1. The three constituent parts of language: the phonological system, the lexical system and thegrammatical system. Phonology, lexicology and grammar as three main branches oflinguistics.Language as a very complex phenomenon includes three different constituent parts: the phonological system, the lexical system, thee grammatical system. By the grammatical system of a language, we understand the whole set of regularities determining the combination of the naming means (words and phraseological word combinations) for the formation of utterances in speech. Language as a whole is the object of study for Linguistics (General, Comparative, Historical, Cognitive, etc.). Different constituent parts of the language are studied by different branches of Linguistics. (The phonological system phonology; the lexical system lexicology; the grammatical system grammar.) Grammar may be subdivided into 2 subbranches: Morphology and Syntax.Morphology (M. Blokh) is the grammatical study of the word in its abstract sense. Syntax (M. Blokh) is the grammatical study of the sentence. It deals with the structure of the sentence on the whole and with different constituent parts of the sentence in particular. As for practical and theoretical approaches in Grammar Studies, they are both considered linguistics disciplines that go hand in hand and deal with grammar as a branch of Linguistics. Their aims and approaches however vary. The aim of study in Theoretical Grammar is to enquire a scientific conception of the object (which is presented as Grammatical System) in accordance with the principals of both traditional and modern Linguistics. The aim of study in Practical Grammar is to get an ability to use certain knowledge about grammatical system of a language in order to speak, understand and write according to the established rules of the language in question. Different aims mean different methods of study. Lexicology is the part of linguistics dealing with the vocabulary of the language and the properties of words as the main units of language. The term vabu1ar is used to denote the system formed by the sum total of all the words and word equivalents that the language possesses.Phonology is a branch of linguistics. Phonology as a branch of linguistics that studies the vocalization process and speech.

The concept of multilevel organization of language structure. Different branches oflinguistics corresponding to the different levels of language structure.

Classification of Linguistics disciplines in connection with the concept of multi-level organization of language structure was originated in the 50th of the XX century. According to this concept, the language structure is looked upon as a complex, consisting of several levels/layers. Different levels of the language structure are established according to the properties of the Linguistics units operating in speech. Some scholars point out four basic linguistic units operating in speech: the phoneme, the morpheme, the word/the lexeme, the sentence. The Phoneme is the smallest distinctive unit. The Morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit.The Word is the smallest naming unit. The Sentence is the smallest communication unit.Accordingly this, scholars speak of four levels: The level of the phoneme/the phonological level (studied by phonology) The level of the morpheme/the morphemic level (part of the morphology/morphological studies) The level of the word/the morphological level (morphology) The level of the sentence/the syntactic level (syntax)Thus we have three branches: Phonology, Morphology and Syntax. As for the level of the word the latter can be taken: As an item of the vocabulary, and thus it is excluded from grammatical studies. As a matter of the language structure and hence it becomes the property of the morphological level.According to this approach Morphology and Syntax are 2 different branches of Linguistics, studying the units of different levels of the language structure though they are closely connected. There is also an opinion according to which there are 6 levels of the language structure: The phonological level (Phonology) The morphemic level (Morphological Studies) The morphological level (Morphology) The phrasemic level/the level of the phrase (*the Syntax of the phrase; *Morphology) The syntactic level (Syntax) The level of sentence groups (Supra-Syntax)*Nowadays there are 8 levels: - the level of the text studied by the textology or text interpretation;- the level of the discourse (Cognitive grammar)Ferdinand de Saussure was also among the first scholars who defined lingual units as specific signs - bilateral (two-sided) units that have both form and meaning.

The units of language are of two types: segmental and supra-segmental. Segmental lingual units consist of phonemes, which are the smallest material segments of the language; segmental units form different strings of phonemes (morphemes, words, sentences, etc.). Supra-segmental lingual units do not exist by themselves, their forms are realized together with the forms of segmental units;Morphology and syntax as branches of grammar corresponding to two adjoining levels oflanguage structure. Their interrelationship and boundary lines between them.

The system of word forms is the sphere of morphology that different words and their forms dont exist for their own sake. They are produced in speech in the process of making sentences and for this the word must assume a certain grammatical form and take a certain position in the sentence. The position is the sphere of Syntax. At the same time the member of the sentence (the level of sentence) is constituted by a certain part of speech (level of morphology). The structure classification and combinability of the words is the object of Morphology. Syntax deals with the structure classification and combinability of sentences which are built up of words and their equivalents. (Phraseological units have the metaphors and wide vivid images. / ()).

In linguistics, morphology is the identification, analysis and description of the structure of morphemes and other units of meaning in a language like words, affixes, and parts of speech and intonation/stress, implied context.Morphological typology represents a way of classifying languages according to the ways by which morphemes are used in a language from the analytic that use only isolated morphemes, through the agglutinative ("stuck-together") and fusional languages that use bound morphemes (affixes), up to the polysynthetic, which compress lots of separate morphemes into single words.Fundamental conceptsThe distinction between these two senses of "word" is arguably the most important one in morphology. The first sense of "word", the one in which dog and dogs are "the same word", is called a lexeme. The second sense is called word form. We thus say that dog and dogs are different forms of the same lexeme. Dog and dog catcher, on the other hand, are different lexemes, as they refer to two different kinds of entities. Inflection vs. word formationGiven the notion of a lexeme, it is possible to distinguish two kinds of morphological rules. Rules of the first kind are called inflectional rules, while those of the second kind are called word formation. The English plural, as illustrated by dog and dogs, is an inflectional rule; compounds like dog catcher or dishwasher provide an example of a word formation rule.There is a further distinction between two kinds of word formation: derivation and compounding. Compounding is a process of word formation that involves combining complete word forms into a single compound form; dog catcher is therefore a compound.Derivation involves affixing bound (non-independent) forms to existing lexemes, whereby the addition of the affix derives a new lexeme.In linguistics, syntax is the study of the principles and rules for constructing sentences in natural languages.The Sentence is the basic unit of syntax. It is different from other language units because it is a unit of communication.The main units of syntax are phrases and sentences. The main difference between the phrase and the sentence is in their linguistic function. The phrase is a nominative unit, the sentence is a predicative one. Nomination is naming things and their relations. A nominative unit simply names something known to everybody or a majority of native language speakers, recalling it from their memory, e.g.: a book, a departure. A phrase represents an object of nomination as a complicated phenomenon, be it a thing, an action, a quality or a whole situation, e.g.: an interesting book, to start with a jerk, absolutely fantastic, his unexpected departure.

The content of the word. Its lexical, lexical-grammatical and grammatical meaning.The lexical meaning of the word is it individual meaning or a bunch of such meanings held in a dictionary or in memory. In speech we realize one of them when there is no pun or metaphor. The lexical meaning characterizes the word as a unit of the vocabulary and therefore it is the object of study for lexicology.

The lexico-grammatical meaning of the word is not individual. Quite different words, sometimes a large number of them have the same lexico-grammatical meaning (a table, beauty, movement lexico-grammatical meaning of substance or thingness). Lexico-grammatical meaning are of interest to both lexicology and grammar. In grammar they are studied mostly by morphology. In a number of cases lexico-grammatical meanings make different words (cases of conversion). Words having the same lexico-grammatical meanings very often have the same or nearly the same system of forms (plural number, strong/weak verbs), patterns of combinability/collacability (art+ad+N; N+N; rare case: notional/modal verb+N, but NEVER N+V)and syntactic functions in the sentence. The latter makes lexico-grammatical meanings in Grammar a very interesting field of study for Syntax.The grammatical meanings of words are not individual either. They can be attached to a number of words that may differ greatly as far as their meanings are concerned. Eg. My cats My brothers: the apostrophe cares the meaning of possessivity, while the individual meaning is different. (also work-worked, create - created)

Grammatical meaning is always expressed either explicitly or implicitly. For instance: The book reads well here the grammatical. meaning of passivity is expressed implicitly. Grammatical meaning is a system of expressing the grammatical meaning through the paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms-expressed by grammatical opposition, which can be of different types:Private Gradual-large-larger-largest Equipollent-am is areBy the number of the opossums opposition may be binary, ternary, quaternary and so on. Any opposition can be reduced. The most important type of opposition is the binary-private opposition. The other type of opposition may be reduced to this kind of opposition.

Oppositional reductions (binary)Neutralization /weak-strong Transposition: strong-weakHow we express grammatical meaning: Inflexions-pen-pens, Sound alternation- replacive morpheme-man-men, Analitycal means with the help of analytical forms (discontinuous morphemes) Suppletivity-different roots for grammatical forms. I-me/go-went

Syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations among language units.

Crucial for the systemic description of language are the two fundamental types of relations between lingual units: paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations. The term syntagmatic relations is derived from the word syntagma, i.e. a linear combination of units of the same level. Lingual units form various lingual strings, sequences, or constructions; in other words, lingual units co-occur in the same actual sequences. E.g.: He started laughing. In this sentence we can point out syntagmatic, or linear relations between the sounds [h+i:] = [hi:]; [s+t+a:+t+i+d] = [sta:tid]; Besides, the sentence can be connected with other sentences by syntagmatic relations in the process of communication, in speech. The other type of relations, opposed to syntagmatic, are called paradigmatic. The term is derived from the word paradigm and denotes the relations between elements in paradigms in the system of language. Ferdinand de Saussure called these relations associative relations, implying the way different linguistic units are arranged and associated with each other in human minds. Classical grammatical paradigms are those making up grammatical categories of words, or, morphological categories, e.g., the category of number or case of the noun: in Russian ; in English toy toys; tooth teeth; children childrens, etc. Paradigm, in most general terms, is a system of variants of the same unit, which is called the invariant; paradigmatic relations are the relations between the variants of the lingual unit within a paradigm for example, sentences may be organized in paradigms according to the category the purpose of communication, in such paradigms declarative, interrogative and imperative sentence patterns of the same sentence invariant are opposed, e.g.: He laughed. Did he laugh? Let him laugh. Since these relations cant be observed in actual speech they are also described as relations in absentia (in the absence). Paradigmatic relations exist not only in grammar, but in the phonetical and lexical systems of language as well. For example, paradigmatic relations exist between vowels and consonants, voiced and voiceless consonants, etc.; between synonyms and antonyms, in topical groups of words, word-building models, etc. But paradigmatic relations are of primary importance for grammar, as the grammar of language is above all systemic.A lingual unit has been described above as a sign a bilateral unit, which has its form and its meaning. Thus, two language planes can be distinguished - the plane of content and the plane of expression: the plane of content comprises all the meaningful, semantic elements contained in the language, while the plane of expression comprises all the material, formal units of the language

The form of the word. Types of morphemes. Positional-functional classification. Amorpheme in the descriptive linguistics. Environment and distribution. Distributionalclassification.A word is a bigger unit of Morphology; the smallest unit is a morpheme. According to Pr. it is the smallest meaningful unit of the language system that is positional dependent or other elements (unlike a word).Pr. Smirnitsky defines a morpheme as the smallest linguistic unit that has both its outer (, sound and graphic) and inner (meaning or sense) components. Eg.: -er. We should bear in mind that definitions of the morpheme have been changed depending on the flow of thought in theoretical studies and on this or that trend. The first to introduce the scholarly notion of morpheme was . In this definition the morpheme was understood as a general term for linear word components: the root and affixes. This starting point of view was further transformed in various linguistic schools. Thus Pr. treats morphemes as any way to express grammatical relations. So he includes into the class of morphemes both auxiliary words and parts of speech (eg. prepositions) and word oder. As Copenhagen linguistic school was famous for its treating morphemes as certain grammatical meanings carried by this or that component. Eg. . Traditional point: 2 morphemes . , 3: case, number, gender. Traditional (functional) class-tion of morphemes. Henry Sweet, Smirnitsky. Study of morph.str-re in traditional gr. - 2 criteria.1) Positional: the analysis of the location of the marginal morphemes in relation to the central ones. 2) Semantic (functional): involves the study of the correlative contribution of the morpheme to the general meaning of the word. M-s at the upper level are divided into root & affixal (lex.&gram.).A lot of varieties of morphemic composition of modern E.words,but preferable model is: prefix+root+lexical suffix+gram.suffix. Roots: concrete, material part of the meaning of the word, affixes specificational part of the meaning. Specifications: of lexico-semantic & grammatico-semantic character. Or 3 criteria: a) semantic properties of words (meaning), b) formal properties (form), c) functional (syntactic f-tion).

Distributional class-tion of morphemes. In the distrib.analysis 3 main types of distribution are discrimin.: contrastive distr., non-contrastive distr., and complementary distr. Contr.& non-contr.distr.concern identical environments of different morphs. (Morph is combination of phones that has a meaning, it happens only once) The morphs are said to be in contrastive distr. if their meanings (f-tions) are different; such morphs constitute dofferent morphemes. Ex: returned/returning/returns. The morphs are in non-contrastive d. if their mean.(f-tions) are identical; such morphs constitute free variants of the same morpheme. Ex: suffixes ed & -t (learned/learnt), -s & -i (genies/genii). As for complementary distr., it concerns diff.environments of formally diff.morphs which fulfill one & the same f-tion; such morphs are termed allo-morphs. Ex: a few allomorphs of the plural suffix: -en (children), -s (toys), -a (data), -es (crises), -I (genii), zero (trout-trout). The application of distr.analysis to the morphemic level-> cl-tion of m. on distr.lines. a) free (M which can build up words by themselves) & bound m.( used only as a part of words hands- hand is FREE,-S is BOUND), b) overt (hands) & covert m.( shows the minigful absence of a M=zero M, handO), Full & empty( M which have no meaning)c) additive (M which are freely combined in a word look+ed,small+er) & replacive m., (root M which replace each other in paradigms sing-sang-sung) d) continuous ( M combined with each other in the same word worked) & discontin.m, ( M which consist of 2 components used jointly to build the analytical forms of the words have worked, is working) e) segmental & supra-segmental m.(stress n. convert v. convert)

Types of oppositions. The notion of a grammatical category in the light of the oppositionaltheory. The privative opposition as the main type of the oppositions in English.

Among grammatical meanings of words we may find those which characterize the word from the point of view that is connected with some certain grammatical aspect. Eg.: desk desks grammatical meaning number of objects. [he] works is opposed to worked: work - worked opposition of past vs. non-past (category of tense), work - working opposition of continuous vs. non-continuous (category of aspect), work - have worked perfect vs. non-perfect (category of correlation), and category of voice: passive vs. non-passive.This grammatical means are sometimes called Homogeneous Grammatical Means (HGM). HGM may be opposed to each other. According to the oppositional theory any grammatical category is the opposition of grammatical meanings and grammatical forms, corresponding to them. Opposition, according to Pr. Blockh, - is a generalized correlation of lingual forms by means of which a certain function is fulfilled ( ). The opposite members have 2 kinds of features: 1) the basic feature upon which the opposition is build; 2) differential feature (only one of the members possesses).The simplest and the most important kind of opposition is the so-called privative/i/ binary () opposition. A privative means that one member has a certain differential feature, and the other doesnt. Binary means that there are 2 members opposed. The member of the opposition that has got the differential feature is called the marked/strong (+) member of the opposition. The member of the opposition that hasnt got the differential feature is called the unmarked/weak (-) member of the opposition.In Morphology we may deal with oppositions having more than 2 morphemes. They are called more than binary or multiple. For the opposition which has 3 members we may used the term triple. The opposition theory was first formulated in Phonology by the Czech scholar . in his book Essentials of Phonology. This theory was further transferred be Pr. (Czech) and in Russia by Pr. , Pr. and Pr. and his school. This theory was also applied to morphology by this scholars.

Ways of form-building in Modern English. Synthetic and analytical grammar forms.A structural type of a language.Formbuilding is the building of forms of one and the same word. Care should be taken not to mix up formbuilding (Grammar) and wordbuilding (Lexicology)/ Most scholars speak about 3 ways of how we can form words in Modern English. 1. Synthetic, 2. Analytical, 3. Suppletive. 1) The synthetic formbuilding is limited to the changes within the body of the word. In other words, it is limited by the use of bound/close morphemes. 2) The analytical formbuilding implies the use of the auxiliary elements or in other words, the use of free or word morphemes. 3) The suppletive way of formbuilding includes only a small number of cases: the suppletive formations are found in the same words in a variety of Indo-European languages. This way of formbuilding implies the use of forms derived from different stems (Eg. Good-better-the best, go-went, I-me, etc.)

Its common knowledge that English is regarded as an Analytical language as compared with Russian that is regarded as Synthetic. Pr. says: it is correct on the whole, but the matter must not be exaggerated as there are no purely synthetic and no purely analytical languagesPr. remarks that in most languages there are both synthetic and analytical means for expression of different grammatical meanings, but their number may vary. In such languages as Slavic (but Bulgarian), Sanskrit, Ancient Greek, Latin German, Arab, Lithuanian, synthetic features prevail. In all Roman languages (but Latin), Bulgarian, English, Danish, Modern Greek, etc. analytical features play a more important part.There are also such languages, called amorphous/isolating W. von Humboldt, that practically lack synthetic forms (Chinese, Japanese, Thai, etc.)(Joseph Greenberg) One of the most reliable methods for defining the degree of language synthesism was originated in 1950 by the American scholar Joseph Greenberg. One of the essentials is to take texts (100 words in length) in different languages and divide the number of morphemes by the number of words. The abstract number 1 shows the greatest degree of language analytism, it shows that the word is equal to morpheme. It is, however, not probable, that relying on that principal we may get real figure, the more synthetic features there are in the language. Eg.: Anglo-Saxon 2.12; Modern English 1.68; Modern German 1.97; Modern Russian 2.39; Vietnamis 1.06; Eskimo 3.72 (it is the highest possible).In Modern English we have such analytical features: 1. A small number of inflectional suffixes, 2. A small number of cases with vowel and consonant interchange, 3. A wide use of prepositions that express relations between words, 4. A prominent use of word order as one of the means to express syntactic relations. Synthetic feature of English is the synthetic way of form-building. That is why it is better to say that the English language at present is mainly analytical and Russian is mainly synthetic. 2 major groups of word formation:1) Words formed as grammatical syntagmas, combinations of full linguistic signs (types: compounding (), prefixation, suffixation, conversion, and back derivation)2) Words, which are not grammatical syntagmas, which are not made up of full linguistic signs.Ex.: expressive symbolism, blending, clipping, rhyme & some others.

The notion of parts of speech in English. Criteria used for establishing parts of speech.

Every word is characterized by its individual feature (its lexical meaning) and some lexico-grammatical, morphological and syntactical characteristics common with those of many other words. Thus it is possible and necessary to use two approaches to the study of the vocabulary. Lexicology dealing with the word as an item of the vocabulary in which every word differs from others studies words one by one. It is clear, that when studying a word as a unit of the language structure it is not necessary to study every word separately. Words have lexico-grammatical characteristics that are shared by many other words. In Grammar we try to classify words according to their lexico-grammatical, morphological and syntactical characteristics and study large classes of words which are traditionally called parts of speech. Morphology practically deals with the properties of different parts of speech. Parts of speech represent the main classification of words in Grammar. By parts of speech we mean big classes of words having certain lexico-grammatical, morphological and syntactical characteristics in common. The parts of speech theory is very old one. But it was only summered in the 20es of the XX century that satisfactory scientific principals for establishing various parts of speech were formulated. The first to formulate this principles in Russia was Pr. . According to this author different parts of speech should be singled put on the basis of three criteria approach. He called these three criteria meaning, form and function. The noun, for example, as a part of speech, is traditionally characterized by 1) the categorial meaning of substance (thingness), 2) a specific set of word-building affixes, the grammatical categories of number, case and article determination, prepositional connections and modification by an adjective, and 3) the substantive functions of subject, object or predicative in the sentence. In the same way, all the other notional parts of speech are described. Functional words, which include conjunctions, prepositions, articles, interjections, particles, and modal words, have incomplete nominative value, are unchangeable and fulfill mediatory, constructional syntactic functions. Notional words, which traditionally include nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns and numerals, have complete nominative meanings, are in most cases changeable and fulfill self-dependent syntactic functions in the sentence.

Contribution to the solution of this problem made by the scholars in this country.

Pr. s ideas were further elaborated and put to practice by academician V.V. Vinogradov in reference to Russia, while Pr. put reference to English. The first semantic criteria means taking into account lexico-grammatical characteristics of words, their lexico-grammatical meanings and lexico-grammatical morphemes. Alone these lines we speak of 1. words having the lexico-grammatical meanings of substance (house, road, movement) 2. Words having the lexico-grammatical meanings of property (big, strong, etc.) 3. Words having the lexico-grammatical meanings of process (write, read) 4. The property of another property (quickly, surely) 5. Of number (one, first, etc.). the second formal criteria means taking into account the morphological characteristic of words their grammatical categories. Along these line we single out such words as having the grammatical categories of number and case, degrees of comparison, person and number, tense, aspect, correlation, voice and mood and so on. The third syntactic criteria means taking into account the combinability of words on the phrase level and their syntactic function in the sentence on the sentence level. On this principal we single out words having the syntactic function of the subject and the object, the predicate, the adverbial modifier and so on. The question whether it is necessary to apply three criterias. It is so that only complex approach can help us more or less surely to classify vocabulary into different parts of speech. Taking in isolation the semantic criteria is not much reliable because not all nouns have the lexico-grammatical meaning of substance. But it doesnt mean that they should form a different category. As for the morphological criteria many words havent got any grammatical categories at all. And as for the syntactic criteria different parts of speech may function as one and the same member of the sentence (Moscow linguistic school end of the 19th century).

Alternative theories of distinguishing parts of speech (H. Sweet, O. Jesperson, Ch. Fries).In the history of Linguistics there have been various approaches to classification of words in grammar. Some grammarians used only the semantic or only the formal criteria. Pr. Henry Sweet noticed the inconsistency() that exists between morphological and syntactic properties of parts of speech. But his attempt resulted in uniting fragments of classes that on the whole dont show either morphological or lexical stability on the one hand and in disentitling that on the whole demonstrate morphological and lexical stability. He offered two classifications. In the first of them he singles out two groups: declinable (; nouns, adjectives and verbs) and indeclinables (adverbs, prepositions, conjunction and interjection). The second typology is based on the syntactic functions of words and word-groups. Thus the typology comprises of the so-called noun words (nouns proper, noun-pronouns, noun-numerals, infinitive and gerund)and the adjective-words (adjective proper, adjective pronouns, adjective numerals, participial construction) and verb-words (finite forms, the infinitive and the Gerund).The next attempt was by Otto Jespersen () tried to unite Syntagmatic and Paradigmatic bonds of different words, their form and function. He introduce the dual system. The 1st aspect: the traditional parts of speech description that is done both from the point of view of their morphology and their lexoc-grammatical meanings. 2nd: these classes are also analysed from the point of view of their importance and value in phrases and sentences. (He gets three ranks to every word) Thus a word may be: primary (the nuclears of the phrase and the subject of the sentence), secondary (serving as an attribute to the primary) and tertiary (subordinated and dependent upon the secondary word). This theory is called the theory of three ranks. It was one of the first attempts to create such a classification that would take into account both syntagmatc and paradigmatic properties of traditional parts of speech. But it resulted only in terminological excess and proved to be not very convenient. The descriptive approach is connected with the name of the American scholar Charles Freeze, who belonged to the comparatively modern trend in Linguistics called American Descriptive Linguistics. Pr. Freeze used only the syntactic criteria for pointing out different classes of words and he called it distribution of words in speech. As a practical devise he used three frames. By frames he meant model sentences in which he pointed out certain syntactic positions. And he tested all the words from his materials in those syntactic positions. Sentences were taken from oral speech. His data base consisted of 50 hours of telephone conversations recorded by him. Frame A the concert was good (class 1, class 2). Frame B the clerk remembered the tax (Class 3). Frame C the team went there (class 4). He pointed out 4 classes of words. Later on some other scholars began to use symbols NAVD (D determiner) for calling these four classes of words. But there is a difference between group N or class 1 words and the traditional noun, the same with all the rest. Class 1 is a large category than the class of nouns for it includes personal pronouns, infinitives and so on.Alongside the 4 syntactic classes of words, Charles Freeze also pointed out 15 groups of the so-called function words (linking verbs, particles, prepositions, conjunctions and so on). These 4 syntactic classes are extensively used by different scholars in the USA and in Russia because they are very convenient for partenning sentences of diverse types. E.g. the concept was good N+be+A. But at the same time these 4 classes cannot fully replace the traditional parts of speech. Thus this theory cannot be applied for morphological investigation.The problem of notional and formal words.

It has been common for a long time to divide all parts of speech into 2 groups: Notional (as noun, adjective, verb, numeral, etc.) and formal (particle, article, conjunction, etc.). But sooner or later there comes the question about the criteria that lies () in the basis of this classification.Academician V.V. Vinogradov proposed to use the naming function as the criteria for this kind of grouping. But nowadays there is a view, that every word may have a naming function.And that is why according to this approach Academician Vinogradov may not be quite right. Pr. Ivanova laid special stress on the syntactic characteristics of the word. E.g. A friend of mine is coming. Traditional: 2 notional means: friend, mine.Notional parts of speech have an independent syntactic function in the sentence. They may be used as a certain member of the sentence. As for formal parts of speech, they havent got such an independent syntactic function in the sentence. Not all scholars approve of this classification into notional and formal. Pr. didnt consider this classification useful for Grammar, because he thought the main criteria shaky enough. But most scholars still do that.

The noun, for example, as a part of speech, is traditionally characterized by 1) the categorial meaning of substance (thingness), 2) a specific set of word-building affixes, the grammatical categories of number, case and article determination, prepositional connections and modification by an adjective, and 3) the substantive functions of subject, object or predicative in the sentence. In the same way, all the other notional parts of speech are described. There are certain limitations and controversial points in the traditional classification of parts of speech, which make some linguists doubt its scientific credibility. First of all, the three criteria turn out to be relevant only for the subdivision of notional words. Second, the status of pronouns and the numerals, which in the traditional classification are listed as notional, is also questionable, since they do not have any syntactic functions of their own, but rather different groups inside these two classes resemble in their formal and functional properties different notional parts of speech: e.g., cardinal numerals function as substantives, while ordinal numerals function as adjectives. p it is very difficult to draw rigorous borderlines between different classes of words, because there are always phenomena that are indistinguishable in their status. E.g., non-finite forms of verbs, such as the infinitive, the gerund, participles I and II are actually verbal forms, but lack some of the characteristics of the verb.There are even words that defy any classification at all; for example, many linguists doubt whether the words of agreement and disagreement, yes and no, can occupy any position in the classification of parts of speech.

13. a) The lexical-grammatical characteristics of the noun;b) The morphological characteristics of the noun;c) The syntactical characteristics of the noun.The categorial meaning of the noun is substance or thingness. Nouns directly name various phenomena of reality and have the strongest nominative force among notional parts of speech: practically every phenomenon can be presented by a noun as an independent referent, or, can be substantivized. Nouns denote things and objects proper (tree), abstract notions (love), various qualities (bitterness), and even actions (movement). All these words function in speech in the same way as nouns denoting things proper.Formally, the noun is characterized by a specific set of word-building affixes and word-building models, which unmistakably mark a noun, among them:age - act of, state of, collection of - salvage, storage, forageal - relating to - sensual, gradual, manual, naturalalgia - pain - neuralgiaan, ian - native of, pertaining toance, ancy - action, process, state - assistance, allowance, defiancecian - having a specific skill - magician, optician, physicianee - one who receives the actioner, or - on who, that which - baker, carpenter, brewerhood - order, quality - neighborhood, motherhoodion, sion, tion - act of, state of, result of - contagion, infection, aversionadjective (however, often the adjective is used as a noun. ex: "The Spanish" meaning the people of Spain), etc.A noun also has special conversion patterns (to find = a find). As for word-changing categories, the noun is changed according to the categories of number (boy-boys), case (boy-boys), and article determination (boy, a boy, the boy). Formally the noun is also characterized by specific combinability with verbs, adjectives and other nouns, introduced either by preposition or by sheer contact.The most characteristic functions of the noun in a sentence are the function of a subject and an object.Besides, the noun can function as a predicative (part of a compound predicate), as an adverbial modifier, as an attribute.

Combinability of nouns with other nouns ("cannon ball" problem)

The noun in English can also function as an attribute in the following cases: when it is used in the genitive case (the teachersbook), when it is used with a preposition (the book of the teacher), or in contact groups of two nouns the first of which qualifies the second(cannonball,spaceexploration,seabreeze, theBushadministration,etc.).The last case presents a special linguistic problem, which is sometimes referred to as the cannon ball problem. One aspect of the problem can be formulated in the following way: is it a contact group of two nouns or is the first word in this phrase an adjective homonymous with a noun? The arguments which support the former point of view are as follows: the first word in such contexts does not display any other qualities of the adjective, except for the function (it can not form the degrees of comparison, it cannot be modified by an adverb, etc.); besides, sometimes the first noun in such groups is used in the plural, e.g.:translations editor. An additional argument is purely semantic, cf.:a dangerous corner a danger signal;the adjectivedangerousdescribes the thing referred to by the following noun, so it is possible to ask a questionWhat kind of ?, while the noundangertells us what the purpose of the signal is, so the possible question isWhat for?Another aspect of the cannon ball problem is as follows: can the components of such contact groups be considered two separate words, or, as some linguists maintain, is it a kind of a compound word? The arguments which support the former point of view are as follows: a compound word is a stable, ready-made lingual unit, fixed in dictionaries, while most noun + noun groups are formed freely in speech; besides, they can be easily transformed into other types of word-combinations (this type of transformation test is known as the isolability test), e.g., prepositional word-combinations:acannon balla ball for cannon, space explorationexploration of space,etc.; compound words as a rule need additional transformations which explain their inner form, or etymological motivation, e.g.:a waterfall water of a stream, river, etc., falling straight down over rocks.So, combinations likespace explorationare combinations of two nouns, the first of which is used as an attribute of the other. They may include several noun attributes, especially in scientific style texts, e.g.:population density factor, space exploration programmes,etc.It must be admitted, though, that with some noun + noun word-combinations, especially if they become widely used and are fixed in dictionaries, their status becomes mixed, intermediary between a word and a phrase, and this is reflected by their one-word spelling and changes in accentuation; incidentally, the lexemecannonballtoday is considered a compound word spelled jointly according to the latest dictionaries.

The problem of further classification of the noun.As a part of speech, the noun is also characterised by a set of formal features determining its specific status in the lexical paradigm of nomination. It has its word-building distinctions, including typical suffixes, compound stem models, conversion patterns. It discriminates the grammatical categories of gender, number, case, article determination, which will be analysed below.The cited formal features taken together are relevant for the division of nouns into several subclasses, which are identified by means of explicit classificational criteria. The most general and rigorously delimited subclasses of nouns are grouped into four oppositional pairs.The first nounal subclass opposition differentiates proper and common nouns. The foundation of this division is "type of nomination". The second subclass opposition differentiates animate and inanimate nouns on the basis of "form of existence". The third subclass opposition differentiates human and non-human nouns on the basis of "personal quality". The fourth subclass opposition differentiates countable and uncountable nouns on the basis of "quantitative structure".Somewhat less explicitly and rigorously realised is the division of English nouns into concrete and abstract.The order in which the subclasses are presented is chosen by convention, not by categorially relevant features: each subclass correlation is reflected on the whole of the noun system; this means that the given set of eight subclasses cannot be structured hierarchically in any linguistically consistent sense (some sort of hierarchical relations can be observed only between animate inanimate and human non-human groupings). Consider the following examples: There were three Marys in our company. The cattle have been driven out into the pastures.The noun Mary used in the first of the above sentences is at one and the same time "proper" (first subclass division), "animate" (second subclass division), "human" (third subclass division), "countable" (fourth subclass division). The noun cattle used in the second sentence is at one and the same time "common" (first subclass division), "animate" (second subclass division), "non-human" (third subclass division), "uncountable" (fourth subclass division).The subclass differentiation of nouns constitutes a foundation for their selectional syntagmatic combinability both among themselves and with other parts of speech. In the selectional aspect of combinability, the subclass features form the corresponding selectional bases.In particular, the inanimate selectional base of combinability can be pointed out between the noun subject and the verb predicate in the following sentence: The sandstone was crumbling. (Not: *The horse was crumbling.)The animate selectional base is revealed between the noun subject and the verb in the following sentence: The poor creature was laming. (Not: *The tree was laming.)The human selectional base underlies the connection between the nouns in the following combination: John's love of music (not: *the cat's love of music).The phenomenon of subclass selection is intensely analysed as part of current linguistic research work.

Case. Definition of the category.The system of forms represents the category of case; its expressed grammatically and shows possessivity.Blokh: case is the morphological category manifested in the forms of the noun declension and showing the relation of the nounal referent to other objects and phenomena.Ilyish: case is the grammatical category of the noun expressing the relation of the thing denoted by the noun to other things, properties and actions, and manifested by some formal signs in the noun itself.Both definitions mention the grammatical form, but in Modern English relations of the nounal referent to other things may be expressed not only be the category of case but also by some other linguistic means (word order, prepositions).e.g. Mike found John in the hall.Case expresses the relation of a word to another word in the word-group or sentence (my sisters 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 :: sisters). 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 : Marys father Mary has a father,b)Subjective Genitive: The doctors arrival The doctor has arrived,c)Objective Genitive : The mans release The man was released,d)Adverbial Genitive : Two hours work X worked for two hours,e)Equation Genitive : a miles distance the distance is a mile,f)Genitive of destination: childrens books books for children,g)Mixed Group: yesterdays paper Nicks school cannot be reduced to one nucleus Johns 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 yesterdays 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 elses 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 doctors 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.

The question about the number of cases:a) the positional case theory (J.C. Nesfield, M. Bryant, M. Deutschbein)Its connected with the names of Pr. M.Deutshbein, pr. J. Nesfield, pr. M. Bryant. According to this theory, the English noun in addition to inflectional genitive case has got four inflectional cases. First of all, the nominative case, vocative case (the addressee of the action is mentioned e.g. Are you coming, my friend?), dative case (e.g. I gave John a ), accusative case (e.g. a cat caught a rat).The uninflexional cases of the noun are taken to be supported by the parallel inflexional cases of the personal pronouns. The would-be cases in question can be exemplified as follows.b) the theory of prepositional cases (G. Curme)5 cases. This theory is connected with the name of the Dutch scholar Curm. According to this theory, the genitive case may be expressed either by mean of s inflectional suffix or by the preposition of. And the dative case may be expressed either by means of word order or by the prepositions to and for.e.g. Will you buy some toys to/for John?3 cases. Scholars in Russia criticized these two theories very severely. They didnt find these theories acceptable, because in them morphological mean of expression (the category of case) are confused with some other linguistic means (word order and prepositions) that have nothing to do with morphology.) theory of possessive postposition (G.Vorontsova)According to this theory, the English noun hasnt got the category of case at all. From this point of view the s is not an inflectional suffix, instead it may be regarded as a sign of syntactic dependence. Its a kind of form-word like preposition.Proves: The expression of the nounal referents relation to other things by means of s is not the only way to express the bond, it is optional. -s is found in rather few cases, the majority of nouns havent got this grammatical category (e.g. street market, car keys). -s may be found not only after nouns but also after adverbs (e.g. yesterdays meeting, todays paper) and phrases (e.g. Henry the eights wives, Prince of Waless helicopter, man drivers rights, Mary and Johns wedding). It may be found at some distance from the noun it refers to (e.g. the man-I-saw-yesterdays son, the fellow-whats-his-names attacks). Pr. Ilyish considered this theory to be rather interesting because s really differs from inflectional suffixes in the classical sense of the word. But at the same time he says that -s is still uninflectional suffix showing the relation of the nounal referent to other things and phenomena. Its meaning is a pure case meaning. In most cases (96%) it is found with single nouns. d) the limited case theory (H. Sweet, O. Jesperson)Its the oldest theory and it was advanced by the two famous scholars of the past: pr. Sweet and pr. Jesperson. According to this theory, the noun in Modern English has 2 cases: common case and genitive or possessive case. This theory is based on the assumption that the English noun has got only one inflectional case form with s.This theory was supported by many scholars. The reason is the oppositional theory. In terms of the oppositional theory, this grammatical category is regarded by many scholars as a binary primitive opposition consisting of two opposite members. The genitive case is marked both in meaning and form. And the common case is unmarked. It is not so easy to define the meaning of the possessive case. Many scholars tried to enumerate its meanings: My brothers room (the meaning of possessivity); My friends enemy (the meaning of relation reminding us of other relation); The presidents arrival (the relation of an action); The mans execution (the relation of an object); Caws milk, an officers cap (qualitative relation). The category of case in the light of the oppositional theory. It contradicts the oppositional theory to a certain extent. Pr. Ilyish found rather an easy way to solve this difficulty. In his opinion its possible to define the meaning of the possessive case as possessivity in a wide sense of the word. The meaning of the unmarked member is usually defined in the negative in comparison with the marked member. Many scholars tried to enumerate the meanings of the common case. The general meaning can be defined like this: the common case doesnt express possessivity in the wide sense of the word. Still another way to explain this mute problem can be found in the theory of prototypes originated by pr. Rosch. Case is the immanent morphological category of the noun manifested in the forms of noun declension and showing the relations of the nounal referent to other objects and phenomena. Thus, the case form of the noun, or contractedly its "case" (in the narrow sense of the word), is a morphological-declensional form. This category is expressed in English by the opposition of the form in -'s [-z, -s, -iz], usually called the "possessive" case, or more traditionally, the "genitive" case (to which term we will stick in the following presentation*), to the unfeatured form of the noun, usually called the "common" case. The apostrophised -s serves to distinguish in writing the singular noun in the genitive case from the plural noun in the common case. E.g.: the man's duty, the President's decision, Max's letter; the boy's ball, the clerk's promotion, the Empress's jewels. The genitive of the bulk of plural nouns remains phonetically unexpressed: the few exceptions concern only some of the irregular plurals. Thereby the apostrophe as the graphic sign of the genitive acquires the force of a sort of grammatical hieroglyph. Cf.: the carpenters' tools, the mates' skates, the actresses' dresses.

The essence of number as a grammatical category.Number is one of the grammatical categories of the noun which shows whether a noun in one of its uses in speech denotes one object or more than one object. As any other grammatical category it may be regarded as a set of opposite numbers.

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 ( or uncountableness - money, milk).The plural form may denote:a)the existence of several objects (cats);b)the inner discreteness ( , 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 number in the light of the oppositional theory. Strong member of the opposition: ways of expressing the plural in English.

The opposition representing the category of number contains only two opposite members: the plural number and the singular or the non-plural number. Thus we may say that this is a privative binary opposition. The plural number is the marked member of the opposition and the non-plural is the unmarked member. The form of the singular number as the unmarked member of the opposition is expressed by the zero inflectional suffix. The form of the plural number contains the positive morpheme of the plural. This form has a number of allomorphs, that is the variants of the morpheme. The allomorphs of the morpheme of the plural are: the s- inflectional suffix which has got in its turn three phonetic variants (/z/, /s/, /iz/). The en- inflectional suffix exists in one set of forms (ox-oxen). The plural number may be also expressed by sound interchange (man-men), sound interchange and the ren inflectional suffix (child-children, brother-brethren).A number of nouns have the plural form identical with the singular (dear-dear, sheep-sheep, so on). Some nouns of foreign origin build up the form of the plural number in the foreign manner. That is in the way this form is made in the language it is borrowed from. The major stock comes from Latin and Greek (cactus-cacti). It is necessary t note that in the process of assimilation some nouns of foreign origin acquire the s- inflectional suffix in the plural.Not all nouns have the category of number as their property. Thus with regard to the grammatical category of number we may divide the class of nouns into two big groups: countables (the nouns that have got the category of number) and uncoutables (havent got this category).

The sphere of operation of the category of number within the morphological system of the noun. Countable & uncountable nouns. Singularia & pluralia tantum nouns.

The uncountable nouns are outside the grammatical category of number. Yet they are treated by the speakers of the language either as singulars or plurals. This is justified both by the form of the nouns and their combinability. e.g. The milk is fresh.His wages were high.All the nouns that havent got the category of number may be divided into two groups: Singularia tantum nouns include mass-nouns (milk, bread, gold, game, toast), abstract nouns (knowledge, love, hatred), some collective nouns (peasantry, intelligentsia). In the sub-class of s.t.n. we find a number of nouns with the s- inflectional suffix, such as some sciences, names of some diseases, and certain games (cards, billiards). Pluralia tantum nouns include the names of objects consisting of two or more parts (trousers, goods, wages), militia(), police, people havent got the s- inflectional suffix but nevertheless are treated by the speakers as plural, it justifies their combinability. Here also belong athletics, acoustics, ethics, hysterics and politics.

Some difficult cases within the category of number.Some nouns in English present certain difficulties for the analysis of the category of number. First of all, here belong rather many nouns denoting materials and some nouns denoting abstract notions, such as snow, water, copper, iron and so on. The difficulty lies in the fact that such words are sometimes used with the s- inflectional suffix of the plural (the snows of the Arctic).Professor Ilyish discusses this question in detail and comes to the conclusion that such words are not singularia tantum nouns. Some scholars suggest another approach. Professor Haimovich and Rogovskaya find out that different semantic variants of one and the same word may belong to different grammatical sub-classes. e.g. water1. The name of material (s.t.n.) 2. A large are covered with water (p.t.n.)beauty1. quality2. Its concrete manifestation ().Beer1. Name of the material (s.t.n.)2. Some portion of this material 3. Types or sorts of this material (p.t.n.)

a) The lexical-grammatical characteristics of the adjective;b) The morphological characteristics of the adjective;c) The syntactical characteristics of the adjectiveThe adjective as a part of speech includes words denoting different attributes of substances, that is different properties of substances, such as size, form, colour, quality, position at space, physical states of living-beings, psychic states. Thus the lexico-grammatical meaning of the adjective is property. This mean is sometimes supported by special adjectival lexico-grammatical morphemes, suffixes and prefixes. Suffixes: -ful, -less, -ive, -al, -able, -eble, -ish, -some. Prefixes: -un, -in, -il-, -ir, -pre. At the same times many adjectives havent got any adjectival lexico-grammatical morphemes.The adjective in English is characterized by the scantiness() of its morphological distinction. The only grammatical category to be mentioned in connection with the English adjective is the category of degrees of comparison. And even this category is not the property of the whole class.The syntactic characteristics:-The combinability on the phrase level.The adjective is combined as a nucleus of a word combination with an adverb of degree. As an agent the adjective is combined with the noun. - The syntactic function in the sentence.The most typical function is that of an attribute to a noun. In this function the adjective may enter practically any part of the sentence. It may also be used as the nominal part of a compound nominal predicate.

The problem of the subclassesIt has been common for a long time to divide adjectives into two subclasses according to their meanings and some of their grammatical characteristics. These subclasses were called qualitative adjectives and relative adjectives. Qualitative adjectives denote different qualities of substances, relative adjectives denote different properties of objects and phenomena through the medium of some other objects and phenomena (e.g. the weather is quite Crimean).Qualitative adjectives have got the category of degrees of comparison, relative adjectives havent. Of course, there are some exceptions. Some qualitative adjectives havent got this category because of their lexico-grammatical meaning (e.g. supreme, extreme). In this category we also include such adjectives as with suffix ish, deaf, blind, lame, that contain a certain degree in their lexical meaning, but the idea of comparison is absurd.We cant see that this classification doesnt fully reflect the grammatical properties of the adjectives. For example, the relation of the adjectives to the category of degrees of comparison. Therefore there appeared at attempts to classify adjectives. Pr. Rogovskaya mentions two subclasses: comparable and non-comparable according to the relation to the category of degrees of comparison. Pr. Blokh is of the opinion that degrees of comparison are potentially represented in the whole class of adjectives. Thats why for him the category of degrees of comparison doesnt serve as the ground for classification. Pr. Blokh divides adjectives into evaluative and specificative, relying more on their lexical meanings.

The category of the degrees of comparison.It should be noted that the comparative and the superlative degrees denote the same property of substance as the positive degree. Thus the forms older and the oldest dont necessarily mean very old or extremely old. In fact they may mean quite young.The question arises what the category of degrees of comparison shows. It shows whether and adjective in speech denotes a property absolutely on the one hand or relatively on the other. In comparison with the same quality some other substances have.b) There are different approaches to this question. Pr. Smirnitsky following Pr. Jesperson, thought there were two degrees of comparison: a positive and a relative degree, the latter existing in the varieties: comparative and superlative. This interpretation fully corresponds to the above given idea concerning the essence of the category of degrees of comparison. Nowadays most scholars think that there are three degrees of comparison: a positive, a comparative and a superlative degree.c) In terms of the oppositional theory this category could be regarded as a triple privative opposition with the positive degree being the unmarked member and the comparative and the superlative degrees serving as the marked members of the opposition. Further on attention was paid to the fact that the unmarked member was unmarked only in the form, but not in the meaning. Thus, yet another type of the opposition was applied and thus we get the triple gradual opposition. By many, this category is considered to be the only example of gradual opposition in English morphology. The meaning of the comparative degree is a larger amount of the quality of the substance, as compared with same quality of another substance. The meaning on the superlative degree is the largest amount of the quality. The category of the positive degree doesnt demonstrate any definite meaning. It characterized by the absence of meaning of other members. If we interpret the category of degrees of comparison as a triple opposition of the gradual type, the above given definition will not fully correspond to it. Hence, the category of degrees of comparison shows whether an adjective in speech denotes a property absolutely or relatively, indicating a larger or the largest amount of this property.

The problem of the combinations like "more important" & "most important".All scholars agree that there exists the morphological way to express the comparative and the superlative degrees synthetically and the suppletive way in some cases at least. Some scholars also point out that there exists the analytical way. Recently there appeared a view that the combinations of more/most + adjective should be regarded as phrases or presyntactical combinations. To prove this the scholars put forward a number of arguments. One of the strongest arguments is that the words more and most may combine with other parts of speech and convey practically the same meaning. Alongside the combinations of more and most there exist the combinations with less/least + adjective. These combinations are treated as free syntactical combinations practically by all scholars. On this basis Pr. Ilyish notes that there is no sufficient reason to treat this pairs of combinations in two different ways. Some scholars however try to defend the traditional point of view. Pr. Haimovich and Rogovskaya try to prove that more/most + adjective are nearly grammatical forms of two different degrees of comparison. The meanings of more and most are practically the same as those of -er and -est.The distribution of the forms with more and most as compared with the forms er ad est is complementary. We can hardly say the same about less/least + adjective. Having examined different points of view Pr. Ilyish comes to the conclusion that strict grammatical considerations tend to the idea that more/most + adjective are free syntactical combinations.A very interesting solution to the problem is suggested by Pr. Blokh. He agrees with Pr. Ilyish that there is no necessity to treat more/most + adjective and less/least + adjective in different ways. He comes to another conclusion. In his opinion these combinations belong to the category of degrees of comparison. The latter, thus, has five forms for three degrees of comparison.

Substantivisation of adjectives.This phenomenon is characteristic not only of English but also of other Indo-European languages, Russian, for instance. Under certain instance. lso of other indoeuropean languagescircumstances are substantivized that is inverted into nouns. When they undergo this process adjectives acquire the characteristics of a noun. When they undergo this process, an adjective acquire the characteristics of a noun, to be more exact its lexico-grammatical meaning, the grammatical category of number and case, the ability to be used in the function of the subject and the object. In this context a word is considered to be a noun not an adjective. In some cases we deal with complete substantivisation. In many other cases, however, substantivisation is only partial. Such adjectives acquire only some properties of the noun its lexico-grammatical meaning of substance, the ability to combine with the definite article, the ability to be used in the function of the subject and the object. But they dont have the grammatical category of number and case, the ability to combine with the indefinite article. According to pr. Ilyish, these words are partially substantivized and occupy an intermediate position between nouns and adjectives.(privates,natives,,,the reach, the English, the unforgettable)

The question about the morphological status of stative words.There are a number of words in English having the prefix a- and the general meaning of state, such as afraid, asleep, alone, agog, adrift, alike, afloat, etc. These words are traditionally regarded as adjectives, but if we compare some characteristics of these words with those of adjectives, we shall see that they have some peculiarities. They are particularly different from the bulk of adjectives as to their syntactical function.It is well known that for the most part an adjective appears in attributive word combinations. But words of the afraid-type are rarely used in this syntactical function. For the most part they are used predicatively that is the nominal part of a compound nominal predicate. This peculiarity of the afraid-type words was noticed rather a long time ago both by the grammarians and lexicographers. That is why in the dictionary such words can be marked as predicative adjectives.

The question about the possibility of establishing stative words as a separate part of speech.The first to examine the characteristics of stative words in greater detail was Pr. Ilysh in 1948. He called it the theory of Stative words. He examined the characteristics of these words on the basis of the criteria applied for establishing different parts of speech. And he came to the conclusion that the distinctive features of the afraid-type words were strong enough to single them out as a separate part of speech the category of state, which is the loan () translation of the Russian term . Later, Pr. Ilysh gave another term the Stative. Having examined all the characteristics of the afraid-type words he tried to prove that they differed from adjectives not only as far as their syntactical functions work and sound, but also in the sphere of their lexico-grammatical and morphological characteristics. First of all he thought, that the meaning of state could be regarded as categorical, lying at the basis of different parts of speech. From his point of view the meaning of state is different from the meaning of property. The lexico-grammatical meaning of property is characteristic of the adjectives, while the meaning of state is characteristic of Stative. As for the lexico-grammatical morphemes Pr. Ilysh found that the morpheme A could be looked upon as the lexico-grammatical morpheme of Stative. As to their morphological characteristics, he thought that these words havent got any grammatical categories; they are unchangeable in contrast with adjectives. The most striking difference between the Stative and the adjectives lies in the syntactic characteristics, they demonstrate in the combinability on the phrase level and in their syntactic function on the sentence level. On the phrase level the most common combinative model of an adjective is the right-hand connection with a noun. This combinative model is found with many other parts of speech, not only with an adjective. The striking thing is that this position is alien to the Stative. Although there are some exceptions (an aloof manner ), in general we dont use this combinative model for the Stative. E.g. A man alive to social interests. On the sentence level Stative words also differ from adjectives. The Stative is used only predicatively from the point of view of Pr. Ilysh. The existence of all these considerations permitted Pr. Ilysh to conclude that the afraid-type words made up a separate part of speech. This theory was accepted rather broadly and the Stative was looked upon as a separate part of speech.

Arguments against and in favour of establishing stative words as a separate part of speech.Pr. Ilysh considered stative words as a separate part of speech, but 10 years later in 1958 Pr.. published an article in which he tried to criticize the Stative theory. His arguments: 1) the meaning of state is but a variety of the meaning of property, which is a pure adjectival lexico-grammatical meaning; 2) some words like these may be preceded by more and most. Thus they have got degrees of comparison (more ashamed); 3) turning to the combinability characteristics, Pr. Barkhudarov couldnt but agree that such words have some peculiarities as compared with near adjectives. But basically their combinability is practically the same. He says that such words may combine with adverbs like adjectives (E.g. deadly tired painfully alive). He says that words of this type could function as predicatives and as attributes. Usually they are used in the function of post-positive attributes (E.g. the Child asleep), less frequently they may be found in the function of pre-positive attributes (an aloof manner, an alive one). Later on, come other scholars (especially Pr. Blokh, Pr. Ivanova) also criticized Pr. Ilyshs theory of a Stative as a separate part of speech. They practically repeated Pr. Barkhuudarovs criticism, but gave their own examples. They said that state is a variety of property. Pr. Blokh: state may be expressed not only by Stative words, but also by near adjectives, such as expectant, healthy, hungry, etc, its sure a state than a property.E.g. a living predecessor = a predecessor alive. Some of these words may be found in the comparative and the superlative degree. E.g. Of us all John was the most aware of the situation. As to the combinability characteristics, Pr. Blokh and Pr. Ivanova couldnt but agree that such words have some peculiarities. They differ at least negatively from the bulk of adjectives. They cannot be used in some combinations in which adjectives are used. Basically, there is hardly any difference between them. They are mainly used in the same syntactic models and function in the sentence:E.g. The house was astir. The household was excited. We found the house astir = We found the household excited. Stative words can also function as attributes. Pr. Blokh gave some quantative considerations. He said that there were about a dozen of stable units belonging to this group, and thrice as many unstable ones. At the same time, there are not so many Stative words. This consideration also serves as a proof that Stative is evidently a subclass of an adjective and not a separate part of speech.

Difficulties of establishing the pronoun as a separate part of speech.Difficulties of establishing the pronoun as a separate part of speech had caused many difficulties. Some of the pronouns seem to share the essential characteristics with the noun (he, she, one, anybody). Some other pronouns seem to have smt in common with the adj. Hence, some think that the pronoun was not a separate part of speech and words of this class should be distinguished among nouns and adj. nowadays, the pronoun is regarded as a separate part of speech. It is necessary to clear up the question about its distinctive features which may be different from other parts of speech. Most scholars agree that the main point of differentiation b/w the pronoun and other parts of speech lies in the fact that the pronoun denotes reality, the noun denotes substances by naming them, the adj which attributes, properties of a substance. Also, by naming them; as for the pronoun, it denotes both substances and their properties by indicating them (pointing them out without naming). Thus, the pronoun is recognized on the basis of its indicatory and substitution semantics functions. The 2 kinds of mean form a unity in which indicatory (deictic) semantics its primary.

The question about the lexical-grammatical meaning of the pronoun.As a matter of fact, indication is the basis of a substitution. A certain noun may be substituted by the pronoun only because the pronoun indicates the same substance as the noun. The noun names, the pronoun indicates. considers that it is possible to defy the lexico-grammatical meaning of the pronoun as indication (or deixis), that pronoun may be looked upon as a separate part of speech at least at the point view of its lexico-grammatical mean. nowadays, the pronoun is regarded as a separate part of speech. It is necessary to clear up the question about its distinctive features which may be different from other parts of speech. Most scholars agree that the main point of differentiation b/w the pronoun and other parts of speech lies in the fact that the pronoun denotes reality, the noun denotes substances by naming them, the adj which attributes, properties of a substance. Also, by naming them; as for the pronoun, it denotes both substances and their properties by indicating them (pointing them out without naming). Thus, the pronoun is recognized on the basis of its indicatory and substitution semantics functions. The 2 kinds of mean form a unity in which indicatory (deictic) semantics its primary.

Subclasses of the pronoun.According to traditional classification the pronoun has a number of sub classes. This number varies depending on the scholarly trend. We may find from 9 to 11 subclasses: 1.Personal.2.Possessive(my,his)3.Reflexive(-self)4.Impathetic (-self; serves to lay emphasis):he did it himself .5Reciprocal (each other/one another).6.Demonstrative(this, that, the same).7.Inerrogative (which,who)8.conjunctive (whom,whose,serve to connect sentence).9.relative (which, that)serve to introduce attributive subordinate clauses.10,indefinite(some,any,smt)11.negative(nobody,none)12.generelazing (all, every)13.quantative(much, little, many)14.Contrastive(other,another). This classif is useful from pract point of view, but as far as its theory below is concerned this classification seems more semantic that grammatical. That is why some scholars found it necessary to introduce another classification. They point out:1.noun-pronoun (he, she, smth, smb).2.adj-pronoun (which, whose, his, other).This classification is based on a rather more formal criteria than traditional classification. This classification is more grammatical, but at the same time, there are noun-pronoun and adj-pr. That do not demonstrate any form of characterization of the noun and the adj. there are some pronouns which belong to both classes: What is this?(noun-pr.) This dictionary (adj-pr). It is possible to speak of a 2 variants of the same pronoun, belonging to different subclasses.

Morphological characteristics of the pronoun.The pronouns cannot be characterized by the uniformity of their morphemic characteristics, even those belonging to one of the subclasses. N-pr. have not got the same morphemic characteristics as the noun and adj have not got the same morphemic characteristics as the adj. N-pr. have got some characteristics similar to those of the noun. Some of the n-pr. have the category of number and some have the category of case. Number: a few n-pr. have the cat of number (that-those, this-these, other-others).the pronoun this/that have the cat of noun as n-pr and adj-pr.(these are the questions we want to discuss). In this case we have n-pr. Some of the pronoun combine with other words either in the singular or in the pl. without changing their form (some books, money).Some pr. have not got the cat of number, cause they have always either sg or pl in the meaning (much,every,each,few,all,many).Case.The pr has got 2 systems of case.1.includes the common and the possessive cases (one-ones/nobody s).2.The other system includes the nominal/objective cases. It is necessary to know that case system of pers pr undergoes serious changes. Nowadays, there is a tendency at work to use the objective case not only in the function of an object, but also in the function of the predicative.(It is me). Another tendency is to use the form them or there (she/he plus self)herself and himself-themselves.

Syntactical properties of the pronoun. Combinability (phrase level) and the syntactical function (sentence level).

The pronoun cannot be characterized by the uniformity of their combinative models. Their combinability differs from that of the both nouns and adj that may serve as another prove that the pronoun is a separate part of speech. There is only one noun-pronoun which have the same combinative model as the noun. (Show me another suit. A grey one.). Some of the pronoun have the post positive agent as an attribute (smt terrible). The pronouns are usually not preceded by an adjective as the nouns are. Some of a pronoun does not combine with any other words (smb, he/she). Some of the adj pronouns form a right hand connection with a noun thus serving attributively (my book, his story). But even this model doesnt complete resemble the model A+N of the adj. A tall boy (A+N).The pronoun take the position of the article not of the adj (That tall boy). This is the position of a determination and it is typical for articles and adj pronouns. However, there are some other adj pronouns that take the position before determination.(All these boys). This position is called The pre-determinate position. There is one adj pronoun with the same combinative model as the adj.-other(The other book). As for the syntactical function in the sentences all noun-pr are used in the function of the subject, object, predicative (. . ). Adj-pr.are used in the function of the attribute, but if we draw a line of difference b/w the attribute and the determina, than we must say that only the pr Other is used in the pure function of the attribute. And other adj pronouns are used in the function of the determina as they occupied exactly the same place as the article.

The Verb. The category of tense. DefinitionVerb -part of speech with grammatical meaning of process, action, performs the central role of the predicative function of the sentence.Classificationaccord to semantic value Notional(full nominative meaning, independent in expression of process),Functional and Semi-funct(partial nominative value, depend on other words in denotation of process, are predicators): they are subdivided into Auxiliary(build analytical form of notional verb have done, was lost, etc; Link(connect predicative with subject pure link verb-to be, specifying link verbs specify connection betw subject and its property);Modal(predicators, denote subject attitudes to action-obligation,ability,etc);Verbid introducers-introduce non-finite forms of verbs into structure of sentence). Notional verbs subdivided into:acc to subject-process relation-Actional(action performed by subject as active doer), Statal(denote various states of subject); acc to combinability features-Transitive(action directed towards certain object),Intransitive and Complimentive Discussing the question about a definition of this grammatical category, Pr. Ilysh points out that the basic features of this category appear the same in English as in other Indo-European languages. Therefore he says: There since no necessity to look for a special definition of tense for English. In English, as well, as in other languages, the category of tense reflects the objective category of time. And upon this background expresses the relation of the time of the action, denoted by the predicate verb and the time of utterance. In other words, the grammatical category of tense shows the time of the action with reference to the moment of speech. This definition is expected by most scholars. There may be some variations, but on the whole the scholars support the above given definition. There was a time when scholars spoke about a large number of tenses (in American linguistics they used to single out 100; traditional number 26 10 passive, 16 active). English like the other Germanic languages, and Russian, and many others has only 2 tenses: past and non-past. It was discovered that such terms as the Present Continuous; Present Perfect; Present Perfect Continuous and the like were combinations of forms, constituting several grammatical classes of the verb (tense, aspect and correlation)E.g. TENSE: past non-past,ASPECT: continues non-continues,CORRELATION: perfect non-perfect,VOICE: passive non-passive,MOOD. I have been reading blend of non-past tense, continues aspect, perfect correlation, non-passive voice, indicative mood.

Tense as a triple opposition (B. Ilysh)Pr. Ilysh is of the opinion that the free main divisions of the objective time are represented by 3 tenses both in English and in Russian: Present, Past, Future. The Present tense shows that the action takes place either at the moment of speech or somehow includes this moment.The Past tense shows that the action precedes the moment of speech. The Future tense shows that the action follows the moment of speech. In terms of the oppositional theory, the category of tense may be spoken of as a triple opposition, containing 3 opposite members. The present tense is unmarked member and the past and future are marked members. It should be noted that many scholars had doubts about the existence of future tense in English. Pr. Jespersen discussed this question more than once. In his opinion, the combinations of will/ shall + V are modal phrases, that is they are combinations of the notional verb in its infinitival form with modal verbs will/ shall. His argument, in favor of this point of view, is that shall/ will as modal verbs has their own lexical meaning and in many cases when we form the traditional future tense, the lexical meanings of shall/ will are retained by these words.The view, according to which the verb in English has not got the future opposite is supported by rather many scholars nowadays, especially abroad. Thus prof of London University group, describe different ways of expressing futurity rather than the future as a separate tense. In Russia, this view was actively advanced by the Pr. Barkh. In favor of this view he put forward a number of arguments: 1. Corresponds to Jespersens: shall/ will are modal verbs and the combinations of shall/ will + V are modal phrases like can + V; must + V; etc. and no matter whether the combinations of shall/ will + V express futurity or not, they cannot be taken as a specific form of the future opposite. 2. Futurity may be expressed in English not only by the combinations of shall/ will + V. 3. A strong argument against considering shall/ will + V as a future opposite is the existence of the so-called future in the past forms in English. Pr. Barkhudarov considers should/ would to be the forms of shall/ will in the Past Tense. Thus if we take shall/ will + V for a future opposite, than should/ would + V will be a union of the future and the past which is illogical and theoretically impossible.

Future tense in English. Tense as a binary opposition (L. Barkhudarov) The view, according to which the verb in English has not got the future opposite is supported by rather many scholars nowadays, especially abroad. Thus prof of London University group, describe different ways of expressing futurity rather than the future as a separate tense. In Russia, this view was actively advanced by the Pr. Barkh. In favor of this view he put forward a number of arguments: 1. Corresponds to Jespersens: shall/ will are modal verbs and the combinations of shall/ will + V are modal phrases like can + V; must + V; etc. and no matter whether the combinations of shall/ will + V express futurity or not, they cannot be taken as a specific form of the future opposite. 2. Futurity may be expressed in English not only by the combinations of shall/ will + V. 3. A strong argument against considering shall/ will + V as a future opposite is the existence of the so-called future in the past forms in English. Pr. Barkhudarov considers should/ would to be the forms of shall/ will in the Past Tense. Thus if we take shall/ will + V for a future opposite, than should/ would + V will be a union of the future and the past which is illogical and theoretically impossible. Pr. Barkh comes to the conclusion that the category of the tense in English is constituted by only 2 opposite members: the Present tense and the Past tense. Then he goes on to discuss the term Present. It doesnt seem to be a good one, because in many scholars opinion, it is not quite correct. Here we mean that the present tense doesnt always show the coincidence of the action with the moment of speech. Sometimes it expresses a more or less long period of time, including the moment of speech, but not necessarily coinciding with it (the plane is taking off in 3 min).Pr. Barkh. mentions that sometimes the form of the present may show the time following the moment of speech: E.g. we are giving a concert tomorrow; the train leaves at 10.30. Thus it is better to use the term non-past than present. It is particularly convenient when the category of tense is represented as an opposition of 2 opposite members. So this category may be looked upon as binary privative opposition. As for the meaning and forms of the members, we defined them like this: Past is the time, preceding the moment of speech or having no association with the moment of speech what so ever (Barkh). The meaning of the non-past we dont define at all or do it negatively in comparison with the marked member. Thus non-past expresses the non-past time doesnt precede the moment of speech and may be associated with it.

The category of primary time & the category of prospective time (M. Blokh)According to Blokh it is possible to establish 2 temporal grammatical categories in English. In his opinion the forms of past, non-past, future and future in the past constitute two different temporal categories. They are closely connected because they are both temporal, but at the same time they have distinctive features of their own. The first temporal category the category of primary time is constituted by two opposite members: past and non-past. In his opinion the future can hardly be included in this system if only because it has two variants: the future and the future-in-the-past. The second temporal category is the category of prospect/prospective time. It also includes two members: future and non-future. Thus both these categories may be looked upon as binary privative oppositions. The category of prospective time shows whether an action coincides with some moment in the past or with the moment of speech or whether it follows that moment. So it is purely relative because it is not necessarily connected with the moment of speech, not always pr