GRAMMAR IN THE SYSTEMIC CONCEPTION OF LANGUAGE

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GRAMMAR IN THE SYSTEMIC CONCEPTION OF LANGUAGE

Language is a system of specific interconnected and interdependent lingual signs united by their common function of forming, storing and exchanging ideas in the process of human intercourse.

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; nevertheless, they render meanings of various kinds, including grammatical meanings; they are: intonation contours, accents, pauses, patterns of word-order, etc. examples: He is at home (statement). – Is he at home? (question).

Segmental lingual units form a hierarchy of levels.

The 1^st level is formed by phonemes, the smallest material lingual elements, or segments. They have form, but they have no meaning.. E.g.: man – men.

The 2^nd level is composed of morphemes, the smallest meaningful elements built up by phonemes. The shortest morpheme can consist of one phoneme, e.g.: step-s; -s renders the meaning of the 3rd person singular form of the verb, or, the plural form of the noun.

The 3rd level consists of words, or lexemes, nominative lingual units,

The 4^th level is formed by word-combinations, or phrasemes, the combinations of two or more notional words things, actions, qualities, and even situations,

The 5^th level is the level of sentences, or proposemes, lingual units which name certain situations, or events, and at the same time express predication, the sentence is often defined as a predicative lingual unit. The minimal sentence can consist of just one word, e.g.: Fire!

The 6^th level is formed by sentences in a text or in actual speech.

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. E.g.: He started laughing

paradigmatic. The term is derived from the word “paradigm” and denotes the relations between elements in paradigms in the system of language., e.g., the category of number or case of the noun: in Russian – стол – стола – столу – столом – на столе; in English – toy – toys; tooth – teeth; children – children’s,

The study of grammar may be either practical (practical grammar), which describes grammar as a set of rules and regulations to follow, or theoretical (theoretical grammar), aiming at the explanation of how and why the grammatical system works.

The parts of speech are further subdivided into nouns, verbs, adjective, adverbs, functional parts of speech; this subdivision of grammar is known as morphology. Sentences are further subdivided into simple and composite: composite sentences are subdivided into complex and compound, etc.; this subdivision of grammar is known as syntax.

one more fundamental type of relation between language elements is to be distinguished: synchronic relations between language elements coexisting at a certain period of time, and diachronic relations between lingual elements of a certain type at different time periods. For example, synchronic relations in New English: hard – harder – hardest; synchronic relations in Old English: heard - heardra - heardost; diachronic relations: hard – heard; harder – heardra; hardest – heardost. Ү г.

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NOUN: GENERAL

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:. Nouns denote things and objects proper (tree), abstract notions (love), various qualities (bitterness), and even actions (movement).

Formally, the noun is characterized by a specific set of word-building affixes and word-building models, which unmistakably mark a noun, among them:

- suffixes of the doer (worker, naturalist, etc.),

-suffixes of abstract notions (laziness, rotation, security, elegance, etc.),

-special conversion patterns (to find – a find), etc.

As for word-changing categories, the noun is changed according to

-the categories of number (boy-boys), case (boy-boy’s),

-and article determination (boy, a boy, the boy).

. The noun is the only part of speech which can be prepositionally combined with other words, e.g.: the book of the teacher, to go out of the room, away from home, typical of the noun, etc.

The most characteristic functions of the noun in a sentence are the function of a subject and an object e.g.: The teacher took the book.

On the basis of “type of nomination” proper nouns are opposed to common nouns.

Common nouns present a general name of any thing belonging to a certain class of things, e.g.: river – any river, boy – any boy,

while the proper nouns have no generalized meaning; they serve as a label, a nickname of a separate individual being or thing, e.g.: Mississippi, John, New York, etc.

animate nouns the former denoting living beings the latter denoting things (man, woman, dog), are opposed to phenomena (tree, table). inanimate nouns,

On the basis of “personal quality” human animate nouns (person nouns man – he, woman – she, ), denoting human beings, or persons, are opposed to non-human nouns (non-person nouns e.g.: the sun - he, the moon - she ) , denoting all the other referents.

On the basis of “quantitative structure” of the referent countable (variable) nouns table – tables, are opposed to uncountable (invariable) noun (sugar), s, the former denoting discrete, separate things which can be counted and form discrete multitudes

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ADJECTIVE

The adjective expresses the categorial meaning of property of a substance, e.g.: hard work. That means that semantically the adjective is a bound word of partial nominative value: it can not be used without a word denoting the substance which it characterizes e.g.: Red is my favourite colour; The blouse is a bit small. Have you got a bigger one?

Adjectives are distinguished by a specific combinability with the nouns which they modify, with link verbs and with modifying adverbs. The functions adjectives perform the function of an attribute e.g.: a suspicious man; a man suspicious of his wife;

when combined with link verbs they perform the function of a predicative e.g.: The man was very suspicious of his wife.

Formally, adjectives are characterized by a specific set of

word-building affixes, e.g.: hopeful, flawless, bluish, famous, decorative, accurate, inaccurate, basic, etc.

As for word-changing categories, the adjective had a number of reflective categories in Old English: it agreed with the noun in number, case and gender; all these forms were lost in the course of historical development and today the only morphological category of the adjective is the immanent category of comparison.

The category of comparison Three forms constitute this category: the positive degree, the comparative degree, and the superlative degree forms of the adjective.

The basic form, known as the positive degree, has no special formal mark, e.g.: tall, beautiful;

the comparative degree is marked by two kinds of forms; synthetical forms with the suffix “-er” and analytical forms with the auxiliary word more, e.g.: taller, more beautiful;

the superlative degree is also formed either synthetically with the help of the grammatical suffix “-est”, or analytically with the help of the auxiliary word most, e.g.: tallest, most beautiful.

. Adjectives are traditionally divided on the basis of their semantics into two grammatically relevant subclasses: qualitative and relative adjectives. Qualitative adjectives denote the qualities of objects as such, e.g.: red, long beautiful, etc

. Relative adjectives denote qualities of objects in relation to other objects; such adjectives are usually derived from nouns, e.g.: wood – wooden, ice – icy, etc.

LECTURE 8

ADVERB the adverb denotes non-substantive properties: in most cases the properties of actions (to walk quickly), or the properties of other properties (very quick), or the properties of the situations in which the processes occur (to walk again).

In other words, the adverb can be defined as a qualifying word of the secondary qualifying order, while the adjective is a primary qualifying word.

Adverbs are characterized by their combinability with verbs, adjectives and other adverbs, which they modify. They perform the functions of various adverbial modifiers: of time (yesterday), place (there), of manner (secretly), etc. The adverbs which refer to whole situations are defined as situation-“determinants”, e.g.: They quarreled again.

In accordance with their form, adverbs are divided into simple and derived. There are few simple adverbs, most of them are of a functional or semi-functional character, e.g.: more, very, there, then, here, etc.

The characteristic adverbial word-building affixes are the following: simply, clockwise, backward, ahead, etc. The most productive derivational model of adverbs is the one with the suffix ‘-ly’. It is so highly productive that practically every adjective has its adverbial counterpart, e.g.: simple - simply, soft – softly, etc.;

The other structural types are compound adverbs, e.g.: sometimes, downstairs, etc., and stable adverbial phrases or composite phrasal adverbs, e.g.: upside down, at least, a great deal of, from

Traditionally, adverbs are divided on the basis of their general semantics into qualitative, quantitative, and circumstantial.

The qualitative adverbs denote the inherent qualities of actions and other qualities; most of them are derived from qualitative adjectives, e.g.: bitterly, hard, beautifully, well, etc.

The quantitative adverbs show quantity measure; genuine quantitative adverbs are usually derived from numerals, e.g.: twice, three times, tenfold, manifold, etc.

The circumstantial adverbs denote mainly the circumstances of time and place (they can also be defined as “orientative”), e.g.: today, here, when, far, ashore, abroad, often, etc.

Аdverbs (qualitative adverbs, predominantly) distinguish the category of comparison and have five morphological forms: one positive, two comparative (direct and reverse) and two superlative (direct and reverse), e.g.: bitterly – more bitterly, less bitterly – most bitterly, least bitterly.

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SENTENCE: GENERAL

The sentence, as has been mentioned, is the central object of study in syntax. It can be defined as the immediate integral unit of speech built up by words according to a definite syntactic pattern and distinguished by a contextually relevant communicative purpose.

The correlation of the word and the sentence shows some important differences and similarities between these two main level-forming lingual units. Both of them are nominative units, but the word just names objects and phenomena of reality; it is a purely nominative component of the word-stock, while the sentence is at the same time a nominative and predicative lingual unit

A sentence can consist of only one word, as any lingual unit of the upper level can consist of only one unit of the lower level, e.g.: Why? Thanks

Another difference between the word and the sentence is as follows: the word exists in the system of language as a ready-made unit, which is reproduced in speech; the sentence is produced each time in speech, except for a limited number of idiomatic utterances. The sentence belongs primarily to the sphere of speech

Being a unit of speech, the sentence is distinguished by a relevant intonation: each sentence possesses certain intonation contours, including pauses, pitch movements and stresses,

The definition of the category of predication is similar to the definition of the category of modality, which also shows a connection between the named objects and actual reality. However, modality is a broader category, revealed not only in grammar, but in the lexical elements of language; for example, various modal meanings are expressed by

modal verbs (can, may, must, etc.),

by word-particles of specifying modal semantics (just, even, would-be, etc.),

by semi-functional modal words and phrases of subjective evaluation (perhaps, unfortunately, by all means, etc.) and

by other lexical units.

Predication can be defined as syntactic modality, expressed by the sentence.

The center of predication in the sentence is the finite form of the verb, the predicate: it is through the finite verb’s categorial forms of tense, mood, and voice that the main predicative meanings, actual evaluations of the event, are expressed

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