Lecture 1(2): the scope of theoretical grammar.

LECTURE 1(2): THE SCOPE OF THEORETICAL GRAMMAR.

BASIC LINGUISTIC NOTIONS.

1.Theoretical grammar and its subject.

Man is not well defined as “Homo sapiens” (“man with wisdom”). For what do we mean by wisdom? It has not been proved so far that animals do not possess it. Those of you who have pets can easily prove the contrary. Most recently anthropologists have started defining human beings as “man the toolmaker”. However, apes can also make primitive tools. What sets man apart from the rest of animal kingdom is his ability to speak: he is “ can easily object by saying that animals can also speak Homo loquens” – “man the speaking animal”. And again, you, naturally, in their own way. But their sounds are meaningless, and there is no link between sound and meaning (or if there is, it is of a very primitive kind) and the link for man is grammar. Only with the help of grammar we can combine words to form sentences and texts. Man is not merely Homo loquens, he is Homo Grammaticus.

The term “grammar” goes back to a Greek word that may be translated as the “art of writing”. But later this word acquired a much wider sense and came to embrace the whole study of language. Now it is often used as the synonym of linguistics. A question comes immediately to mind: what does this study involve?

Grammar may be practical and theoretical. The aim of practical grammaris the description of grammar rules that are necessary to understand and formulate sentences. The aim of theoretical grammar is to offer explanation for these rules. Generally speaking, theoretical grammar deals with the language as a functional system.

 

2. General principles of grammatical analysis.

According to the Bible: ‘In the beginning was the Word’. In fact, the word is considered to be the central (but not the only) linguistic unit (одиниця) of language. Linguistic units (or in other words – signs) can go into three types of relations:

a) The relation between a unit and an object in the world around us (objective reality). E.g. the word ‘table’ refers to a definite piece of furniture. It may be not only an object but a process, state, quality, etc.

This type of meaning is called referential meaning of a unit. It is semantics that studies the referential meaning of units.

b) The relation between a unit and other units (inner relations between units). No unit can be used independently; it serves as an element in the system of other units. This kind of meaning is called syntactic. Formal relation of units to one another is studied by syntactics (or syntax).

c) The relation between a unit and a person who uses it. As we know too well, when we are saying something, we usually have some purpose in mind. We use the language as an instrument for our purpose (e.g.). One and the same word or sentence may acquire different meanings in communication. This type of meaning is called pragmatic. The study of the relationship between linguistic units and the users of those units is done by pragmatics.

Thus there are three models of linguistic description: semantic, syntactic and pragmatic. To illustrate the difference between these different ways of linguistic analysis, let us consider the following sentence: Students are students.

The first part of the XXth century can be characterized by a formal approach to the language study. Only inner (syntactic) relations between linguistic units served the basis for linguistic analysis while the reference of words to the objective reality and language users were actually not considered. Later, semantic language analysis came into use. However, it was surely not enough for a detailed language study. Language certainly figures centrally in our lives. We discover our identity as individuals and social beings when we acquire it during childhood. It serves as a means of cognition and communication: it enables us to think for ourselves and to cooperate with other people in our community. Therefore, the pragmatic side of the language should not be ignored either. Functional approach in language analysis deals with the language ‘in action’. Naturally, in order to get a broad description of the language, all the three approaches must be combined.

 

3. General characteristics of language as a functional system.

Any human language has two main functions: the communicative function and the expressive or representative function – human language is the living form of thought. These two functions are closely interrelated as the expressive function of language is realized in the process of speech communication.

The expressive function of language is performed by means of linguistic signs and that is why we say that language is a semiotic system. It means that linguistic signs are of semiotic nature: they are informative and meaningful. There are other examples of semiotic systems but all of them are no doubt much simpler. For instance, traffic lights use a system of colours to instruct drivers and people to go or to stop. Some more examples: Code Morse, Brighton Alphabet, computer languages, etc. What is the difference between language as a semiotic system and other semiotic systems? Language is universal, natural, it is used by all members of society while any other sign systems are artificial and depend on the sphere of usage.

 

4. Notions of ‘system’ and ‘structure’. General characteristics of linguistic units.

Language is regarded as a system of elements (or: signs, units) such as sounds, words, etc. These elements have no value without each other, they depend on each other, they exist only in a system, and they are nothing without a system. System implies the characterization of a complex object as made up of separate parts (e.g. the system of sounds). Language is a structural system. Structure means hierarchical layering of parts in `constituting the whole. In the structure of language there are four main structural levels: phonological, morphological, syntactical and supersyntatical. The levels are represented by the corresponding level units:

The phonological level is the lowest level. The phonological level unit is the `phoneme. It is a distinctive unit (bag – back).

The morphological level has two level units:

a) the `morpheme – the lowest meaningful unit (teach – teach er);

b) the word -the main naming (`nominative) unit of language.

The syntactical level has two level units as well:

a) the word-group – the dependent syntactic unit;

b) the sentence – the main communicative unit.

The supersyntactical level has the text as its level unit.

All structural levels are subject matters of different levels of linguistic analysis. At different levels of analysis we focus attention on different features of language. Generally speaking, the larger the units we deal with, the closer we get to the actuality of people’s experience of language.

To sum it up, each level has its own system. Therefore, language is regarded as a system of systems. The level units are built up in the same way and that is why the units of a lower level serve the building material for the units of a higher level. This similarity and likeness of organization of linguistic units is called isomorphism. This is how language works – a small number of elements at one level can enter into thousands of different combinations to form units at the other level.

We have arrived at the conclusion that the notions of system and structure are not synonyms – any system has its own structure (compare: the system of Ukrainian education vs. the structure of Ukrainian education; army organization).

Any linguistic unit is a double entity. It unites a concept and a sound image. The two elements are intimately united and each recalls the other. Accordingly, we distinguish the content side and the expression side. The forms of linguistic units bear no natural resemblance to their meaning. The link between them is a matter of convention, and conventions differ radically across languages. Thus, the English word ‘dog’ happens to denote a particular four-footed domesticated creature, the same creature that is denoted in Ukrainian by the completely different form. Neither form looks like a dog, or sounds like one.

 

5. Various theories related to Grammatic.

4.1. Aristotle. In his work “Ritorics and poetics” he made a description of all speech units like nouns_ adjectives and other. He also speculated on the difference of written and aural speech. Aristotle was the first to describe the syntactic structure of a sentence. This work of his laid the basics for what is now linguistic analysis.

 

4.2. Works on grammar were being written long before modern syntax came about; the Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini is often cited as an example of a pre-modern work that approaches the sophistication of a modern syntactic theory.[1] In the West, the school of thought that came to be known as "traditional grammar" began with the work of Dionysius Thrax.

4.2 For centuries, work in syntax was dominated by a framework known as grammaire générale, first expounded in 1660 by Antoine Arnauld in a book of the same title. This system took as its basic premise the assumption that language is a direct reflection of thought processes and therefore there is a single, most natural way to express a thought. That way, coincidentally, was exactly the way it was expressed in French.

Port Royal grammarians

The following ideas of the Port Royal grammarians are reflected in the XX-century generative/universal grammar as initiated by Chomsky (1957, 1965).

The fundamental feature of the Port-Royal view of language is the concept of operations in our minds in terms of ”conception”, ”judgement” and ”reasoning”.

 

(Graffi, 2001).

• The basic linguistic form is a sentence, called ”proposition” Attempt to reveal the unity of grammar underlying the separate grammars of different languages (Robins, 1997); to identify the unversal principles underlying the art of speaking (Harris and Taylor, 1989).

• The universalist foundation was human reason and thought (Robins, 1997)

• Language provides fininte means but infinite possibilities of expession con-strained only by rules of concept formation and sentence formation (Chomsky, 1966).

• A sentence has an inner mental aspect and an outer physical aspect as a sound sequence (Chomsky, 1966)

• Chomsky (1966) finds examples, like the treatment of explicative and re-stricted relative clauses by the Port Royal grammarians, to support the idea of deep structure and principles that relate it to surface organizationof the sentence.

• Deep structure consists of a system of propositions, organized in various ways, where an elementary proposition in deep structure is of the subject-predicate form (Chomsky, 1966). • Adverbs are analysed as elliptical forms of preposition-noun constructions; verbs are analysed as implicitly containing an underlying copula that ex- presses affirmation.

 

Moscow Linguistic Circle,founded in 1915. The members of the Moscow Linguistics Circle were interested in and also dealt with problems regarding language and linguistics. The sources on which its members` studies were based were Ferdinand de Saussure`s and Baudouin de Courtenay`s works. Due to historical background and events which occurred there (The October Revolution from Russia) the members of the Moscow Linguistic Circle were forced to leave Russia and to continue their activity elsewhere. Roman Jakobson and Nicholay Serghey Trubetzkoy fled to Czechoslovakia, where they joined The Prague Linguistic Circle.

 

4.3. Generative Grammar

The use of the term ‘Generative Grammar’ has become quite vague in recent years and nowadays comprises any Chomsky-derived linguistic approach to natural language. Initially, ‘generative’ meant that the description of the language is rigorous and explict in the sense that ”... it is sufficiently explicit to determine how sentences of the language are in fact characterized by the grammar”

(Chomsky, 1980).

1 One of the underlying characteristics of Generative Grammar is the view

that human beings possess an innate ”language faculty”. The faculty of language

allows children to acquire the mother tongue relatively quickly and easily. In this

view of grammar, there exist also universal principles common to all languages

and specific parameters which differ across languages. By Chomsky, when a child is born he is already aware of a certain language. His mind is set for a inner logic i.e- grammatical structure. Another argument by N. Chomsky is that it is difficult for the people of an old age to study a language because biological faculty weakens through age.

 

2. The notions of Deep (or D-) and Surface (or S-) structures are also central to transformational generative grammar. The central idea is the generation of D-structure of a sentence by phrase-structure rules and subsequently changing it to an S-structure by some transformations. However, in the current works of

Chomsky, e.g. Chomsky (1995), the D- and S-structures do no longer exist.

Chomsky (1966) ‘translates’/formalizes the ideas of the Port-Royal grammarians in terms of his Transformational Generative Grammar view. ”The base system consists of rules that generate the underlying grammatical relations with abstract order (the rewrite rules of a phrase-structure grammar); the transformational system consists of rules of deletion, rearrangement, adjunction, and so on.” (p. 42). Chomsky also states that the Port Royal grammarians are the first to develop the notion of phrase structures and to discuss the inadequacy of phrase-structure description of language, and to propose transformations.

Phrase-structure rules and Context-Free Grammars are now widely used in parsing natural languages. Transformations, however, have not been adopted for dealing with natural language syntax in computational linguistics. It is still worth mentioning the work of Stabler (1997) inter alia for syntactic recognition and parsing in the Minimalist Program framework (Chomsky, 1995).

 

4.4. Prague Linguistic Circle

The most important and valuable contribution of the Prague Linguistic Circle after the war was brought by Vilém Mathésius in the field of syntax namely the distinction, which he made between theme and rheme. He tried to surpass phonology and to study grammar, especially syntax. Vilém Mathésius approached and analysed the sentence from a functional perspective, he stated that the sentence has two parts: the theme and the rheme. By the theme of a sentence is meant the part that refers to what is already known or given in the context while the rheme is the part that conveys new information. Although this contribution represents the school`s last efforts to tackle and conquer another area of linguistics, syntax, Mathésius` work and terminology remained unknown and without echo in the world of linguistics. 1948 represents the year when Prague scholars went public for the last time. This is the year when the last lecture of the circle took place. It is also in 1948 when the school`s last representative works, Vodicka`s monograph “The Beginnings of Czech Artistic Prose” and the three-volume edition of Mukarovsky`s selected works “Chapters from Czech Poetics” were published.

The Prague Linguistic Circle greatly contributed to the way linguistics developed, by coining new concepts and theories by providing rich material for the following generations of linguists.

Their works and papers are widely consulted nowadays, Trubetzkoy`s “Principles of Phonology”,Roman Jakobson`s “Comments on Phonological Change in Russian Compared with that in Other Slavic Languages” (1929), “Characteristics of the Eurasian Language Affinity” (1931). The Prague School`s linguistics, theory and activity influenced and changed the character of the European linguistics. Trubetzkoy`s contributions were inherited and further elaborated by André Martinet who founds the functionalist school and develops functionalist linguistics. The new concepts and theories, launched by The Prague Linguistic Circle became key concepts in linguistics so happened with the concept of neutralization and the theory of markedness, which were inherited by generative grammar. It anticipated and supported the emergence of new movements in linguistics. Prague

scholars provided the first systematic formulation of semiotic structuralism. Semiotics emerged

from Prague Linguistic Circle structuralism. The Prague Linguistic Circle members were the first

to claim that literary history has to be based on literary theory and the first to develop a

comprehensive theory of literary history. Without the Prague School the image of the twentieth century structuralism and linguistics is incomplete both historically and theoretically. They brought innovations and contributions not only to the development of linguistics, but also to the development of phonetics, phonology and syntax.

Language and speech.

The distinction between language and speech was made by Ferdinand de Saussure, the Swiss scholar usually credited with establishing principles of modern linguistics. Language is a collective body of knowledge, it is a set of basic elements, but these elements can form a great variety of combinations. In fact the number of these combinations is endless. Speech is closely connected with language, as it is the result of using the language, the result of a definite act of speaking. Speech is individual, personal while language is common for all individuals. To illustrate the difference between language and speech let us compare a definite game of chess and a set of rules how to play chess.

Language is opposed to speech and accordingly language units are opposed to speech units. The language unit phoneme is opposed to the speech unit – sound: phoneme /s/ can sound differently in speech - /s/ and /z/). The sentence is opposed to the utterance; the text is opposed to the discourse.

6.Systemic relations in language. Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic relations. A linguistic unit can enter into relations of two different kinds. It enters into paradigmatic relationswith all the units that can also occur in the same environment. PR are relations based on the principles of similarity. They exist between the units that can substitute one another. For instance, in the word-group A PINT OF MILK the word PINT is in paradigmatic relations with the words bottle, cup, etc. The article A can enter into PR with the units the, this, one, same, etc. According to different principles of similarity PR can be of three types: semantic, formal and functional.

a) Semantic PR are based on the similarity of meaning: a book to read = a book for reading. He used to practice English every day – He would practice English every day.

b) Formal PR are based on the similarity of forms. Such relations exist between the members of a paradigm: man – men; play – played – will play – is playing.

c) Functional PR are based on the similarity of function. They are established between the elements that can occur in the same position. For instance, noun determiners: a, the, this, his, Ann’s, some, each, etc.

PR are associated with the sphere of ‘language’.

A linguistic unit enters into syntagmatic relations with other units of the same level it occurs with. SR exist at every language level. E.g. in the word-group A PINT OF MILK the word PINT contrasts SR with A, OF, MILK; within the word PINT – P, I, N and T are in syntagmatic relations. SR are linear relations, that is why they are manifested in speech. They can be of three different types: coordinate, subordinate and predicative.

a) Coordinate SR exist between the homogeneous linguistic units that are equal in rank, that is, they are the relations of independence: you and me; They were tired but happy.

b) Subordinate SR are the relations of dependence when one linguistic unit depends on the other: teach + er – morphological level; a smart student – word-group level; predicative and subordinate clauses – sentence level.

c) Predicative SR are the relations of interdependence: primary and secondary predication.

As mentioned above, SR may be observed in utterances, which is impossible when we deal with PR. Therefore, PR are identified with ‘language’ while SR are identified with ‘speech’.

GRAMMATICAL CATEGORIES.

1. The notion of ‘grammatical meaning’.

The word combines in its semantic structure two meanings – lexical and grammatical. Lexical meaning is the individual meaning of the word (e.g. table). Grammatical meaning is the meaning of the whole class or a subclass. For example, the class of nouns has the grammatical meaning of thingness. If we take a noun (table) we may say that it possesses its individual lexical meaning (it corresponds to a definite piece of furniture) and the grammatical meaning of thingness (this is the meaning of the whole class). Besides, the noun ‘table’ has the grammatical meaning of a subclass – countableness. Any verb combines its individual lexical meaning with the grammatical meaning of verbiality – the ability to denote actions or states. An adjective combines its individual lexical meaning with the grammatical meaning of the whole class of adjectives – qualitativeness – the ability to denote qualities. Adverbs possess the grammatical meaning of adverbiality – the ability to denote quality of qualities.

There are some classes of words that are devoid of any lexical meaning and possess the grammatical meaning only. This can be explained by the fact that they have no referents in the objective reality. All function words belong to this group – articles, particles, prepositions, etc.

2. Types of grammatical meaning.

The grammatical meaning may be explicit and implicit. The implicit grammatical meaning is not expressed formally (e.g. the word table does not contain any hints in its form as to it being inanimate). The explicit grammatical meaning is always marked morphologically – it has its marker. In the word cats the grammatical meaning of plurality is shown in the form of the noun; cat’s – here the grammatical meaning of possessiveness is shown by the form ‘s; is asked – shows the explicit grammatical meaning of passiveness.

The implicit grammatical meaning may be of two types – general and dependent. The general grammatical meaning is the meaning of the whole word-class, of a part of speech (e.g. nouns – the general grammatical meaning of thingness). The dependent grammatical meaning is the meaning of a subclass within the same part of speech. For instance, any verb possesses the dependent grammatical meaning of transitivity/intransitivity, terminativeness/non-terminativeness, stativeness/non-stativeness; nouns have the dependent grammatical meaning of contableness/uncountableness and animateness/inanimateness. The most important thing about the dependent grammatical meaning is that it influences the realization of grammatical categories restricting them to a subclass. Thus the dependent grammatical meaning of countableness/uncountableness influences the realization of the grammatical category of number as the number category is realized only within the subclass of countable nouns, the grammatical meaning of animateness/inanimateness influences the realization of the grammatical category of case, teminativeness/non-terminativeness - the category of tense, transitivity/intransitivity – the category of voice.

 

GRAMMATICAL MEANING

 

EXPLICIT IMPLICIT

 

GENERAL DEPENDENT

 

3. Grammatical categories.

Grammatical categories are made up by the unity of identical grammatical meanings that have the same form (e.g. singular::plural). Due to dialectal unity of language and thought, grammatical categories correlate, on the one hand, with the conceptual categories and, on the other hand, with the objective reality. It may be shown with the help of a triangle model:

Conceptual reality Conceptual category

 

Objective reality Lingual reality Objective category Grammatical category

It follows that we may define grammatical categories as references of the corresponding objective categories. For example, the objective category of time finds its representation in the grammatical category of tense, the objective category of quantity finds its representation in the grammatical category of number. Those grammatical categories that have references in the objective reality are called referential grammatical categories. However, not all of the grammatical categories have references in the objective reality, just a few of them do not correspond to anything in the objective reality. Such categories correlate only with conceptual matters:

Conceptual correlate

 

Lingual correlate

They are called significational categories. To this type belong the categories of mood and degree. Speaking about the grammatical category of mood we can say that it has modality as its conceptual correlate. It can be explained by the fact that it does not refer to anything in the objective reality – it expresses the speaker’s attitude to what he says.

 

4. The notion of opposition.

Any grammatical category must be represented by at least two grammatical forms (e.g. the grammatical category of number – singular and plural forms). The relation between two grammatical forms differing in meaning and external signs is called opposition – book::book s (unmarked member/marked member). All grammatical categories find their realization through oppositions, e.g. the grammatical category of number is realized through the opposition singular::plural.

Taking all the above mentioned into consideration, we may define the grammatical category as the opposition between two mutually exclusive form-classes (a form-class is a set of words with the same explicit grammatical meaning).

Means of realization of grammatical categories may be synthetic (near – nearer) and analytic (beautiful – more beautiful).

 

5. Transposition and neutralization of morphological forms.

In the process of communication grammatical categories may undergo the processes of transposition and neutralization.

Transposition is the use of a linguistic unit in an unusual environment or in the function that is not characteristic of it (He is a lion). In the sentence He is coming tomorrow the paradigmatic meaning of the continuous form is reduced and a new meaning appears – that of a future action. Transposition always results in the neutralization of a paradigmatic meaning. Neutralization is the reduction of the opposition to one of its members: custom:: customs – x:: customs; x:: spectacles.

LECTURE 5: THE NOUN

General characteristics.

The noun is the central lexical unit of language. It is the main nominative unit of speech. As any other part of speech, the noun can be characterised by three criteria: semantic (the meaning), morphological (the form and grammatical catrgories) and syntactical (functions, distribution).

Semantic features of the noun. The noun possesses the grammatical meaning of thingness, substantiality. According to different principles of classification nouns fall into several subclasses:

1. According to the type of nomination they may be proper and common;

2. According to the form of existence they may be animate and inanimate. Animate nouns in their turn fall into human and non-human.

3. According to their quantitative structure nouns can be countable and uncountable.

This set of subclasses cannot be put together into one table because of the different principles of classification.

Morphological features of the noun. In accordance with the morphological structure of the stems all nouns can be classified into: simple,derived (stem + affix, affix + stem – thingness); compound (stem+ stem – armchair) and composite (the Hague). The noun has morphological categories of number and case. Some scholars admit the existence of the category of gender.

Syntactic features of the noun. The noun can be used un the sentence in all syntacticfunctions but predicate. Speaking about noun combinability, we can say that it can go into right-hand and left-hand connections with practically all parts of speech. That is why practically all parts of speech but the verb can act as noun determiners. However, the most common noun determiners are considered to be articles, pronouns, numerals, adjectives and nouns themselves in the common and genitive case.

2. The category of number

The grammatical category of number is the linguistic representation of the objective category of quantity. The number category is realized through the opposition of two form-classes: the plural form:: the singular form. The category of number in English is restricted in its realization because of the dependent implicit grammatical meaning of countableness/uncountableness. The number category is realized only within subclass of countable nouns.

The grammatical meaning of number may not coincide with the notional quantity: the noun in the singular does not necessarily denote one object while the plural form may be used to denote one object consisting of several parts. The singular form may denote:

a) oneness (individual separate object – a cat);

b) generalization (the meaning of the whole class – The cat is a domestic animal);

c) indiscreteness (нерасчлененность or uncountableness - money, milk).

The plural form may denote:

a) the existence of several objects (cats);

b) the inner discreteness (внутренняя расчлененность, pluralia tantum, jeans).

To sum it up, all nouns may be subdivided into three groups:

1. The nouns in which the opposition of explicit discreteness/indiscreteness is expressed: cat::cats;

2. The nouns in which this opposition is not expressed explicitly but is revealed by syntactical and lexical correlation in the context. There are two groups here:

A. Singularia tantum. It covers different groups of nouns: proper names, abstract nouns, material nouns, collective nouns;

B. Pluralia tantum. It covers the names of objects consisting of several parts (jeans), names of sciences (mathematics), names of diseases, games, etc.

3. The nouns with homogenous number forms. The number opposition here is not expressed formally but is revealed only lexically and syntactically in the context: e.g. Look! A sheep is eating grass. Look! The sheep are eating grass.

The category of case.

Case expresses the relation of a word to another word in the word-group or sentence (my sister’s coat). The category of case correlates with the objective category of possession. The case category in English is realized through the opposition: The Common Case:: The Possessive Case (sister:: sister’s). However, in modern linguistics the term “genitive case” is used instead of the “possessive case” because the meanings rendered by the “`s” sign are not only those of possession. The scope of meanings rendered by the Genitive Case is the following:

a) Possessive Genitive: Mary’s father – Mary has a father,

b) Subjective Genitive: The doctor’s arrival – The doctor has arrived,

c) Objective Genitive: The man’s release – The man was released,

d) Adverbial Genitive: Two hour’s work – X worked for two hours,

e) Equation Genitive: a mile’s distance – the distance is a mile,

f) Genitive of destination: children’s books – books for children,

g) Mixed Group: yesterday’s paper

Nick’s school cannot be reduced to one nucleus

John’s word

To avoid confusion with the plural, the marker of the genitive case is represented in written form with an apostrophe. This fact makes possible disengagement of –`s form from the noun to which it properly belongs. E.g.: The man I saw yesterday’s son, where -`s is appended to the whole group (the so-called group genitive). It may even follow a word which normally does not possess such a formant, as in somebody else’s book.

 

There is no universal point of view as to the case system in English. Different scholars stick to a different number of cases.

1. There are two cases. The Common one and The Genitive;

2. There are no cases at all, the form `s is optional because the same relations may be expressed by the ‘of-phrase’: the doctor’s arrival – the arrival of the doctor;

3. There are three cases: the Nominative, the Genitive, the Objective due to the existence of objective pronouns me, him, whom;

4. Case Grammar. Ch.Fillmore introduced syntactic-semantic classification of cases. They show relations in the so-called deep structure of the sentence. According to him, verbs may stand to different relations to nouns. There are 6 cases:

1) Agentive Case (A) John opened the door;

2) Instrumental case (I) The key opened the door; John used the key to open the door;

3) Dative Case (D) John believed that he would win (the case of the animate being affected by the state of action identified by the verb);

4) Factitive Case (F) The key was damaged (the result of the action or state identified by the verb);

5) Locative Case (L) Chicago is windy;

6) Objective case (O) John stole the book.

4. The Problem of Gender in English

Gender plays a relatively minor part in the grammar of English by comparison with its role in many other languages. There is no gender concord, and the reference of the pronouns he, she, it is very largely determined by what is sometimes referred to as ‘natural’ gender for English, it depends upon the classification of persons and objects as male, female or inanimate. Thus, the recognition of gender as a grammatical category is logically independent of any particular semantic association.

According to some language analysts (B.Ilyish, F.Palmer, and E.Morokhovskaya), nouns have no category of gender in Modern English. Prof.Ilyish states that not a single word in Modern English shows any peculiarities in its morphology due to its denoting male or female being. Thus, the words husband and wife do not show any difference in their forms due to peculiarities of their lexical meaning. The difference between such nouns as actor and actress is a purely lexical one. In other words, the category of sex should not be confused with the category of sex, because sex is an objective biological category. It correlates with gender only when sex differences of living beings are manifested in the language grammatically (e.g. tiger – tigress). Still, other scholars (M.Blokh, John Lyons) admit the existence of the category of gender. Prof.Blokh states that the existence of the category of gender in Modern English can be proved by the correlation of nouns with personal pronouns of the third person (he, she, it). Accordingly, there are three genders in English: the neuter (non-person) gender, the masculine gender, the feminine gender.

LECTURE 6: THE VERB. 1.General characteristics

Grammatically the verb is the most complex part of speech. First of all it performs the central role in realizing predication - connection between situation in the utterance and reality. That is why the verb is of primary informative significance in an utterance. Besides, the verb possesses quite a lot of grammatical categories. Furthermore, within the class of verb various subclass divisions based on different principles of classification can befound.

Semantic features of the verb. The verb possesses the grammatical meaning of verbiality - the ability to denote a process developing in time. This meaning is inherent not only in the verbs denoting processes, but also in those denoting states, forms of existence, evaluations, etc.

Morphological features of the verb. The verb possesses the following grammatical categories: tense, aspect, voice, mood, person, number, finitude and phase. The common categories for finite and non-finite forms are voice, aspect, phase and finitude. The grammatical categories of the English verb find their expression in synthetical and analytical forms. The formative elements expressing these categories are grammatical affixes, inner inflexion and function words. Some categories have only synthetical forms (person, number), others - only analytical (voice). There are also categories expressed by both synthetical and analytical forms (mood, tense, aspect).

Syntactic features. The most universal syntactic feature of verbs is their ability to be modified by adverbs. The second important syntactic criterion is the ability of the verb to perform the syntactic function of the predicate. However, this criterion is not absolute because only finite forms can perform this function while non-finite forms can be used in any function but predicate. And finally, any verb in the form of the infinitive can be combined with a modal verb.

 

2. Classifications of English verbs

According to different principles of classification, classifications can be morphological, lexical-morphological, syntactical and functional.

A. Morphological classifications..

I. According to their stem-types all verbs fall into: simple ( to go), sound-replacive (food - to feed, blood - to bleed), stress-replacive (import - to im port, transport - to transport, expanded (with the help of suffixes and prefixes): cultivate, justify, overcome, composite (correspond to composite nouns): to blackmail), phrasal: to have a smoke, to give a smile (they always have an ordinary verb as an equivalent). 2.According to the way of forming past tenses and Participle II verbs can be regular and irregular.

B. Lexical-morphological classification is based on the implicit grammatical meanings of the verb. According to the implicit grammatical meaning of transitivity/intransitivity verbs fall into transitive and intransitive. According to the implicit grammatical meaning of stativeness/non-stativeness verbs fall into stative and dynamic. According to the implicit grammatical meaning of terminativeness/non-terminativeness verbs fall into terminative and durative. This classification is closely connected with the categories of Aspect and Phase.

C. Syntactic classifications. According to the nature of predication (primary and secondary) all verbs fall into finite and non-finite. According to syntagmatic properties (valency) verbs can be of obligatory and optional valency, and thus they may have some directionality or be devoid of any directionality. In this way, verbs fall into the verbs of directed (to see, to take, etc.) and non-directed action (to arrive, to drizzle, etc.):

 

Syntagmatic classification of English verbs

(according to prof.G.Pocheptsov)

V Vobj. She shook her head

Vaddr. He phoned me

V2 – V10 Vobj.-addr. She gave me

her pen

V11 – V15 Vadv. She behaved well

V1 V2 – V24 V16 – V24 Vobj.-adv. He put his hat

on the table

Vaddr.-adv. I won’t keep

you long

 

D. Functional classification. According to their functional significance verbs can be notional (with the full lexical meaning), semi-notional (modal verbs, link-verbs), auxiliaries.

 

3. The category of voice

 

The form of the verb may show whether the agent expressed by the subject is the doer of the action or the recipient of the action (John broke the vase - the vase was broken). The objective relations between the action and the subject or object of the action find their expression in language as the grammatical category of voice. Therefore, the category of voice reflects the objective relations between the action itself and the subject or object of the action:

 

 

Relations of actions The category of voice

The category of voice is realized through the opposition Active voice::Passive voice. The realization of the voice category is restricted because of the implicit grammatical meaning of transitivity/intransitivity. In accordance with this meaning, all English verbs should fall into transitive and intransitive. However, the classification turns out to be more complex and comprises 6 groups:

1. Verbs used only transitively: to mark, to raise;

2.Verbs with the main transitive meaning: to see, to make, to build;

3. Verbs of intransitive meaning and secondary transitive meaning. A lot of intransitive verbs may develop a secondary transitive meaning: They laughed me into agreement; He danced the girl out of the room;

4.Verbs of a double nature, neither of the meanings are the leading one, the verbs can be used both transitively and intransitively: to drive home - to drive a car;

5.Verbs that are never used in the Passive Voice: to seem, to become;

6. Verbs that realize their passive meaning only in special contexts: to live, to sleep, to sit, to walk, to jump.

Some scholars admit the existence of Middle, Reflexive and Reciprocal voices. "Middle Voice" - the verbs primarily transitive may develop an intransitive middle meaning: That adds a lot; The door opened; The book sells easily; The dress washes well. "Reflexive Voice": He dressed; He washed - the subject is both the agent and the recipient of the action at the same time. It is always possible to use a reflexive pronoun in this case: He washed himself. "Reciprocal voice”: They met; They kissed - it is always possible to use a reciprocal pronoun here: They kissed each other.

We cannot, however, speak of different voices, because all these meanings are not expressed morphologically.

4. The category of tense

The category of tense is a verbal category that reflects the objective category of time. The essential characteristic of the category of tense is that it relates the time of the action, event or state of affairs referred to in the sentence to the time of the utterance (the time of the utterance being 'now ' or the present moment). The tense category is realized through the oppositions. The binary principle of oppositions remains the basic one in the correlation of the forms that represent the grammatical category of tense. The present moment is the main temporal plane of verbal actions. Therefore, the temporal dichotomy may be illustrated by the following graphic representation (the arrows show the binary opposition):

Present Past

Future I Future II

Generally speaking, the major tense-distinction in English is undoubtedly that which is traditionally described as an opposition of past::present. But this is best regarded as a contrast of past:: non-past. Quite a lot of scholars do not recognize the existence of future tenses, because what is described as the 'future' tense in English is realized by means of auxiliary verbs will and shall. Although it is undeniable that will and shall occur in many sentences that refer to the future, they also occur in sentences that do not. And they do not necessarily occur in sentences with a future time reference. That is why future tenses are often treated as partly modal.

5. The Category of Aspect

The category of aspect is a linguistic representation of the objective category of Manner of Action. It is realized through the opposition Continuous::Non-Continuous (Progressive::Non-Progressive). The realization of the category of aspect is closely connected with the lexical meaning of verbs.

There are some verbs in English that do not normally occur with progressive aspect, even in those contexts in which the majority of verbs necessarily take the progressive form. Among the so-called ‘non-progressive’ verbs are think, understand, know, hate, love, see, taste, feel, possess, own, etc. The most striking characteristic that they have in common is the fact that they are ‘stative’ - they refer to a state of affairs, rather than to an action, event or process. It should be observed, however, that all the ‘non-­progressive' verbs take the progressive aspect under particular circumstances. As the result of internal transposition verbs of non-progressive nature can be found in the Continuous form: Now I'm knowing you. Generally speaking the Continuous form has at least two semantic features - duration (the action is always in progress) and definiteness (the action is always limited to a definite point or period of time). In other words, the purpose of the Continuous form is to serve as a frame which makes the process of the action more concrete and isolated.

D wh-clause, that-clause

 

5. Noun-phrases with pre-posed adjuncts.

In noun-phrases with pre-posed modifiers we generally find adjectives, pronouns, numerals, participles, gerunds, nouns, nouns in the genitive case (see the table). According to their position all pre-posed adjuncts may be divided into pre-adjectivals and adjectiavals. The position of adjectivals is usually right before the noun-head. Pre-adjectivals occupy the position before adjectivals. They fall into two groups: a) limiters (tothis group belong mostly particles): just, only, even, etc. and b) determiners (articles, possessive pronouns, quantifiers – the first, the last).

Premodification of nouns by nouns (N+N) is one of the most striking features about the grammatical organization of English. It is one of devices to make our speech both laconic and expressive at the same time. Noun-adjunct groups result from different kinds of transformational shifts. NPs with pre-posed adjuncts can signal a striking variety of meanings:

It’s hot excuse

inducement to do something about it

menace

 

To put it in other words, they are different speech acts. That is, speech acts are simply things people do through language – for example, apologizing, instructing, menacing, explaining something, etc. The term ‘speech act’ was coined by the philosopher John Austin and developed by another philosopher John Searle.

John Austin is the person who is usually credited with generating interest in what has since come to be known as pragmatics and speech act theory. His ideas of language were set out in a series of lectures which he gave at Oxford University. These lectures were later published under the title “How to do things with words”. His first step was to show that some utterances are not statements or questions but actions. He reached this conclusion through an analysis of what he termed ‘performative verbs’. Let us consider the following sentences:

I pronounce you man and wife

I declare war on France

I name this ship The Albatros

I bet you 5 dollars it will rain

I apologize

The peculiar thing about these sentences, according to J.Austin, is that they are not used to say or describe things, but rather actively to do things. After you have declared war on France or pronounced somebody husband and wife the situation has changed. That is why J.Austin termed them as performatives and contrasted them to statements (he called them constatives). Thus by pronouncing a performative utterance the speaker is performing an action. The performative utterance, however, can really change things only under certain circumstances. J.Austin specified the circumstances required for their success as felicity conditions. In order to declare war you must be someone who has the right to do it. Only a priest (or a person with corresponding power) can make a couple a husband ad wife. Besides, it must be done before witnesses and the couple getting married must sign the register.

Performatives may be explicit and implicit. Let us compare the sentences:

I promise I will come tomorrow – I will come tomorrow;

I swear I love you – I love you.

On any occasion the action performed by producing an utterance will consist of three related acts (a three-fold distinction):

1) locutionary act – producing a meaningful linguistic expression, uttering a sentence. If you have difficulty with actually forming the sounds and words to create a meaningful utterance (because you are a foreigner or tongue-tied) then you might fail to produce a locutionary act: it often happens when we learn a foreign language.

2) illocutionary act – we form an utterance with some kind of function on mind, with a definite communicative intention or illocutionary force. The notion of illocutionary force is basic for pragmatics.

3) perlocutionary act – the effect the utterance has on the hearer. Perlocutionary effect may be verbal or non-verbal. E.g. I’ve bought a car – Great! It’s cold here – and you close the window.

 

2. Classifications of speech acts. Indirect speech acts.

 

It was John Searle, who studied under J.Austin at Oxford, who proposed

a detailed classification of speech acts. His speech act classification has had a great impact on linguistics. It includes five major classes of speech acts: declarations, representatives, expressives, directives and commissives:

Speech act type Direction of fit s – speaker, x - situation

 

Declarations words change the world S causes X

E.g. I pronounce you man and wife. You’re fired.

The Maxim of Quality

Do not say what you believe to be false

Do not say for what you lack adequate evidence

The Maxim of Quantity

The Maxim of Relevance

Be relevant

The Maxim of Manner

Be clear

Be orderly

3. Implicatures of discourse.

Communicative maxims make it possible to generate inferences which are defined as conversational implicatures and conventional implicatures. Conversational implicatures aresuch components of an utterance that are not expressed semantically but are understood by communicants in the process of communication: Was it you who broke the cup? This question presupposes: Someone has broken the cup. If you did not do that your normal reaction would be: What cup?, while the answer I didn’t do that shows that you know about the fact. Conversational implicatures are universal, they do not depend on the language used. The second type of implicatures, conventional implicatures, are derived from a definite lexical or grammatical structure of an utterance: I saw only John (conventional implicature – I didn’t see anyone else), Even Bill is smarter than you (Everybody is smarter than John, John is stupid).

4. Implicatures and indirectness.

Both kinds of implicatures are of great interest for discourse analysis. When there is a mismatch between the expressed meaning and the implied meaning we deal with indirectness. Indirectness is a universal phenomenon: it occurs in all natural languages. Let us see how conversational implicatures arise from Maxims of Conversation and thus create indirectness.

A). In the following example Polonius is talking to Hamlet:

Polonius: What do you read, My Lord?

Hamlet: Words, words, words.

In this dialogue Hamlet deliberately gives less information than is required by the situation and so flouts the Maxim of Quantity. At the same time he deliberately fails to help Polonius to achieve his goals, thereby flouting the Maxim of Relevance. The Maxim of Quantity is also flouted when we say: Law is law, woman is woman, students are students. This makes us look for what these utterances really mean.

B). In the utterance You’re being too smart! the Maxim of Quality is flouted and the hearer is made to look for a covert sense. Similarly, the same maxim is flouted with metaphors. If I say: He is made of iron, I am either non-cooperative or I want to convey something different.

C). The Maxim of Relevance can also be responsible for producing a wide range of standard implicatures:

A: Can you tell me the time?

B: The bell has gone.

The introductory function

Before sharing some information about the object, we need to introduce it to the hearer. Fairy tales can be used as ideal illustrations of the use of the indefinite article in its introductory function.

e.g. Once upon a time there lived an old man. He had a wife and a daughter. He lived in a small house.

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

The definite article may be used in the following functions:

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. There are five different ways of getting the information about something existing in the objective reality. We can see it (Do you like the picture?), hear it (I believe, the music is too loud), feel it (The pillow is so soft!), smell it (What is the name of the perfume?) or taste it (The soup tastes bitter).

The definitizing function

The object or thing denoted by the noun is presented as a part of some complex. In modern science the term “frame ” is often used. The frame is a structurally organized system of images. For example, 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.

e.g. I want to talk to the rector (even if you have never met the man).

The reliability of the channel can be defined as the answer to the question “Is there any difference between what was sent and what was received?” To increase the reliability the speaker may want to speak slower, repeating the same over and over again, which, of course, will decrease the effectiveness of the channel. It has been proved for example that the study material covered by an average half-an-hour lecture could be successfully presented for just twenty minutes, if the teacher were after the efficiency of the channel only. However, it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the students to receive pure semiological (or logical) information, not dissolved by any flashbacks or jokes. Normal speech is half-reliable and half-effective.

In 1954 a book by Ch. Osgood and L. Sebeok was published. The title of it was “Psycholinguistics: A study of Theory and Research Problems” and it gave birth to psycholinguistics as an independent discipline. Psycholinguistics is defined as “a science which provides for the use of linguistic analysis of grammar to identify the mental and behavioral processes which underlie language acquisition and development”. Ch. Osgood suggested a three-level model of the derivation of the utterance. The speaker (sender) realizes his communicative intention step by step, level by level, choosing one of the possible phonetic, lexical and morphological variants. According to P.L. Newcomer and D.D. Hannill, psycholinguistics is the study of the mental processes which underlie the acquisition and use of language.

A.A. Leontyev, defines the subject matter of psycholinguistics as the relationship between language system and linguistic competence. What is meant, scholars no longer focus on language as a system, but they also analyze the person’s ability to use the linguistic units and structures more effectively.

PSYCHOLINGUISTIC FACTORS

 

Psycholinguistics focuses on the speaking individual. Therefore,