English language. - Longman, London and New York 1994, 265-286pp. 6. Гатилова В.К. Методические рекомендации для самостоятельной работы

студентов по курсу “теоретическая грамматика английского языка”. Алма-Ата, 1993, С.48-59

THE MODAL WORDS

Semantic characteristics (meaning) Morphological characteristics (form) Syntactic characteristics (function)

As a part of speech the modals are characterized by the following features:

1. Their lexico-grammatical meaning of 'modality'.

2/ Their negative combinability

3 Their functions of parenthetical elements and sentence-words

Semantic characteristics:

'Modality' as a linguistic term denotes the relation of the contents of speech to reality as viewed by the speaker. When describing the meaning of 'modality' in the small group of modal verbs we are in fact dealing with lexical 'modality'. The 'modality' of the indicative, subjunctive and imperative moods is grammatical 'modality'. Now we are dealing with the meaning of 'modality' uniting a part of speech. This is lexico-grammatical 'modality'.

Modal words indicate whether the speaker is sure that the contents of his utterance corrrespond to reality or he doubts it or he regards it as something possible, probable, desirable etc Accordingly modal words can be divided into several groups .

a. Those which denote various shades of certainty: certainly, surely, of course, no doubt, assuredly, undoubtedly, indeed, really, etc.

b. Those which denote various degrees of probability: maybe, perhaps, possibly, probably, etc.

c. Those which denote various shades of desirability : happily, luckily, fortunately, unhappily, etc.

Morphological characteristics:negative

Syntactic characteristics:

1. Combinability. The relatively combinability of modal words manifest itself in various ways.

a. They are almost never used as adjuncts to some headword. b. They but seldom function as head-words to some adjuncts, mostly adverbs of

degree like very, quite, most, etc.

E. g... whom most probably they were compelled to respect. (Dreiser).

c) Their isolatability is greater than that of other words. They very often make response sentences.

E. g. But you can take a carpet to Caesar in it if I send one? — Assuredly. (Shaw).

Functioning as a parenthetical element of sentence, a modal word is usually connected with the sentence as a whole. E.g. Perhaps I shall never pray again. (Shaw).

Apparently, they were fully prepared for the coming of the visitors from England. (Tracy)

But sometimes it may be connected with a part of the sentence only. E. g. We worked that land for m a y b e a hundred years. (Daily Worker).

1. Function. The usage of modals depends upon the type of sentence. They are found almost exclusively in declarative sentences, very rarely in interrogative and almost never in imperative sentences. According to S. E. Kagan l there are 256 modal words in The Man of Property by J. Galsworthy. 250 of them are in declarative sentences, 6 in interrogative ones and none in imperative sentences. This fact can easily be accounted for. Interrogative and imperative sentences are used not in order to express one's knowledge of reality with various degrees of certainty or doubt. They are means of urging somebody else to say something or do something.

Literature: 1. B.C. Haimovich, B.I. Rogovskaya A course in English grammar. Moscow

1967., pp.203-204

THE PARTICLE

Semantic properties (Meaning ) Morphological properties (form) Syntactic properties Three views The particle notTo include a word in the class of particles we must find out whether it has the characteristic features of particles which we have described in our general survey of parts of speech, and we should not apply any other criteria. We shall not inquire whether the word has one syllable, or two, or many; this phonetic quality of a word is irrelevant to its grammatical status: just as, for example, a preposition may have one syllable (of, to) or four (notwithstanding) a particle may have one syllable (just) or four (exclusively). Thus the diminutive suffix -icie should not be taken to refer to the length of the word.In dealing with particles, we will limit ourselves to the grammatical side of the matter. We will not discuss either their meanings, which belong to the sphere of lexicology, nor the morphemes making them up, which should be considered in the theory of word-building.The particle as a part of speech is characterized by the following features:1. Its lexico-grammatical meaning of 'emphatic specification'.2. Its unilateral combinability with words of different classes, groups of words, even clauses. 3. Its function of a specifier .Semantic properties meaning:When speaking of particles in our review of parts of speech we have noted already that they usually refer to the word (or, sometimes, phrase) immediately following and give special prominence to the notion expressed by this word (or phrase), or single it out in some other way, depending on the meaning of the particle. As we know, the definitions of the lexico-grammatical meanings of parts of speech are not general enough. With particles it is, probably, more so than elsewhere because they are less uniform.In most of them the meaning of 'emphatic specification' is quite obvious. Only sixteen hundred talents, Pothius. (Shaw). Why, man, Ireland was peopled ] ust as England was. (Ib.). / never thought of that then. (Ib.). / notice that there is but one chair in it. (Ib.). But there are particles in whose meanings there is as much 'emphatic specification' as there is 'action' in the verb belong or 'substance' in the noun faith. There are, for instance, the connective particles also, too, else, either 1. They seem to resemble the conjunction and lexically, but their properties are different. Compare, for instance, the particle too and the conjunctions and, if in the following sentence. / / life is dull, you can be dull too, a n d no harm is done. (Shaw). Different lexically, the conjunctions if, and have the same lexico-grammatical meaning of 'relations between...' in accordance with which each of them shows

the relation between two clauses without interfering lexically with their content. The particle too in fact 'specifies' the pronoun you (you too can be dull), but as a condition of that specification it requires, in accordance with its lexical meaning, that the content of the clause, of which the specified word is part, should be similar to the content of the previous clause. Thus it connects the two clauses lexically. So, according to their meaning particles fall under the following main groups: Limiting particles: only, just, but, alone, solely, merely, barely, etc. Intensifying particles: simply, still, just, yet, all, but, only, quite, even, etc. Connecting particles: too, also. Negative particles: not, never. Morphological properties (form): Particles have no grammatical categories, no typical stem-building elements. As far as their structure is concerned, they may be simp1e (just, still, yet, even, else), derivative (merely, simply, alone), compound (also). Very few particles (else, merely, solely) are not homonymous with other words. Most of them are identical in form with adverbs (exactly, precisely, simply, never, still), adjectives (even, right, just, only), pronouns (all, either), conjunctions (but), articles (the). Syntactic properties Combinability: As a rule, the combinability of particles is unilateral and variable. They can specify different classes of words or clauses. Most of them precede the unit they specify, but some particles follow it, as in the case of too. Here are a few illus trations of the combinability of the particle only. By George, if she o n I y knew that two men were talking about her like this! (Shaw). A sestertius is only worth a loaf of bread. (Ib.). You look only f i ft y in it. (Ib.). Is it nothing to you what wicked thing you do if o n I y you do it like a g e n t I e m a n? (Ib.). Function: Like most particles not can be used with different classes of words or clauses (not he, not the student, not beautiful, not forty, not yesterday, not to see. not seeing, not when he comes). Sometimes a particle occupies a different position in the sentence. The question of the place of a particle in sentence structure remains unsolved. It would appear that the following three solutions are possible: (1) a particle is a separate secondary member of the sentence, which should be given a special name; (2) a particle is an element in the part of the sentence which is formed by the word (or phrase) to which the particle refers (thus the particle may be an element of the subject, predicate, object, etc.); (3) a particle neither makes up a special part of the sentence, nor is it an element in any part of the sentence; it stands outside the structure of the sentence and must be neglected when analysis of a sentence is given. Each of these three views entails some difficulties and none of can be proved to be the correct one. The view that a particle is a part of the sentence by itself makes necessary to state what part of the sentence it is. Since it obviously cannot be brought under

the headings either of object, or attribute or adverbial modifier, we should have to introduce a special part of the sentence which ought then to be given a special name. The second view would be plausible if the particle always stood immediately before (or immediately after) the word or phrase to which it belongs. But the fact that it can occasionally stand at a distance from it (for example, within the predicate, while referring to an adverbial modifier) makes this view impossible of realization; compare, for instance, / have only met him twice. The last view, according to which a particle stands, as it were, outside the sentence, seems rather odd. Since it is within the sentence, and is essential to its meaning, so that omission of the particle could involve a material change in the meaning, it is hard to understand how it can be discounted in analysing the structure of the sentence. Since, then, the second view proves to be impossible and the third unconvincing, we shall have to adhere to the first view and to state that a particle is a separate secondary part of the sentence which ought to be given a special name. THE PARTICLE Not The particle not deserves special attention. It can, as is well known, be used in two different ways. On the one hand, it may stand outside the predicate, as in the following sentence: Not till Magnus had actually landed in Orkney did he consider the many difficulties that confronted him. (LINKLATER) It also stands outside the predicate in a type of so-called short answers, in which the negative is expressed by the particle not, if it is accompanied by a modal word like certainly, perhaps, or a phrase equivalent to a modal word, e. g. of course: Certainly not. Perhaps not. Of course not. ' Compare also: / am afraid not, I think not, etc. In these cases the particle not appears to be the main part of the sentence. Another use of the particle not is that within the predicate. In these cases it is customary to treat it as part of the verb itself. The usual way of putting it is this. The negative form of the present indicative, e. g., of the verb be, is: (I) am not, (he) is not, etc., or, the negative form of the present indicative, e. g., of the verb. Literature:

1. B.A. Ilyish The structure of modern English. L., 1971, pp.160-164 2. Blokh M.Y. A course of theoretical English grammar. M., 1994 , pp.39,

66-67, 72. 3. Rogovskaya B.I., Haimovich B.S. Theoretical English grammar . M., !

967 , pp.217--220 4. Kayshanskaya B.L. and others The grammar of the English language.

L.1967, pp219-221.

Notional parts of speech

The noun, the pronoun, the adjective, the verb, the adverb, the numeral are notional parts of speech as they

1) unite words of complete nominating meaning;

2) have specific morphological categories revealed in the changeability of forms, specific derivational affixes and

3) are characterized by independent functions in the sentence and peculiar combinability

2. Ilyish B.A. ThTHE VERB: MOODTHE INDICATIVE THE IMPERATIVE THE OTHER MOODS

The category of mood expresses the relation of the utterance to actual reality, presenting it as real, desirable, unreal, etc. The category of mood in the present English verb has given rise to so many discussions, and has been treated in so many different ways, that it seems hardly possible to arrive at any more or less convincing and universally acceptable conclusion concerning it. Indeed, the only points in the sphere of mood which have not so far been disputed seem to be these: (a) there is a category of mood in Modern English, (b) there are at least two moods in the modern English verb, one of which is the indicative. As to the number of the other moods and as to their meanings and the names they ought to be given, opinions to-day are as far apart as ever. It is to be hoped that the new methods of objective linguistic investigation will do much to improve this state of things. Meanwhile we shall have to try to get at the roots of this divergence of views and to establish at least the starting points of an objective investigation. We shall have to begin with a definition of the category. Various definitions have been given of the category of mood. One of them (by Academician V. Vinogradov) is this: "Mood expresses the relation of the action to reality, as stated by the speaker." ' This definition seems plausible on the whole, though the yords "relation of the action to reality" may not be clear enough. What is meant here is that different moods express different degrees of reality of an action, viz. one mood represents it as actually taking (or having taken) place, while another represents it as merely conditional or desired, etc.

It should be noted at once that there are other ways of indicating the reality or possibility of an action, besides the verbal category of mood, viz. modal verbs

(may, can, must, etc.), and modal words (perhaps, probably, etc.), which do not concern us here. All these phenomena fall under the very wide notion of modality, which is not confined to grammar but includes some parts of lexicology and f phonetics (intonation) as well. In proceeding now to an analysis of moods in English, let us first state the main division, which has been universally recognized. This is the division of moods into the one which represents an action as real, i. e. as actually taking place (the indicative) as against that or those which represent it as non-real, i. e. as merely imaginary, conditional, etc.

THE INDICATIVE

The use of the indicative mood shows that the speaker represents the action as real. Two additional remarks are necessary here. (1) The mention of the speaker (or writer) who represents the action as real is most essential. If we limited ourselves to saying that the indicative mood is used to represent real actions, we should arrive at the absurd conclusion that whatever has been stated by anybody (in speech or in writing) in a sentence with its predicate verb in the indicative mood is therefore necessarily true. We should then ignore the possibility of the speaker either being mistaken or else telling a deliberate lie. The point is that grammar (and indeed linguistics as a whole) does not deal with the ultimate truth or untruth of a statement with its predicate verb in the indicative (or, for that matter, in any other) mood. What is essential from the grammatical point of view is the meaning of the category as used by the author of this or that sentence. Besides, what are we to make of statements with their predicate verb in the indicative mood found in works of fiction? In what sense could we say, for instance, that the sentence David Copperfield married Dora or the sentence Soames Forsyte divorced his first wife, Irene represent "real facts", since we are aware that the men and women mentioned in these sentences never existed "in real life"? This is more evident still for such nursery rhyme sentences as, The cow jumped over the moon. This peculiarity of the category of mood should be always firmly kept in mind. (2) Some doubt about the meaning of the indicative mood may arise if we take into account its use in conditional sentences such as the following: / will speak to him if I meet him. It may be argued that the action denoted by the verb in the indicative mood (in the subordinate clauses as well as in the main clauses) is not here represented as a fact but merely as a possibility (I may meet him, and I may not, etc.). However, this does not affect the meaning of the grammatical form as such. The conditional meaning is expressed by the conjunction, and of course it does alter the modal meaning of the sentence, but the meaning of the verb form as such remains what it was. As to the predicate verb of the main clause, which expresses the action bound to follow the fulfilment of the condition laid down in the subordinate clause, it is no more uncertain than an action belonging to the future generally is. This brings us to the question of a peculiar modal char-

acter of the future indicative, as distinct from the present or past indicative. In the sentence // he was there I did not see him the action of the main clause is stated as certain, in spite of the fact that the subordinate clause is introduced by if and, consequently, its action is hypothetical. The meaning of the plain clause cannot be affected by this, apparently because the past has a firmer meaning of reality than the future. On the whole, then, the hypothetical meaning attached to clauses introduced by if is no objection to the meaning of the indicative as a verbal category.

THE IMPERATIVE

The imperative mood in English is represented by one form only, viz. come(!'}, without any suffix or ending.It differs from all other moods in several important points. It has no person, number, tense, .or, aspect distinctions.and. which is the main thing, it is limited in its use to one type of sentence only, viz. Imperative sentences.Most usually a verb in the imperative has no pronoun acting as subject. However, the pronoun may be used in emotional speech, as in the following example: "But, Tessie— he pleaded, going towards her. "You leave me alone!" she cried out loudly. (E. CALDWELL) These are essential peculiarities distinguishing the imperative, and they have given rise to doubts as to whether the imperative can be numbered among the moods at all. This of course depends on what we mean by mood. If we accept the definition of mood given above there would seem to be no ground to deny that the imperative is a mood. The definition does not say anything about the possibility of using a form belonging to a modal category in one or more types of sentences: that syntactical problem is not a problem of defining mood. If we were to define mood (and, indeed, the other verbal categories) in terms of syntactical use, and to mention the ability of being used in various types of sentences as prerequisite for a category to be acknowledged as mood, things would indeed be different and the imperative would have to go. Such a view is possible but it has not so far been developed by any scholar and until that is convincingly done there appears no ground to exclude the imperative. A serious difficulty connected with the imperative is the absence of any specific morphological characteristics: with all verbs, including the verb be, it coincides with the infinitive, and in all verbs, except be, it also coincides with the present indicative apart from the 3rd person singular. Even the absence of a subject pronoun you, which would be its syntactical characteristic, is not a reliable feature at all, as sentences like: You sit here! occur often enough. Meaning alone may not seem sufficient ground for establishing a grammatical category. Thus, no fully convincing solution of the problem has yet been found.

THE OTHER MOODS

Now we come to a very difficult set of problems, namely those connected with the (subjunctive, conditional, .or whatever other name we may choose to give

these moods. The chief difficulty analysis has to face here is the absence of a straightforward mutual relation between meaning and form. Some times the same external series of signs will have two (or more) dif ferent meanings depending on factors lying outside the form itself, and outside the meaning of the verb; sometimes, again, the same modal meaing will be expressed by two different series of external signs. The first of these two points may be illustrated by the sequence: we should come, which means one thing in the sentence I think we should come here again to-morrow (here we should come is equivalent to we ought to come); it means another thing in the sentence : we knew that he wants us we should come to see him (here we should come denotes a conditional action, i. e. an action depending on certain conditions), and it means another thing again in the sentence How queer that we should come at the very moment when you were talking about us! (here we should come denotes an action which has actually taken place and which is considered as an object for comment). In a similar way, several meanings may be found in the sequence he would come in different contexts. The second of the two points may be illustrated by comparing the two sentences, I suggest that he go and / suggest that he should go, and we will for the present neglect the fact that the first of thetwo variants is more typical of American, and the second of British English. It is quite clear, then, that we shall arrive at different systems of English moods, according as we make our classification depend on the meaning (in that case one should come will find its placeunder one heading, and the other should come under another, whereas (he) go and (he) should go will find their place under the same heading) or on form (in that case he should come will fall under one heading, no matter in what context it may be used, while (he) go and (he) should go will fall under different headings). This difficulty appears to be one of the main sources of that wide devergence of views which strikes every reader of English grammars when he reaches the chapter on moods.

Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M.,2000. pp.179-197 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L.,1971. pp.105-120

e structure of Modern English. - L.,1971. pp.120-129

THE NOUN

Classification of nouns Number Pluralia Tantum and Singularia Tantum Collective Nouns and Nouns of Multitude Case Mutual relartions of number and case

Noun - is characterised by the following features : semantically - it has the meaning of substance, morphologically - a) the category of number, case and gender, b) certain word-building suffixes, syntactically - a)performs the function of a subject, object, predicative, attribute, adverbial modifier, b) has specific combinability.

Classification of nouns: - on the basis of type of nomination - proper and common (Mary, sister) - on the basis of form of existance - animate and inanimate (dog, desk) - on the basis of personal quality - human and non-human (boy, fish) - on the basis of a qualitative structure - countable and uncountable (pencil,water)

The noun in Modern English has only two main grammatical categories, number and case. The existence of case appears to be doubtfuland has to be carefully analysed.

The Modern English noun certainly has not got the categoryof grammatical gender, which is to be found, for example, in Russian, French, German and Latin. Not a single noun in Modern English shows any peculiarities in its morphology due to its denoting a male or a female being. Thus, the words husband and wife do not show any difference in their forms due to the peculiaritiesof their lexical meanings.This category is expressed by the obligatory correlation of nouns with the personal pronouns of the third person. There are only several suffixes which show the gender : actor - actress, widow - widower.

NUMBERThe grammatical meaning of the category is oneness and more than oneness. Modern English, as most other languages, distinguishes between two numbers,singular and plural., The essential meaning of singular and plural seems clear enough: the singular number shows that one object is meant, and the plural shows that more than one object is meant. Thus, the opposition is "one — more than one". This holds good for many nouns: table —tables, pupil — pupils, dog — dogs, etc. However, language facts are not always so simple as that. The category of number in Englishnouns gives rise to several problems which claim special attention.

First of all, it is to be noted that there is some difference between, say, three houses and three hours. Whereas three houses are three separate objects existing side by side, three hours are a continuous period of time measured by a certain agreed unit of duration. The same, of course, would apply to such expressions as three miles, three acres, etc.

If we now turn to such plurals as waters (e. g. the waters of the Atlantic), or snows (e. g. " Daughter of the Snows", the title of a story by Jack London), we shall see that we are drifting further away from the original meaning of the plural number. In the first place, no numeral could be used with nouns of this kind. We could not possibly say three waters, от three snows. We cannot say how many waters we mean when we use this noun in the plural number. What, then, is the real difference in meaning between water and waters, snow and snows, etc.? It is fairly obvious that the plural form in every case serves to denote a vast stretch of water (e. g. an ocean), or of snow, or rather of ground covered by snow (e. g. in the arctic regions of Canada), etc. In the case of water and waters we can press the point still further and state that the water of the Atlantic refers to its physical or chemical properties (e. g. the water of tfie Atlantic contains a considerable portion of salt), whereas the waters of the Atlantic refers to a geographical idea: it denotes a seascape and has, as such, a peculiar stylistic value which the water of the Atlantic certainly lacks. So we see that between the singular and the plural an additional difference of meaning has developed. Now, the difference between the two numbers may increase to such a degree that the plural form develops a completely new meaning which the singular has not got at all. Thus, for example, theplural form colours has the meaning 'banner' which is restricted to the plural (e. g. to serve under the colours of liberty). In a similar manner, the plural attentions has acquired the meaning wooing (pay attentions to, a young lady). A considerable amountof examples in point have been collected by 0. Jespersen. Since, in these cases, a difference in lexical meaning develops between the plural and the singular, it is natural to say that the plural form has been lexicalized. It is not our task here to go into details about the specific peculiarities of meaning which may develop in the plural form of a noun. This is a matter of lexicology rather than of grammar. What is essential from the grammatical viewpoint is the very fact that a difference in meaning which is purely grammatical in its origins is apt under certain conditions to be vershadowed by a lexical difference.

Pluralia Tantum and Singularia TantumWe must also consider here two types of nouns differing fromall others in the way of number: they have not got the usual two number forms, but only one form. The nouns which have only a plural and no singular are usually termed "pluralia tantum" (which is the Latin for "plural only"), and those which have only a singular and no plural are termed "singularia tantum" (the Latinfor "singular only"). Among the pluralia tantum are the nouns trousers, scissors, tongs, pincers, breeches; environs, outskirts, dregs. As is obvious from these examples, they include nouns of two types. On the one hand, there are the nouns which denote material objects consisting of two halves (trousers, scissors, etc.); on the other, there are thosewhich denote a more or less indefinite plurality (e. g. environs'areas surrounding some place on all sides'; dregs 'various smallthings remaining at the bottom of a vessel after the liquid has been poured out of it', etc.). If we compare the English pluralia tantum with the Russian, we shall find that in some cases they correspond to each other (e. g., trousers — брюки, scissors — ножницы, environs — окрестности, etc.), while in others they do not (деньги — money, etc.). This seems to depend on a different view of the objects in question reflected by the English and the Russian language respectively.

The reason why a given object is denoted by a plurale tantum noun in this or that language is not always quite clear. Close to this group of pluralia tantum nouns are also some names; of sciences, e. g. mathematics, physics, phonetics, also politics, and some names of diseases, e. g. measles, mumps, rickets. The reason for this seems to be that, for example, mathematics embrace a wholeseries of various scientific disciplines, and measles are accompanied by the appearance of a number of separate inflamed spots on the skin (rash). However, the reasons are less obvious in the case of phonetics, for instance. Now, it is typical of English that some of these pluralia tantum may, as it were, cease to be plural. Theymay occasionally, or even regularly, be accompanied by the indefinite article, and if they are the subject of a sentence the predicateverb may stand in the singular. This way of treating pluralia tantum, which would be unthinkable in Russian, is of course connected with the structure of English as a whole. The possibility of treating a plural form as if it were singular is also seen in the use of the phrase the United Nations, which may, when it is the subject of a sentence, have the predicate verb in the singular, e. g. the United Nations is a world organization. Examples of a phrase including a noun in the plural being modified by a pronoun in the singular and thus shown to be apprehended as a singular are by no means rare. Here are a few typical examples. / myself still wonder at that six weeks of calm madness. (CARY) The unity of the period of time, measured in the usual units of months, weeks, and days, is thus brought out very clearly. Bessie, daring that twenty-four hours, had spent a nightwith Alice and a day with Muriel... (CARY) The unity of the space of time referred to is even more obvious in this example than in the preceding one; twenty-four hours is a commonly received unit of measurement of time (in Russian this would be expressed by a single noun—сутки). The variant those twenty-four hours would be inappropriate here, as it would imply that the statement wasreferring to every single hour of the twenty-four taken separately. This way of showing the unity of a certain quantity of space or time by modifying the phrase in question by a pronoun in the singular, and also (if the phrase be the subject of the sentence) by using the predicate verb in the singular, appears to be a very common thing in present-day English. The direct opposite of pluralia tantum are the singularia tantum, i. e. the nouns which have no plural form. Among these wemust first note some nouns denoting material substance, such as milk, butter, quicksilver, etc., and also names of abstract notions,such as peace, usefulness, incongruity, etc. Nouns of this kind express notions which are, strictly speaking, outside the sphere of number: e. g. milk, or fluency. But in the morphological and syntactical system of the English language a noun cannot stand outside the category of number. If the noun is the subject of a sentence, the predicate verb (if it is in the present tense) will have to be either singular or plural. With the nouns just mentioned the predicate verb is always singular. This is practically the only externalsign (alongside of the absence of a plural inflection in the noun itself) which definitely shows the noun to be singular. Some nouns denoting substance, or material, may have a plural form, if they are used to denote either an object made of the material or a special kind of substance, or an object exhibiting the quality denoted by the noun. Thus, the noun wine, as well as the

noun milk, denotes a certain substance, but it has a plural form wines used to denote several special kinds of wine. The noun iron, as well as the noun quicksilver, denotes a metal, but it may be used in theplural if it denotes several objects made of that metal (утюги).The noun beauty, as well as the noun ugliness, denotes a certainquality presented as an object, but it may be used in the plural to denote objects exhibiting that quality, e. g. the beauties of nature;His daughters were all beauties. Many more examples of a similarkind might be found. Accordingly, the nouns wine, iron, and beautycannot be called singularia tantum, although in their chief application they no more admit of a plural form than milk, quicksilver,or ugliness.

Collective Nouns and Nouns of MultitudeCertain nouns denoting groups of human beings (family, government, party, clergy, etc.) and also of animals (cattle, poultry, etc.) can be used in two different ways: either they are taken to denote the group as a whole, and in that case they are treated as singulars, and usually termed "collective nouns" (in a restricted sense of the term); or else they are taken to denote the group as consisting of a certain number of individual human beings (or animals), and in that case they are usually termed "nouns of multitude".The difference between the two applications of such nouns may be briefly exemplified by a pair of examples: My family is small and My family are good speakers It is quite obvious here that inthe one sentence the characteristic "small" applies to the family as a whole, while in the other sentence the characteristic "good speakers" applies to every single member of the family ("everyone of them is a good speaker" is what is meant, but certainly not "everyone of them is small"). The same consideration would also apply to such sentences as The cattle were grazing in the field, itis also quite lossible to say, Many cattle were grazing in the field, where the use of many (not much) clearly shows that cattle is apprehended as a plural. The following bit of dialogue is curious, as the noun board which is the subject of the first sentence, is here connected with a predicate verb in the singular, but is replaced by a plural pronoun in the second sentence: "Does the Board know of this?" "Yes," said John, "they fully approve the scheme." (A. WILSON) With the noun people the process seems to have gone further than with any other noun of this kind. There is, on the one hand, the noun people, singular, with its plural peoples (meaning 'nations'), and there is, on the other hand, the noun people apprehended asa plural (There were fifty people in the hall) and serving as a kindof plural to the noun person (There was only one person in the hall). People can of course be modified by the words many and few and by cardinal numerals (twenty people).In the following sentence the word people is even modified by the phrase attribute one or two, although the numeral one in itself could not possibly be an attribute to the noun people in this sense:the phrase One or two people looked at him curiously, but no one said anything. (A. WILSON) Strictly speaking we might expect one man or two people, however, this variant does not appear to be used anywhere. The perfect possibility of the phrase two people appears to be sufficient ground for making the phrase one or two people possible as well. Recently a peculiar view of the category of number was put forward by A. Isachenko. According to this. view, the essential meaning of the category (in nouns) is not that of quantity, but of discreteness (расчлененность). The plural, in this view, expresses

fundamentally the notion of something consisting of distinguishable parts, and the meaning of quantity in the usual sense would then appear to be a result of combining the fundamental meaning of the category as such with the lexical meaning of the noun used in the plural. Thus, in scissors the category of plural number, which, in Isachenko's view, expresses discreteness, combines with the lexical meaning of the noun, which denotes an object consisting of two halves, whereas in houses the same meaning of the grammatical category combines with the lexical meaning of the noun, which denotes separate objects- not coalescing together, as in the case of scissors. Accordingly, the resulting meaning is that of anumber of separate objects, i. e. the plural number in the usual sense of the term. These views put forward by A. Isachenko throw a new light on the problem of number in nouns and certainly deserve close attention. It is yet too early to say whether they can provide a final solution to the complex problem of number in nouns.

CASECase is the category of noun expressing relation between the thing denoted by the noun and other things. The problem of case in Modern English nouns is one of the most vexed problems in English grammar. This can be seen from the fact that views on the subject differ widely. The most usual view is that English nouns have two cases: a common case (e. g. father) and a genitive (or possessive) case (e. g. father's). Side by side with this view there are a number of other views, which can be roughly classified into two main groups: (1) the number of cases in English is more than two, (2) there are no cases at all in English nouns. The first of these can again be subdivided into the views that the number of cases in English nouns is three, or four, or five, or even an indefinite quantity. Among those who hold that there are no cases in English nouns there is again a variety of opinions as to the relations between the forms father and father's, etc.Before embarking on a detailed study of the whole problem it is advisable to take a look at the essence of the notion of case. It is more than likely that part, at least, of the discussions and misunderstandings are due to a difference in the interpretation of case as a grammatical category. It seems therefore necessary to give as clear and unambiguous a definition of case as we can. Case is the category of a noun expressing relations between the thing denoted by the noun and other things, or properties, or actions, and manifested by some formal sign in the noun itself. This sign is almostalways an inflection, and it may also be a "zero" sign, i. e. The absence of any sign шау be significant as distinguishing one particular case from another. It is obvious that the minimum number of cases in a given language system is two, since the existence оftwo correlated elements at least is needed to establish a category (In a similar way, to establish the category of tense in verbs, at least two tenses are needed, to establish the category of mood two moods, etc.). Thus case is part of the morphological system of a language.Approaching the problem of case in English nouns from this angle, we will not recognize any cases expressed by non-morphological means. It will be therefore impossible to accept the theories of those who hold that case may also be expressed by prepositions (i. e. by the phrase "preposition + noun") or by word order. Such views have indeed been propounded by some scholars, mainly Germans. Thus, it

is the view of Max Deutschbein that Modern English nouns have four cases, viz. nominative, genitive, dative and accusative, of which the genitive can be -expressed by the -s inflection and by the preposition of, the dative by the preposition to and also by word order, and the accusative is stinguished from the dative by word order alone. It should be recognized that once we admit prepositions, or word order, or indeed any non-morphological means of expressing case, the number of cases is bound to grow indefinitely. Thus, if we admit that of the pen is a genitive case, and to the pen a dative case, there would seem no reason to deny that with the pen is an instrumental case, in the pen a locative case, etc., etc. Thus the number of cases in Modern English nouns would become indefinitely large. This indeed is the conclusion Academician I. I. Meshchaninov arrived at. That view would mean abandoning all idea of morphology and confusing forms of a word with phenomena of a completely different kind. Thus, it seems obvious that the numberof cases in Modern English nouns cannot be more than two (father and father's). The latter form, father's, might be allowed to retain its traditional name of genitive case, while the former (father)may be termed common case. Of course it must be borne in mind that the possibility of forming the genitive is mainly limited to a certain class of English nouns, viz. those which denote living beings (my father's room, George's sister, the clog's head) and a few others, notably those denoting units of time (a week's absence, thisyear's elections), and also some substantivized adverbs (to-day's newspaper, yesterday's news, etc.). It should be noted, however, that this limitation does not appear be too strict and there even seems to be some tendency at work to use the -'s-forms more extensively. Thus, we can come across such phrases as, a work's popularity, the engine's overhaul life, which certainly are not stock phrases, like at his fingers' ends, or at the water's edge, but freely formed phrases, and they would seemto prove that it is not absolutely necessary for a noun to denote aliving being in order to be capable of having an -'s-form. The more exact limits of this possibility have yet to be made out. The essential meaning of this case would seem to require an exact definition. The result of some recent investigations into the nature of the -'s form shows that its meaning is that of possessivity in a wide sense of the term. Alongside of phrases like my father's room, the young man's friends, our master's arrival, etc., we also find such examples as nothing could console Mrs Birch forher daughter" s loss, where the implied meaning of course is, 'MrsBirch lost her daughter'. The real relation between the notionsexpressed by the two nouns may thus depend on the lexical meaning of these nouns, whereas the form in -'s merely denotes thepossessive relation. Up to now we have seen the form in -'s as a genitive case, and in so far we have stuck to the conception of a two-case system in Modern English nouns. There are, however, certain phenomena which give rise to doubts about the existence of such a system — doubts, that is, about the form in -'s being a case form at all. We will now consider some of these phenomena. In the first place, there are the expressions of the type Smith and Brown s office. This certainly means 'the officebelonging to both Smith and Brown'. Not only Brown, whose name is immediately connected with the -'s, but also Smith, whose name stands somewhat apart from it, is included in the possessive relation. Thus we may say that the -'s refers, not to Brown alone, butto the whole group Smith and Brown. An example of a

somewhat different kind may be seen in the expression the Chancellor of theExchequer's speech, or the Oxford professor of poetry's lecture.These expressions certainly mean, respectively, 'the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer', and 'the lecture of the Oxford professor of poetry. Thus, the -'s belongs to the groups the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Oxford professor of poetry. The same of course applies to the groups the Duke of Edinburgh's speech, the King of England's residence, and many others. A further step away from the category of case is taken in the groups somebody else's child, nobody else's business, etc. Here the word immediately preceding the -'s is an adverb which could not by itself stand in the genitive case (there is an obvious difference between somebody else's child and, e. g., to-day's news, or yesterday's paper). The -'s belongs here to the group somebody else as a whole. It cannot, then, be an inflection making an integral part of a word: it is here part of a whole phrase, and, accordingly, a syntactical, not a morphological, element. Formations of this kind are by no means rare, especially in colloquial style. Thus, in the following sentence the -'s is joined on to a phrase consisting of a noun and a prepositional phrase serving as attribute to it: This girl in. my class's mother took us [to the movies] (SALINGER), which of course is equivalent to the mother,of this girl (who is) in my class. It is only the lexical meaning ofthe words, and in the first place the impossibility of the phrase my class's mother, that makes the syntactical connection clear.Compare also: . . .and constantly aimed to suggest a man of the world's outlook and sophistication... (The Pelican Guide to EnglishLiterature)The -'s is still farther away from its status as an inflection insuch sentences as the following: The blonde I had been dancingwith's name was Bernice something — Crabs or Krebs. (SALINGER); Inever knew the woman who laced too tightly's name was Mathson. (FORSTER) This is the type usually illustrated by Sweet's famous example,the man I saw yesterday's son, that is, the type "noun + attributive clause + -'s".Let us have a look at J. D. Salinger's sentence. It is obvious that the -'s belongs to the whole group, the blonde I had been dancing with (it is her name he is talking about). It need hardly be emphasized that the preposition with cannot, by itself, be in the genitive case. Such constructions may not be frequent but they do occur and they are perfectly intelligible, which means that they fit into the pattern of the language.All this seems to prove definitely that in the English languageof to-day the -'s can no longer be described as a case inflection innouns without, at least, many reservations. This subject has been variously treated and interpreted by a number of scholars, both in this country and elsewhere. The following views have been put forward: (1) when the -'s belongs to a noun it is still the genitive ending, and when it belongs to a phrase (including the phrase "noun + attributive clause") it tends to become a syntactical element, viz, a postposition; (2) since the -s can belong to a phrase (as described above) it is no longer a case inflection even when itbelongs to a single noun; (3) the -'s when belonging to a noun, no longer expresses a case, but a new grammatical category, viz. the category of "possession", for example, the possessive form father'sexists in contradistinction to the non-possessive form father. An essential argument in favour of this view is, that both the form without -'s and the form with -'s can perform the same syntactic functions; for instance, they can both be

subject of the sentence (cf. My father was a happy man and My father's was a happy life). Itshould be noted that the views listed under (2) and (3) lead to the conclusion that there are no eases in the Modern English noun. Though the question is still under discussion, and a final agreement on it may have to wait some time, we must recognize that there is much to be said in favour of this view. We will, then, conclude the discussion by saying that apparently the original case system in the English nouns, which has undergone a systematic reduction ever since the earliest times in the history of the language, is at presentextinct, and the only case ending to survive in the modern language has dveloped into an element of a different character —possibly a particle denoting possession.Different views have also been expressed concerning the scope of meaning of the -'s. Besides phrases implying possession in the strict sense of the term (my father's books, etc.), the -'s is also found inother contexts, such as my father's friends, my father's arrival, my father's willingness, etc. The question now arises how wide this scope may be. From this point of view it has been customary to point out that the relation expressed by the collocation "noun + + -'s + noun" is often a subjective relation, as in my father's arrival: my father's expresses the subject of the action, cf. my father arrives. This would then correspond to the so-called subjective genitive of inflected languages, such as Russian or Latin. It would, however, not do to say that the noun having the -'s could never indicate the object of the action: cf. the example Doughty's famoustrial and execution, where the implied meaning of course is, 'Doughty was tried and executed'. This would correspond to the so-called objective genitive of inflected languages. Now, though this particular use would seem to be far less frequent than the subjective, it is by no means impossible or anomalous. Thus it would not be correct to formulate the meaning of the -'s in a way that wouldexclude the possible objective applications of the -'s-formation.My father was a happy man and My father's was a happy life). It should be noted that the views listed under (2) and (3) lead to the conclusion that there are no cases in the Modern English noun. ' Though the question is still under discussion, and a final agreement on it may have to wait some time, we must recognize that there is much to be said in favour of this view. We will, then, conclude the discussion by saying that apparently the original case system in the English nouns, which has undergone a systematic reduction ever since the earliest times in the history of the language, is at present extinct, and the only case ending to survive in the modern language has dveloped into an element of a different character — possibly a particle denoting possession. Parallel use of the -'s-form and the preposition of is seen in the following example: In the light of this it was Lyman's belief and it is mine — that it is a man's duty and the duty of his friends to see to it that his exit from this world, at least, shall be made with all possible dignity. (TAYLOR) It should also be noted in this connection that, if both the subject of an action and its object are mentioned, the former is expressed by a noun .with -'s preceding the name of the action, and the latter by an o/-phrase following it, as in Coleridge's praise of Shakespeare, etc. The same of course applies to the phrases in which the object is not a living being, as in Einstein's theory ofrelativity, or Shakespeare's treatment of history. The -'s form can also sometimes be used in a sense which may be termed qualitative. This is best illustrated by an example. The phrase an officer s cap can be interpreted in two different ways.For one thing, it may mean 'a cap belonging to a certain officer',

and that, of course, is the usual possessive meaning (фуражка офицера). For another thing, it may mean 'a cap of the type worn by officers', and this is its qualitative meaning (the Russian equivalent for this is офицерская фуражка). Only the context will showwhich is meant. Here are a few examples of the qualitative meaning; it is only the context that makes this clear: if it were not for thecontext the usual possessive meaning might be ascribed to the form. She perceived with all her nerves the wavering of Amanda's confidence, her child's peace of mind, and she understood how fragile it was. (CARY)'The meaning of the phrase her child's peace of mind is in itself ambiguous. Taken without the context, it may mean one of two .things: (1} 'the peace of mind of her child' (the usual possessive meaning), or (2)her peace of mind, which was like a child's' (the qualitative meaning). Outside the context both interpretations would be equally justified. In the sentence as it stands in the text the surrounding words unmistakably point to the second,that is, the qualitative interpretation: the whole sentence deals only with Amanda herself, there is no question of any child of hers, so that the usual possessive meaning is not possible here. A somewhat similar expression is found in the phrase, a small cupid's mouth,which might mean, either the mouth of a small cupid, or a small mouth, like that of a cupid. The context also confirms that the intended meaning is the qualitative one. A special use of the -'s-forms has also to be mentioned, which may be illustrated by such examples as, I went to the baker's; we spent a week at our uncle's, etc. Yes, Mary, I was going to write toMacmillan's and suggest a biography... (GR. GREENE)

The older view was based on the assumption that the -'s-form was an attribute to some noun supposed to be "understood", namely I went to the baker's shop, we spent a week at our uncle's house, etc. However, this interpretation is doubtful. It cannot be proved that a noun following the -'s-form is "understood". It seems more advisable, therefore, to take the facts for what they are and tosuppose that the -'s is here developing into a derivative suffix, used to form a noun from another noun. This is also seen in the fact that the famous cathedral in London is very often referred to as St. Paul's. A historical novel by the nineteenth-century English writer W. Harrison Ainsworth bears the title "Old St. Paul's", and itappears to be quite impossible here to claim that this is an attribute to the noun cathedral which is "understood": if we were to restore the word which is supposed to be omitted, we should get Old St. Paul's Cathedral, where the adjective old would seem to modify St. Paul, rather than Cathedral, just as in any other phrase of this type: old John's views, young Peter's pranks, etc.

MUTUAL RELATIONS OF NUMBER AND CASEIn Old English, the notions of number and case were alwaysexpressed by one morpheme. Thus, in the Old English form stdna the ending -a expressed simultaneously the plural number andthe genitive case. That was typical of an inflected language. A change came already in Middle English, and in Modern English the two notions have been entirely separated. This is especially clear in the nouns which do not form their plural in -s: in the forms men's,children's number is expressed by the root vowel and the inflection -ren, while the -'s expresses case alone. But this applies to nouns forming their plural in -s as well. E. g. in

father s the -'s expressespossessivity, whereas the notion of singular has no material expression. In the plural fathers' the -s expresses the plural number,whereas the notion of possessivity has no material expression in pronunciation (in the written language it is expressed by the apostrophe standing after the -s). In spoken English the two forms may of course be confused. Thus, in the phrase [ 'boiz buks) is impossible to tell whether one or more boys are meant (in written English these variants would be distinguished by the place of the apostrophe: the boy's books as against the boys' books}, unless the context gives a clue. It is natural, therefore, that ambiguity is better avoided by using the of-phrase instead of the possesive, e. g. the opinions of our mothers, etc. Literature: 1. Blokh M.Y. A course in theoretical English grammar. - M,.2000. pp.48-61 2. Ilyish B.A. The structure of Modern English. - L.,71. pp.39-52 3. Гатилова В.К. Методические рекомендации для самостоятельной работы студентов по курсу Теоретическая грамматика английского языка. часть 1. Алма-Ата, 1993. сс36-40

Adjective as a part of speech

Definition Meaning (semantic property)

Form (morphological properties) Function (syntactic properties) Subclasses of the adjectives Qualitative adjectives Predicative adjectives The statives Substantivized (adjectivids)

Definition : The adjective is considered to be a part of speech as it has its own categorial meaning, form and function.Meaning (semantic property). The adjective expresses the categorical semantics of property of a substance. It means that each adjective used in the text presupposes relation to some noun, the property of whose referent it denotes, such as its material, color, dimensions, position, state and other characteristics both permanent and temporary. The semantically bound character of the adjective is emphasized in English by the use of the non-substitute “one” in the absence of the notional head-noun of the phrase. E.g. : I don’t want a yellow balloon, let me have the green one over there.

On the other hand, if the adjective is placed in a nominatively self-dependent position, this leads to its substantivization. E.g.:Outside it was a beautiful day, and the sun tinged the snow with red .

Subclasses of the adjectives

Qualitative adjectives denote various qualities of substances which admit a quantitative estimation. The measure of a quality can be estimated as high or low, adequate or inadequate, sufficient or insufficient, optimal or excessive, e.g.: an awkward situation - a very awkward situation , a difficult task - too difficult task, an enthusiastic reception- rather an enthusiastic reception, etc. Relativeadjectives express such properties of substance as are determined by direct relation of the substance to some other substance, e.g.: wood - a wooden hut, table -tabular presentation, history - a historical event. Predicative adjectives or The statives denote different states, mostly of temporary duration. E.g. : afraid, agog, adrift, ablaze. This class of adjective is problematic as it was first identified : I. as a separate part of speech in the Russian language by L.V.Scherba and V.V. Vinogradov. And was called the “words of the category of state” , which was later changed into “stative words”, or “statives”. B.S.Khaimovich and B.I. Rgovskaya criated their theory, explaining why it is a separate part of speech. 1. The categorial meaning of such adjectives is different - adjectives denote “qualities” and statives denote “states”, e.g.: But Johnny and Paddy were asleep, the rose-red grow had paled, bats were flying, and still the bathers had not returned. (Mansfield) Crearer said, "I'm afraid, General, we have to rely on the appeal of the leaflet." (Heym) 2. Statives are characterized by the specific prefix a-,e.g.: ablaze, afire, aflame, afoot, afraid, asleep, awake, etc. 3. The statives do not possess the category of the degrees of comparison, 4. The combinability of statives is different from that of adjectives as they are not used in pre-positional attributive function; 5. They are mainly used in the function of: A. a predic ative: 1."He is awake! " Sally cried. (Saxton)2.That was all right in the daytime, but while Alice was putting her to bed she grew suddenly afraid . (Mansfield). 3. When he got into bed, he was sure he'd never fall asleep, and yet he was dog-tired. (Wilson). B. Words of the category of state may be used as objective predicatives: She was saying that she intended to leave him entirely alone again. (Wilson) C. Words of the category of state may be sometimes used as attributes. But unlike adjectives they cannot be placed before the words they modify. As attributes they may be only used in post-position: The father dolls, who sprawled very stiff as though they had fainted in the drawing-room, and their two little children asleep upstairs were really too big for the doll's house. (Mansfield) II. Statives may be treated as a subclass of adjectives (Blokh M.Y.). 1. as the adjectives denote not “quantity” in the narrow sense, but “property” and formulates the meaning of the statives as “sative property” : the psychic state of a person (afraid, ashamed, aware) - cf/happy, curious, spondent, the physical state of a person (astir, afoot) -cf/ sound, refreshed, hungry, the state of an object (afire, ablaze, aglow) the state of an object in space (askew, awry, aslant).

2. Combinability - though the statives are not used in attributive position but like adjectives they are distinguished by the left-hand categorial combinability both with nouns and link-verbs. 3. Functions - the predicative and attribute like adjectives. 4. Degrees of comparison - the statives are capable of expressing comparison analytically, e.g.: Jack was the one most aware of the delicate situation in which we found ourselves. 5. Prefix a- is not a prefix of a special part of speech because some adjectives do not have any affixes at all but display the stative set as well: ill, well, glad, sorry, worth, due to and etc.(Blokh M.Y. 197-214)

Substantivized (adjectives) are divided into wholly substantivized and partially substantivized adjectives.

Wholly substantivized adjectives have all the characteristics of nouns, namely plural form , the genetive case, they are associated with articles: a native - the natives, a native’s hut. Some wholly substantivized adjectives have only the plural form eatables, valuables, ancients, sweets, greens. (Kayshanskaya, 50-51).

Partially substantivized adjectives acquire only some of characteristics of the noun ; they are used with the definite article. Partially substantivized adjectives denote a whole class: the rich, the poor, the unemployed. They may also denote abstract notions: the good, the evil, the beautiful, the singular, the plural. Substantivized adjectives are : a Russian - Russians, a German - Germans. Partially substantivized adjectives are: the English, the French, the Chinese.

Form (morphological properties):

Derivational features. The most important suffixes and prefixes are: -ful(hopeful), -less(flawless), -ish (bluish), -ous (famous), -ive (decorative), -ic (basic), un (unprecedented), pre- (premature). Among the adjectival affixes should also be named the prefix a-, constructive for the stative subclass.

Grammatical form. As for the veritable morphological features, the English adjective, having lost in the course of the history of English all its forms of grammatical agreement with the noun, is distinguished only by the hybrid category of comparison: primary, comparative, superlative. Only qualitative adjectives are capable of forming degrees of comparison, e.g.: a prettier girl, a quicker look, the most bombastic speech . However, there are two cases of contradiction: 1 - adjectives ,which possess such qualities which are incompatible with the idea of degrees of comparison, are incapable of forming degrees of comparison: extinct, immobile, deaf, final, fixed, etc. 2 - many adjectives considered under the heading of relative still can form degrees of comparison when the property of a substance can be graded quantitatively : cf. a mediaeval approach - rather a mediaeval approach - a far more mediaeval approach. In order to overcome the demonstrated lack of rigor in the definition the following additional linguistic distinction are introduced: “evaluable” and “specificative” . In particular , one and the same adjective, irrespective of its being basically relative or quantitative, can be used either in the evaluative or specificative function

Function (syntactic properties)

Combinability. Adjectives are distinguished by specific combinability with nouns in pre-position and occasionally in post-position; with link-verbs, both functional and notional, with modifying adverbs. In addition to the general combinability characteristics of the whole class are distinguished by a complementive combinability with nouns. The complement-expansion of adjectives are effected by means of prepositions. E.g.: fond of, jealous of, angry with, sick with, serious about, grateful to, mad for, etc.

In the sentence the adjective performs the functions of an Attribute and a Predicative, e.g.: I will be silent as a grave. (Predicative) I will be like a silent grave. (Attribute)

LITERATURE:

M.Y. Blokh A course in theoretical English Grammar M., 2000, pp.197-214 B. Ilyish The structure of modern English Leningrad, 1971, pp.58-66 B.B. Khaimovich , B.I. Rogovskaya A course in English grammar, M.1967, pp.

75-83 И.П.Иванова, В.В. Бурлакова , Г.Г. Почепцов Теоретическая грамматика

современного английского языка М., 1981 СС.34-39

THE NUMERAL

Meaning

Form

Function

Cardinal numerals

Ordinal numerals

Имя числительное ( по Ивановой И . П . и Бурлаковой В . В . ) With numerals, even more than with pronouns, it is difficult to keep the strictly grammatical approach and not to let oneself be diverted into lexicological considerations. 0.Jespersen has quite rightly remarked that numerals have been treated by grammarians in a different way from other parts of speech. This is what he says, "...the grammarian in this chapter on numerals does what he never dreamed of doing in the two previous chapters (those on nouns and adjectives.—B. I.), he gives a complete and orderly enumeration of all the words belonging to this class." 2

It seems therefore all the more necessary to stick to the grammatical aspect of things when dealing with this particular category of words. What, indeed, ought to be said about numerals from a grammatical viewpoint?

(Meaning )Semantically the numeral possess the categorial meaning of number.

(Form) Morphologically the numerals are, to all intents and purposes, invariable.

There are no grammatical categories to be discussed in numerals. There is no category of number, nor of case, nor any other morphological category. So there is only the function of numerals to be considered, and also possibilities of their substantivization.

(Function) Syntactically

The most characteristic function of numerals is of course that of an attribute preceding its noun. However a numeral can also perform other functions in the sentence (it can be subject, predicative, and object) if the context makes it clear what objects are meant, as in: We are seven. Of the seven people 1 was looking /or / found only three.

Numerals include two classes of words—cardinal numerals and ordinal numerals.

Cardinal numerals indicate number: one, two, three, four, ten, twelve, eighteen, twenty, thirty-three, seventy-five, ninety- one, a hundred, one hundred end forty-six, two hundred and twenty-eight, a thousand, three thousand and fifty-two, seven thousand three hundred and seventeen, etc.

Note 1. The numerals hundred, thousand and million are always preceded by the indefinite article а о the numeral one. The latter is generally used when these numerals are followed by some other numerals, e.g. a hundred but one hundred and twenty-three; a thousand but one thousand seven hundred and thirty.

Note 2. Care should be taken to remember the following patterns:

a) five hundred books (=500 books),

b) hundreds of books,

a) three thousand cars (=3,000 cars),

b) thousands of cars,

a) two million workers (==2, 0(0, 000 workers),

b) millions of workers.

In the examples under (a) the exact number of persons or things is given; in the examples under (b) hundred, thousand and million do not indicate any exact number but only a great multitude of persons or things.

As to their structure, the cardinal numerals from 1 to 12 and 100, 1000, 1,000,000 are simple words (one, two, three, etc., hundred, thousand, million); those from 13 to

19 are .derivatives with the suffix -teen (thirteen, fourteen, etc.); the cardinal numerals indicating tens are formed by means of the suffix-ty (twenty, thirty, etc.). The numerals from 21 to 29, from 31 to 39, etc. are composite: twenty-two, thirty-five, etc.

Note 1.—Twenty-two, thirty-five, etc. are spelt with a hyphen. Note 2. — In two hundred and twenty-three, four hundred and sixteen etc. there must be the word and after the word hundred.

Such cardinal numerals as hundred, thousand, million may be used with articles (a hundred, a thousand, a million)', they may be substantivized and used in the plural (hundreds, thousands, millions).When used after other numerals they do not take -s (two hundred times. Thirty thousand years etc). The word million may be used with or without -s (two million, two millions). When the word, million is followed by some other cardinal numeral only the first variant is possible; two million five hundred inhabitants.

The functions of cardinal numerals in a sentence.

Cardinal numerals are used in the function of subject, predicate, object, adverbial modifier and attribute (apposition).e.g.:

... the young man opposite had long since disappeared. Now the other two got out. (Mansfield) (subject) Earle Fox was only fifty-four, but he felt timeless and ancient. (Wilson) (predicative)

And again she saw them, but not four, more like forty laughing, sneering, jeering... (Mansfield) (object) At eight the gang sounded for supper. (Mansfield) (advfrbial MODIFIER)

Four men in their shirt-sleeves stood grouped together on the garden path. (Mansfield) (attribute)

“And he remembered the holidays they used to have the four of them, with a little girl, Rose, to look after the babies. (Mansfield) (apposition)

Cardinals are sometimes used to denote the place of an object In a series. Cardinals are used in reading indications: line 23, page 27S, Chapter X, No. 49. etc.

... but from the corner of the street until she came to No. 26 she thought of those four flights of stairs. (Mansfield)

Class nouns modified by a numeral in post-position are used without articles. e.g.: All he wanted was to be made to care again, but each night he took up his briefcase and walked home to dinner at 117th Street and Riverside Drive, apartment 12D. (Wilson)

Ordinal numerals indicate order: first, second, third, fourth, tenth, twelfth, eighteenth, twenty-fifth, forty-seventh, a hundredth, two hundred and thirty-ninth, etc.

Ordinal numerals show the order of persons and things in a series. With the exception of the first three (first, second, third) the ordinal numerals are formed from cardinal numerals by means of the suffix -th.

In ordinal groups only the last member of the group takes the ordinal form: (the) sixty-fifth, (the) twenty-third. Ordinal numerals are generally used with the definite article (the first, the fifth, the tenth, etc.). Ordinal numerals may be used with the indefinite article when they do not show a definite order of persons and things in series :"I've torn simply miles and miles of the frill," wailed a third. (Mansfield)

The functions of ordinal numerals in a sentence.

As a rule ordinal numerals are used as attributes.

"No, this is my first dance," she said. (Mansfield)

Almost immediately the band started and her second partner

seemed to spring from the ceiling. (Mansfield)

Note 1. Dates are read in the following way:1st September, 1944—the first of September (September the first),

nineteen (hundred and) fourty-four, 5th January, 1807—the fifth of January (January the fifth), eighteen

hundred and seven.

Note 2. Common fractions are read in the following way 2/3 = two

thirds;3/8= three eights; 5/12=five twelfths,

Decimal fractions are read as: 8.5= three point five; 4.76=four nni < seventy-six; 8.03=eight point naught three. row Function of cardinal and ordinal numeralsBoth cardinal and ordinal numerals can have certain functions of nouns (a) and of adjectives (b) in the sentence. e.g. a) Three of the schoolboys fell ill with scarlet fever. There were four of us there. "Will you have another cup of tea?" "No, thank youI've had two." There were three questions in the test. The secondwas particularly difficult. Jane was the first to wake up. "Which exercise would you like to do first?" "I thinkI'd begin with the third." b) We had three visitors that day. The first visitor to arrive was my aunt Milly.

LITERATURE:1. 0. Jespersen, The Philosophy of Grammar, p. 37. 2. M.Y. Blokh A course in theoretical English Grammar M., 1994, pp.38 3. B. Ilyish The structure of modern English Leningrad, 1971, pp.66-74 4. B.B. Khaimovich , B.I. Rogovskaya A course in English grammar, M.1967, pp.

92-96

5. V.L.Kaushanskaya and others Practical grammar of the English language Leningrad 1967, pp.70-73

6. И.П.Иванова, В.В. Бурлакова , Г.Г. Почепцов Теоретическая грамматика современного английского языка М., 1981 , СС.39-40

ИМЯ ЧИСЛИТЕЛЬНОЕ

В то время как существительные обладают всеми тремя признаками частей речи — морфологическими, синтаксическими и семантическими, а у прилагательных морфологический признак представлен слабее (1.3.3), числительные объединены только своей семантикой (см. 1.1.1). Они обозначают точное количество или точный по- рядок следования; соответственно, они подразделяются на количественные (one, two ...) и порядковые (the first, the second...). Словоизменительные признаки у них отсутствуют; синтаксически они могут занимать позиции, свойственные как существительным, так и прилагательным:

She might be thirty or forty-five. (Christie) Two Italian primitives on the wall. (Christie) She had not seen me for four days. (Snow)

Обе позиции в равной степени свойственны числительным; следует, однако, указать, что субстантивная позиция, как правило, связана с анафорическим употреблением: after a minute or two...

Количественные числительные могут употребляться неанафорически, если они обозначают отвлеченное число: Two and two is four.

В атрибутивной позиции количественные числительные обусловливают форму числа существительного: one day — two days.

Порядковые числительные, обозначающие знаменатель дроби, подвергаются полной субстантивации; они получают морфологическую форму множественного числа: two thirds.

Количественные числительные способны обозначать порядок следования, когда речь идет о годах, страницах или главах книги:

in ten sixty-six; Chapter seven.

Отсутствие морфологических признаков, а также особых, только им свойственных синтаксических функций были причиной того, что некоторые лингвисты (Есперсен, Керм) не признавали за числительными статуса части речи, причисляя их к существительным и прилагательным. Однако, как мы видели, оба подкласса числительных способны выступать в равной мере в функциях, свойственных и существительному, и прилагательному; они имеют специфическую семантику, их объединяющую, и, наконец, у них имеется свойственная им словообразовательная система: для количественных от

двенадцати до двадцати — образования с суффиксом -teen, от двадцати до ста — с суффиксом -ty, для порядковых, начиная от пяти, с суффиксом -th. Количественные hundred, thousand, million являются числительными, когда они обозначают точное число: two thousand five hundred and ten. Омонимичные им существительные употребляются для обозначения большого количества приблизительно, не называя точной цифры, причем эти существительные выступают тогда в форме множественного числа: hundreds of people, by twos and threes.

P R O N O U N S

Introduction Semantical properties (meaning) Morphological properties (form) CASE PERSON GENDER NUMBER Syntactical properties (function)

Introduction Pronouns share several characteristics, most of which are absent from nouns. Their name implies that they 'replace' nouns, but it is best to see pronouns as comprising a varied class of closed-class words with nominal function. By 'nominal' here we mean 'noun-like' or, more frequently, 'like a noun phrase'.Semantically, a pronoun has a categorial meaning that of deixis (indication). It may be a 'pro-form' in any of the three senses illustrated in the following example

Margot longed for a bicycle, and at last (C) somebody gave (B) her (A) a brand new one

(A) It may substitute for some word or phrase (as one may substitute for a noun, and therefore be a 'pronoun in a quite literal sense)

B. It may signal, as personal pronouns like her do, that reference is being made to something which is given or known within the linguistic or situational context

C. It may stand for a very general concept, so that its reference includes the reference of untold more specific noun phrases somebody, for example, indicates a broad class of people including a girl, a man, a secretary, etc.

Subclasses of pronoun according to their meaning:

reciprocal demonstrative interrogative relative conjunctive defining indefinite negative

each, other, one another.

That

this

these

those

such

same

Who, whose, what, which.

Who

whose

that

which

as

who

whose

what

which

each, every, everybody, everyone, everything, all, either, both, other, another.

some, any, somebody anybody something, anything someone anyone, one.

No, none, neither nobody, no one, nothing

+ +

and

how much,

how many

- + and

how much,

how

many

that

- +

1.proper

2.distribu-tive

3. quanti-

tative

-

+ + _ - - + -

According to E.M. Gordon and I.P.Krylova emphatic pronouns have the same forms as reflexive pronouns - they are homonyms, but are used for emphasis, e.g.: You yourself told them the story. Indefinite pronouns are subdivided into the following groups: 1. proper some, any, no somebody, anybody, nobody, someone, anyone, no one, something, anything, nothing one, none distributive pronouns all, every, each, other, either, neither, both everybody, everyone, everything quantitative pronouns: much, many, little, few, a little, a few, a lot of, lots of, a great deal, a great many

Morphologically, some pronouns have characteristics that nouns have: CASE There is a contrast between subjective and objective cases for personal, possessive, interrogative pronouns, genitive case for reciprocal, defining, interrogative , indefinitepronouns: personal pronouns: she / her, I/me, he/him, we/us and etc. possessive pronouns: my, his, her, our, it, their ( genitive case) interrogative pronouns: who/whom, whose etc. reciprocal pronouns: each other / each other’s (genitive case) defining pronouns: everybody/ everybody’s , other/other’s (genitive case) indefinite pronoun: one/one’s, somebody/somebody’s and etc. (genitive case) According to the point of view of Quirk there are the following cases: 1.common case (someone) 2.genitive case (someone’s) However, the five personal pronouns /, we, he, she, they and the wh-pronoun: who have a further distinction between subjective and objective cases Table 1. Personal pronouns with subjective, objective and genitive case forms

Subjective I we you

he she it they

who

Objective me us you

him

her it them

who(m

Possessive determinative

my our your

his her its their

whose

independent

mine

ours

yours

his hers

its theirs

whose

PERSON. There is a contrast between 1st, 2nd, and 3rd persons for personal, possessive, reflexive pronouns: 1ST PERSON PRONOUNS I, me, my, mine, myself we, us, our, ours, ourselves 2ND PERSON PRONOUNS you, your, yours, yourself, yourselves The reference of these pronouns includes the addressee(s), but excludes the speaker(s)/writer(s). 3RD PERSON PRONOUNS. he, him, his, himself she, her, hers, herself it, its, itself ,they, them, their, theirs, themselves All noun phrases (except those having 1st and 2nd person pronouns as heads) are 3rd person for purposes of concord GENDER .

There are overt grammatical contrasts between (1) personal and non-personal gender, and between (2) masculine and feminine gender .Gender distinctions are largely restricted to 3rd person singular pronouns of the categories of personal, possessive, and reflexive pronouns, as shown in Table 2 Gender distinctions in pronouns:

masculine

he him his himself

PERSONAL feminine

she her her hers

herself

NONPERSONAL

neutral it it its itself

These gender distinctions are neutralized in the plural: they, them, etc. No pronouns other than those in Table2 manifest a masculine/feminine contrast, but the personal/nonpersonal contrast is also found in relativepronouns (who/whom contrasted with which) and in indefinite pronouns (somebody contrasted with something, etc). The 1st and 2nd person pronouns are inevitably of personal rather than nonpersonal gender. The choice between personal and nonpersonal gender is determined primarily by whether the reference is to a 'person', i.e. to a being felt to possess characteristics associated with a member of the human race. So defined, 'persons' are not only human beings, but may also include supernatural beings (the Deity, gods, angels, fairies, etc.), and higher animals. Exceptional uses such as it referring to babies and she referring to ships have already been noted. The occurrence of he and she in cases of outright personification is common in informal use: he may refer to a computer; she (or, for some women, he) to a car. In poetry and fiction (especially children's fiction) there are virtually no limits to the kinds ofobject which can be personified in this way. The choice between masculine and feminine pronouns is primarily based of the sex of the person (or animal) referred to: Fred looked at himself in the mirror. Freda looked at herself in the mirror. In recent decades, the use of he, him, etc. as an 'unmarked' pronoun when the sex of the referent is undetermined has been opposed, particularly in the United States, by those campaigning against sexual bias in language. NUMBER There are morphologically unrelated number forms, as in personal, possessive, reflexive demonstrative (this/these, that/those), defining (other/others) pronouns: singular : I , he, she, it, my, his, her, it, myself, herself, himself, itself, yourself, this, that. other. plural: we, they, our, their, ourselves, themselves, yourselves, these, those. others. as opposed to the typical regular formation of noun plurals girl/girls, etc. These special distinctions associated with pronouns are found most notably in the class of personal pronouns, which may be regarded, by reason of their

frequency and their grammatical characteristics, as the most important and central class of pronouns. Accordingly, it is to personal pronouns above all that we turn in exemplifying these characteristics. It is also worth noticing that the plurals of the 1st and 2nd person have a more specific meaning than do those of nouns. Except when it refers to, for example, collective authorship, we means 'I plus one or more other persons'; and, similarly, you with plural reference normally means 'you (singular) and one or more other persons, but not me'. But contrast of number is neutralized with you: in current standard English, only the reflexive forms yourself and yourselves preserve a distinction between singular and plural: Harry, behave yourself Harry and Susan, behave yourselves! Reflexive pronouns in general show number contrast in the manner of nouns. The suffix -self the singular changes, by the addition of a sibilant suffix, to -selves in the plural :

singularyourself

himself/herself /herselfherself itself

plural ourselves yourselves

themselves

Pronouns belonging to other classes, such as interrogative, relative, and indefinite pronouns, do not in general have number contrast. Exceptions are the demonstratives this/these and that/those, and the indefinite pronoun onewhen used as a substitute Other pronouns, like the corresponding determiners, are invariable for number. The pronoun both, like the predeterminer both, has dual meaning, but is plural for purposes of concord. Note [a] In the absence of a singular/plural distinction in the 2nd person pronoun, plural reference is sometimes indicated by lexical additions, e.g. you people, you boys, and you guys [b] The low-prestige plural form youse /ju:z/ is current in Northern American English and certain areas of Britain such as Liverpool and Glasgow In Southern AmE, by contrast, the singular/plural distinction has been reformed through suffixation of the originally plural form You-all (y'all /jo:i/) is widely used on all social levels in Southern AmE (always with a plural meaning by those to whom the form is native, although often misunderstood as a singular by outlanders) There is also a colloquial genitive ) alls /J3:lz/, as in I really like у all s new car ['your family's new car'] [c] You in earlier English was a plural pronoun only, and was restricted to oblique cases A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language R.Quirk, S.Greenbaum, G.Leech, J.SvartvikLongman, London and New-York 1994, pp.335-345 Syntactically, most pronouns function like noun phrases rather than nouns. They combine in only a limited way with determiners and modifiers. We can say, indeed, that most pronouns, being either definite or indefinite, incorporate their own determiner. Pronouns may perform several functions such as :

SUBJECT :1.We are convinced that the Government has made a grave mistake in imposing this tax. (personal pronoun) 2.’ Yours (sum of money) won’t come short of a hundred thousand, my boy’, said old Jolyon. (possessive pronoun). It’s all right, but I’d rather try my hand at brokerage, I think that appeals to me. ( demonstrative pronoun) Who , do you think, has been to see you, Dad? She couldn’t wait. (interrogative pronoun) ... when all is said and done. (defining pronoun) In the next house someone was playing the piano. (indefinite pronoun) Nobody seemed to know him well. (negative pronoun)

OBJECTI met him in the street. ( personal pronoun) ... he realized that she was making an effort to talk his talk, and he resolved to get away from it and talk hers. (possessive pronoun) In that moment of emotion he betrayed the Forsyte in him - forgot himself, his interests, his property - was capable of almost anything. (reflexive pronoun) Elizabeth and George talked and found each other delightful. (reciprocal pronoun) Tell me just how you did this. (demonstrative pronoun) ‘Who do you mean?’ I said. (interrogative pronoun) And Martin forgot all about it. ( defining pronoun) We’d have nobody to fight the war. (negative pronoun) Where is his home? He didn’t have any. (indefinite pronoun)

PREDICATIVE But I think that was him that I spoke. (personal pronoun) When he turned round again he saw Fleur standing near the door holding a handkerchief which the boy had evidently just handed to her. ‘F.F. ‘, he heard her say. ‘Fleur Forsyte - it’s mine all right. Thank you ever so.’ (possessive pronoun) When she came back she was herself again. (reflexive pronoun) The only honest people - if they existed - were those who said : ‘ This is foul brutality... ‘ (demonstrative pronoun) ‘No, who’s he?’ ‘Oh, he’s a Polish Jew.’ (interrogative pronoun) He just loved me, that is all. (defining pronoun) ..What he likes is anything except art. (indefinite pronoun) ‘Now, look here, Marian, this is nothing but nonsense. (negative pronoun)

ATTRIBUTE

1..... and while she rattled on, he strove to follow her, marvelling at all the knowledge that was stowed away in that pretty head of hers. (possessive pronoun) ‘I fancied you looked a little downcast when you came in ,’ she ventured to observe, anxious to keep away from the subject of herself. (reflexive pronoun) Not until moon and stars faded away and streaks of daylight began to appear, did Meitjie Brinker and Hans look hopelessly in to each other’s face. (reciprocal pronoun)

‘If that young fellow wanted a place, I’d give it to him,’ he thought. (demonstrative pronoun) ‘Which day is it that Dorloote Mill is to be sold?’ (interrogative pronoun) This is something more than genius. It is true, every line of it. (defining pronoun) We approved neither plan. (negative pronoun) ‘It’s anybody’s right,’ Martin heard somebody said. (indefinite pronoun)

DVERBIAL MODIFIER

1. If June did not like this, she could have allowance and live by herself. (reflexive pronoun)

Adverbs as a part of speech

The definition Meaning ( semantic property) Form (the morphological properties) Function (the syntactic property )

The definition: The adverb is a part of speech which expresses some circumstances that attend an action or state, or points out some characteristic features of an action or a quality. (Kayshanslaya , 204-205). This definition, though certainly informative and instructive, fails to directly point out the relation between the adverb and adjective as the primary qualifying part of speech. In attempt to overcome this drawback Blokh M.Y. defines the adverb as a notional word expressing a non-substantive property. This formula immediately shows the actual correlation between the adverb and adjective, since the adjective is a word expressing a substantive property. (Blokh M.Y., pp. 214-222)

Meaning (semantic property): Adverbs fall under several groups:

adverbs of time (today, tomorrow, soon) adverbs of repetition or frequency ( often, seldom, ever, never) adverbs of place or direction (inside, here, backward, upstairs) adverbs of cause and consequence ( therefore, consequently, accordingly) adverbs of manner (kindly, quickly, hard) adverbs of degree, measure, quantity (very, rather, too, nearly, almost, twice,

firstly) Three groups of adverbs stand aside : interrogative (where, when, why, who),

relative, conjunctive.(Kayshanslaya , 204-205)

Blokh M.Y. divides adverbs into qualitative (adverbs which express immediate, inherently non-graded qualities of actions and other qualities : bitterly, plainly), quantitative (words of degree - very, entirely, utterly, highly, awfully, dreadfully, surprisingly, comparatively, slightly, enough, ridiculously, hardly and etc.) ,

circumstantial (adverbs of this type may be divided into notional and functional. Functional include adverbs of time, place manner, cause, consequence. Many of these adverbs are used as connectives and question forming functionals -now, here, when, where, so, thus, how, why, etc. Notional include adverbs of place, time - today, shortly, recently, seldom, late etc.( Blokh M.Y., pp. 214-222)

Form (the morphological properties):

a. As to their structure adverbs are divided into simple (long, enough, then, there), derivative (slowly, likewise, headlong), compound (anyhow, sometimes, nowhere) , composite (at once, at last). Blokh M.Y. considers that composite adverbs differ in principle from the one cited above. The difference consists in the fact that their parts are semantically not blended into an indivisible lexemic unity and present combinations of a preposition with a peculiar adverbial substantive -a word occupying an intermediatery lexico-grammatical status between the noun and the adverb, e.g.:

The pale moon looked at me from above. The departure of the delegation is planned for later this week.

Of quite a different nature are preposition-adverb-like elements which, placed in post-position to the verb, form a semantic blend with it. By combining with these elements, verbs of broader meaning are subjected to a regular, systematic multiplication of their semantic functions. E.g.:

to give - to give up, to give in, to give out, to give away, to give over, etc.

The function of these post-positional elements is either to impart an additional aspective meaning to the verb-base, or to introduce a lexical modification to its fundamental semantics. E.g.: to bring about - to cause to happen, to bring down -to kill or wound. The lexico-grammatical standing of the elements in question has been interpreted in different ways. Some scholars have treated these words as a variety of adverbs (H.Palmer, A.Smirnitsky); others as preposition-like functional words (I.Anichkov, N.Amosova); still others, as peculiar prefix-like suffixes similar to the German separable prefixes (Y.Zhluktenko); finally some scholars have treated these words as a special set of lexical elements functionally intermediate between words and morphemes (B.A.Ilyish, B.S.Khaimovich and B.I.Rogovskaya). One fundamental idea is common to all various theories advanced, and that is the idea of the functional character of the analyzed elements. Blokh M.Y. classes these words as a special functional set of particles, i.e. words of semi-morphemic nature , correlative with prepositions and conjunctions. As for the name to be given to the words for their descriptive identification (“postpositions”, “adverbial word-morphemes”, “adverbial postpositions) we prefer the term “postpositives” introduced by N. Amosova.

Some adverbs have degrees of comparison: 1. If the adverb is a word of one syllable, the comparative degree is formed by adding -er and the superlative by adding -est. 2. Adverbs ending in -ly form the comparative form by means of more and the superlative by means most. 3. Some adverbs have irregular forms of comparison:

(well-better-best, badly-worse-worst, much-more-most, little-less-least)

Function (the syntactic property ):

a. Combinability: An adverb may modify verbs (verbals), words of the category of state, adjectives and adverbs, nouns:

Annette turned her neck lazily ( verb + adverb) And glancing sidelong at his nephew he thought ... (verbal + adverb) And now the morning grew so fair, and all things were so wide awake. (word of the

category of state + adverb) Harris spoke quite kindly about it. (adverb + adverb) She is very beautiful (adverb + adjective). (Kayshanslaya , 204-205)

Adverbs can also refer to whole situations; in this function they are considered under the heading of situation-“determinants”, cf. :

The woman was crying hysterically (an adverb modifier of manner, in left-hand contact combination with the verb-predicate)

Wilson looked at him appraisingly. (an adverbial modifier of manner, in left-hand contact distant combination with the verb-predicate).

Adverbs can also combine with nouns acquiring in such cases a very peculiar adverbial-attributive function, essentially in post position, but in some cases also in pre-position. E.g.:

The world today presents a picture radically different from what was before the Second world War.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, the then President of the United States, proclaimed the “New Deal” - a new Government economic policy.(Blokh m.Y., pp. 214-222)

b. The function of the verb is that of an adverbial modifier:

1. That is very good. (adverbial modifier of degree) 2. She is busy now. (adverbial modifier of time) 3. We shall meet here. (adverbial modifier of place) 4. She sings beautifully. (adverbial modifier of manner).

Adverbs, usually mixed up with other parts of speech.

Such adverbs may be distinguished only from the context.

Adverbs coincide with an adjective: fast, loud, late, wide : He rode fast. She waited long. The teacher always reads loud enough. She opened her eye wide.

Adverbs coincide with prepositions: after, before, since. Cf. : I shall speak to you after. (preposition). I shall tell you about it after. (adverb)

Adverbs coincide with conjunctions: when, where, but. Cf.: When did you speak to her? (adverb) When she returns, I shall go to see her.

The History of English grammars

Documents

Transcript of The History of English grammars