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 import, 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 regularand 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 andintransitive. 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 obligatoryand 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.):

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

 

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) lim iters (to this 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:

world peace – peace all over the world \

silver box – a box made of silver

table lamp – lamp for tables

table legs – the legs of the table

river sand – sand from the river

school child – a child who goes to school

The grammatical relations observed in NPs with pre-posed adjuncts may convey the following meanings:

1.subject-predicate relations: weather change;

2.object relations: health service, women hater;

3.adverbial relations:

a) of time: morning star,

b) place: world peace, country house,

c) comparison: button eyes,

d) purpose: tooth brush.

It is important to remember that the noun-adjunct is usually marked by a stronger stress than the head.

Of special interest is a kind of ‘grammatical idiom’ where the modifier is reinterpreted into the head: a devil of a man, an angel of a girl.

 

Билет 6

Linguistic unit.

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 calledsyntactic. 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.

 

Forms of verb stems.

All Old English verbs may be subdivided into a number of groups in accordance with the grammatical means with the help of which they built their principal stems.

There were two principal means for forming verb-stems in Old English:

1. By means of vowel interchange of root vowel and 2. By means of suffixation.

In accordance with these two methods of formation all the verbs in Old English formed two groups – the strong and the weak verbs.

The strong verbs are verbs which use vowel-interchange as principal means of expressing different grammatical categories. They differ from the weak ones not only in the manner of the building of their forms but also in the number of these principal forms.

There were seven principal gradation classes, five of them based on qualitative ablaut, the sixth class on the quantitative ablaut, the seventh- by means of the so-call reduplication of the root syllable.

The weak verbs are relatively younger than strong verbs. They reflect a later stage in the development of Germanic languages.

They were an open class in Old English, as new verbs that entered the language generally formed their forms on analogy with weak verbs.

The weak verbs are subdivided into three classes.

1.-the stem-suffix-i

2.-the stem-suffix-oi

3.-of the third class there remained in Old English only three verbs –habban (have),libban (live), seyan (see)

 

The verb-phrase.

The VP is a definite kind of the subordinate phrase with the verb as the head. The verb is considered to be the semantic and structural centre not only of the VP but of the whole sentence as the verb plays an important role in making up primary predication that serves the basis for the sentence. VPs are more complex than NPs as there are a lot of ways in which verbs may be combined in actual usage. Valent properties of different verbs and their semantics make it possible to divide all the verbs into several groups depending on the nature of their complements

Classification of verb-phrases.

VPs can be classified according to the nature of their complements – verb complements may be nominal (to see a house) and adverbial (to behave well). Consequently, we distinguish nominal, adverbial and mixed complementation.

Nominal complementation takes place when one or more nominal complements (nouns or pronouns) are obligatory for the realization of potential valency of the verb: to give smth. to smb., to phone smb., to hear smth.(smb.), etc.

Adverbial complementation occurs when the verb takes one or more adverbial elements obligatory for the realization of its potential valency: He behaved well, I live …in Kyiv (here).

Mixed complementation – both nominal and adverbial elements are obligatory: He put his hat on he table (nominal-adverbial).

According to the structure VPs may be basic or simple (to take a book) – all elements are obligatory; expanded (to read and translate the text, to read books and newspapers) andextended (to read an English book).

 

Билет 7

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 thediscourse.

 

The division of the 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 import, 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 regularand 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 andintransitive. 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 obligatoryand 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.):

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