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1. DIFFERENT APPROACHES to the classification of the parts of speech., 5.…
1. DIFFERENT APPROACHES to the classification of the parts of speech.
WHY?
The attitude of grammarians with regard to parts of speech and the basis of their classification varied a good deal at different times.
1)
classical
(logical-inflectional)
ancient times = based on Latin grammar
all words were divided dichotomically into
declinable
and
indeclinable
parts of speech
indeclinable words
1) adverbs
2) prepositions
3) conjunctions
4) interjections
declinable words
1) nouns,
2)pronouns,
3) verbs and participles
4) participles
The logical-inflectional classification is
successful
for languages with developed
morphology and synthetic paradigms
,
BUT
it
cannot
be applied to the English language because
the principle of declinability/indeclinability
is not relevant for
analytical languages
.
2)
functional
the XIX century,
Henry Sweet
=> resorted to the functional features of words and singled out nominative units and particles
nominative parts of speech
1) noun-words (noun, noun-pronoun, noun-numeral, infinitive, gerund),
2) adjective-words (adjective, adjective-pronoun, adjective-numeral, participles),
3) verb (finite verb, verbals – gerund, infinitive, participles)
the group of particles
1) adverb,
2) preposition,
3) conjunction
4) interjection
Henry Sweet
failed to break the tradition and classified words into those having morphological forms and lacking morphological forms
, in other words, declinable and indeclinable.
3)
distributional
•
Charles Fries
=> to avoid the traditional terminology and establish a classification of words based on distributive analysis, that is, the ability of words to combine with other words of different types.
•
BUT
the lexical meaning of words
was NOT taken into account.
He introduced four major classes of words and 15 form-classes.
Three test frames formed the basis for his analysis:
Frame A - The concert was good (always);
Frame B - The clerk remembered the tax (suddenly);
Frame C – The team went there.
Number word classes
Class 1
words are words that can substitute for concert (food, coffee, etc.) and words that can substitute for clerk, tax and team .
Class 2
words are words that can substitute for was, remembered and went ;
Class 3
words are words that can substitute for good.
Class 4
words are words that can fill the position of there .
4)
complex
parts of speech are discriminated according to three criteria:
semantic, formal and functional
.
2)
The formal criterion
reveals paradigmatic properties: relevant grammatical categories, the form of the words, their specific inflectional and derivational features.
characterizing any part of speech we are to describe:
1) its semantics;
2) its morphological features;
3) its syntactic peculiarities.
1)
The semantic criterion
presupposes the grammatical meaning of the whole class of words (general grammatical meaning).
3)
The functional criterion
concerns the syntactic function of words in the sentence and their combinability.
LANGUAGE:
1) notional words
those denoting things, objects, notions, qualities, etc. –
words with the corresponding references in the objective reality
In notional words
the lexical meaning
is
predominant
.
2) function words, or grammatical words
those having no references of their own in the objective reality; most of them are
used only as grammatical means to form up and frame utterances
In function words
the grammatical meaning
dominates over the lexical one.
5. The ARTICLE as a functional part of speech. Articles as determiners, the theme and rheme markers, generalizers and concretizers.
The article is a
function word
, which means it has no lexical meaning and is devoid of denotative function.
Semantically the article can be viewed as a
significator
, i.e. a
linguistic unit representing some conceptual content without naming it
.
functions of the INDEFINITE article
1)
the classifying function
realized in the so-called
classifying utterances
. Their invariant sentence pattern is:
N + Vbe + N1
.
a)
structures with the verb “to be”
(This is a computer.)
b)
exclamatory sentences beginning with “what” or such
. (What a long story! He is such a nuisance!)
c)
sentences including an adverbial modifier of manner or comparison
(You look like a rose! She works as a teacher.)
2)
the indefinitizing function
realized when the referent of the
noun is not a real thing, but it exists in the speaker’s imagination only
.
Those are sentences containing modal verbs or verbs with modal meaning, forms of the Subjunctive Mood, Future Tense forms, negative and interrogative sentences. (I wish I had a home like you do. / Have you ever seen a living tiger?)
3)
the introductory function
to introduce it to the hearer
(e.g. fairy tales)
Once upon a time there lived an old man. He had a wife and a daughter. He lived in a small house
4)
the quantifying function
The indefinite article developed from
the numeral “one”
. The meaning of “oneness” is still preserved when the article is used with nouns denoting measure, like “a minute”, “a year” or “a pound”.
functions of the DEFINITE article
1)
the identifying function
When we speak, we may want
to point out to something that both us and the hearer perceive with our organs of feeling
.
5 ways of getting the information
: 1) see (Do you like the picture?), 2) hear (I believe, the music is too loud), 3) feel (The pillow is so soft!), 4) smell (What is the name of the perfume?), 5) taste (The soup tastes bitter).
2)
the definitizing function
The object or thing denoted by the noun is presented as a part of some complex.
The frame is a structurally organized system of images
. (The frame “classroom” includes a window, a blackboard and a door.). So
if both the speaker and the hearer know what classroom they are speaking of, the constituents of the classroom don’t need
any special concretization, and the indefinite article will be used.( I want to talk to the rector (even if you have never met the man).).
3)
the individualizing function
The object in question may be presented as
a unique thing with the hearer’s attention focused on its distinguishing features
, which are represented with the help of a particularizing attribute. The object is singled out from the class it belongs to. The particularizing attribute can be expressed by:
a)
adjectives in the superlative degree
(This is the easiest way out.)
b)
ordinal numerals
(I have forgotten the first word.)
c)
attributive relative restrictive clauses
(I need the book I bought yesterday.)
ARTICLE
1) The Use of Articles as
Determiners
The invariant function of all the articles is that of
determination
. Any human language has a system of devices used to determine words as parts of speech.
In analytical languages
, the article is
the basic noun determiner
.
In synthetic languages
, the same function is performed by
inflexions
.
2)
Theme-and-Rheme Markers
The theme
is
the information already known
, and
the rheme
is
the semantic focus of the utterance, the new idea that is being introduced
. An utterance where there is only the rheme
can’t be understood
.
EXAMPLE: “What about a wedding dress for Jane?” (three rhematic pieces of information)
1.Jane (you don’t know who she is).
2.Jane’s forthcoming marriage.
3.You have to take care of Jane’s wedding dress.
EXAMPLE: «Let me share something important with you. This is a table.» (contain the theme) = no sense
3)
Generalizers
The “referent”
is called
the object denoted by the word
.
1)
concrete
(I have a dog at home), if something is said about a concrete object or phenomenon,
2)
general
(The dog is man’s friend -- function: generalizer), if what we say is true for the whole class of objects.
The generalizing function can be performed by both
the definite, the indefinite and the zero article
.
The zero article
is used in
the plural or with uncountable nouns
(Iron is metal.).
When
concrete nouns
are used in generic sense, they are usually preceded by
the definite article
.
The indefinite article
may be used when two classes of objects are
compared
(A dog is stronger than a cat.).
4)
Concretizers
The generalizing function of articles is OPPOSED to that of concretization
.
The concretization function
is realized through some
specific functions which are different for definite, indefinite and zero articles
.
3. The PROBLEM OF CLASSIFICATION of FUNCTION words.
Function words
are words that have little lexical meaning or have ambiguous meaning and express grammatical relationships among other words within a sentence, or specify the attitude or mood of the speaker.
They signal the structural relationships that words have to one another and are the glue that holds sentences together. Thus they
form important elements in the structures of sentences
.
Function words
are words that exist
to explain or create grammatical or structural relationships into which the content words may fit
.
They are much fewer in number and generally do not change as English adds and omits content words.
2. COMPLEX APPROACH to classifying parts of speech: meaning, form and function. Notional and functional parts of speech
parts of speech are discriminated according to three criteria:
semantic, formal and functional
.
3)
The functional criterion
concerns the syntactic function of words in the sentence and their combinability.
2)
The formal criterion
reveals paradigmatic properties: relevant grammatical categories, the form of the words, their specific inflectional and derivational features.
1)
The semantic criterion
presupposes the grammatical meaning of the whole class of words (general grammatical meaning).
characterizing any part of speech we are to describe:
1) its semantics;
2) its morphological features;
3) its syntactic peculiarities.
LANGUAGE:
2) function classes (closed classes)
(function words, or grammatical words
1) determiners
2) particles
3) prepositions
4) conjunctions
5) modal words
6) interjections
those having no references of their own in the objective reality; most of them are
used only as grammatical means to form up and frame utterances
In function words
the grammatical meaning
dominates over the lexical one.
1) content classes (opened classes)
(
notional words
)
3) numbers
6) adverbs
4) verbs
5) adjectives
2) pronouns
those denoting things, objects, notions, qualities, etc. –
words with the corresponding references in the objective reality
In notional words
the lexical meaning
is
predominant
.
1) nouns
TROUBLE:**
migrate
from different parts of speech (*
up -- adverb, preposition (go up), noun (up and down
*
)
6. The problem of the ZERO article.
The zero article performs the same functions as the indefinite one.
The difference
is that the combinability of the latter is restricted to the group of countable nouns used in the singular form, whereas
the zero article combines with uncountable nouns and countable nouns in the plural
. (It was a large room with many windows. / The toasts were in champagne.).
There are situations where the zero article is used in its
specific functions
which are different from those of the indefinite article.
When used with the zero article,
the noun loses its general grammatical meaning of thingness to a certain degree
and
acquires the meaning of qualitativeness
. For example, the nouns “day” and “night” used with the zero article stand for “light” and “darkness” rather than time units.
4. Grammatically relevant CLASSES of FUNCTION words.
Function words
1)
determiners
a)
articles
: a, an, the
b) demonstratives: that, this, those, these
c)
possessive pronouns
: my, your, their, our, ours, whose, his, hers, its, which
d)
quantifiers
: some, both, most, many, a few, a lot of, any, much, a little, enough, several, none, all
2)
conjunctions
(and, but, for, yet, neither, or, so, when, although, however, as, because, before)
3)
prepositions
(in, of, between, on, with, by, at, without, through, over, across, around, into, within)
4)
pronouns
(she, they, he, it, him, her, you, me, anybody, somebody, someone, anyone)
5)
auxiliary verbs
(to be (am, is, are, was,were); to have (has, had); to do (does, did))
6)
modals
(may, might, can, could, will, would, shall, should)
7)
qualifiers
(some, both, most, many, a few, a lot of, any, much, a little, enough, several, none, all)
8)
question words
(how, where, what, when, why, who)
9)
demonstratives
(this, these, that, those)
Function words
are words that have little lexical meaning or have ambiguous meaning and express grammatical relationships among other words within a sentence, or specify the attitude or mood of the speaker.
They signal the structural relationships that words have to one another and are the glue that holds sentences together. Thus they
form important elements in the structures of sentences
.