Lecture 4. The Category of Definetness / Indefinetness

The Category of Definetness/Indefinetness is expressed by means of the Article and is found in any language where the article is used.

There have always been many discussions about the place of the Article. Its status in the language is a controversial problem and has been such for centuries.

One of the earliest classifications was Ben Johnson’s classification. He singled out the article in the special class and added it to the general list of parts of speech. Later grammarians (18, 19^th cc) classed the grounds that it was usually used with a noun and preceded the noun as the adjective. Their approach was purely structural.

Barkhudarov considers article to be a formal word which constitutes the class of its own. He distinguishes between indefinite, definite and zero articles.

If we think that the article is a word then it should have a meaning of its own, but the article has no meaning (consider the zero). Some modern structural linguists don’t take the trouble of explaining the essence of the article, they just refer it to the class of form words.

Freeze considers the article together with form words where we find “that, those, all, two…”. The approach is one and the same – the position in relation to the noun. All those words have one thing in common which is preposition in relation to the noun.

Franciscalls the article one of the noun determiners.

All in all according to some grammarians the Article is a word which constitutes the class of its own, other grammarians claim that Article is included in other classes since it is a structural marker of the word / noun and marks its definiteness / indefiniteness as a grammatical meaning. So it seems advisable to consider the Article the morpheme of the category of definiteness / indefiniteness.

It is a very important text building element. When we introduce a new notion we use the indefinite or the zero Article – introductory function. The definite Article presents a notion as known or it refer to the previous text – the anaphoric function.

We should distinguish between the traditional article and the semantic. The traditional article does together with some names or with the phraseological units. Here we don’t have to think of the article, it’s a historically and traditionally set phrase. By the semantic article we mean the article which carries a certain meaning: grammatical, communicative and stylistic.

The definite article is a determining unit of specific nature accompanying the noun in communicative collocation. The semantic purpose of the article is to specify the noun referent to define it in the most general way. The definite article expresses the identification of the referent of the noun: the use of this article shows that the object denoted is taken in its concrete, individual quality.

The indefinite articleas different from the definite article expresses a classifying generalization of the nounal referent, or takes it in a relatively general sense.

The zero article is a variant of the indefinite article in the nominating function with nouns in the plural and uncountables. However there are numerous instances of the nouns without any article which cannot be explained by the nominating function of the indefinite article. Here we should distinguish two cases: traditional non-use and omission due to some semantic (the meaning of the noun, the meaning of the attribute), structural (the syntactic function of the meaning of the noun, the meaning of the noun and the use in some syntactic structures) or stylistic reasons (telegrams, headlines, notices; for expressive charge).

There are also cases of the semantically unspecified non-use of the article in various fixed types combinations: at hand, make news, day by day. Three other types of really semantic absence of the article with the noun are:

1) The meaningful absence of the article before a countable noun in the singular signifies that the noun is taken in an abstract sense and can also be called absolute generalization: Charity begins at home.

2) The absence of the article for uncountable noun corresponds to two kinds of generalization; both relative and absolute: John laughed with great bitterness – relative.

3) The absence of the article before the countable noun in the plural corresponds to both kinds of generalization: Stars, planets and comets are different celestial bodies.

To distinguish the demonstrated semantic functions of the non-uses of the article we may say that the absence of the article with uncountable nouns as well as countable nouns in the plural renders the meaning of uncharacterized generalization as different from the meaning of absolute generalization achieved by the absence of the article with countable nouns in the singular. The definite article from the point of view of the situational assessment of the article uses serves as an indicator of the type of nounal information which is presented as the fact already known. The indefinite article or the meaningful absence of the article introduces the central communicative nounal part of the sentence – rheme, theme. The typical syntactic position of the noun modified by the definite article is the thematic subject, while the typical syntactic position of the noun modified by the indefinite article or by the meaningful absence of the article is the rhematic predicative: “The day was drawing to a close, the busy noises of the city were dying down.” – subject. “How to handle the situation was a big question.”–predicative.

Exerceses:

1. Identify the meaning of the article in utilized phrases:

a) A 12-year-old boy got mad at his parents Friday night because they refused to let him go fishing on the Colorado River with relatives. So, while his parents were distracted during a barbecue with eight adult friends, he slipped away from his sister and three brothers, snatched the keys to a Volkswagen Beetle and drove off in one of his parent’s four cars, prompting fears that he had been kidnapped. […] El Cajon police sent teletyped descriptions of the curly haired, 90-pound sixth-grader to law enforcement agencies throughout Southern California and the Arizona border area. The boy was found unharmed – but scared and sleepy – at about noon yesterday by San Diego County sheriff’s deputies.

b) I’m looking for a millionaire, she says, but I don’t see any round.

c) I feel terrible. I need a friend.

d) We have wine on the table, girls, drink it.

e) We have telephones and we talk to people.

f) The Mercedes took a hard bounce from a pothole. “Christ,” said Sherman, “I didn’t even see that.” He leaned forward over the steering wheel. The headlights shot across the concrete columns in delirium.

2. Illustrate the cases of omission of the article due to the semantic, syntactic and stylistic reasons.

3. Explain the usage or absence of the article:

a) Fish live in water;

b) There’s sand in my shoes;

c) It wasn’t your fault. it was an accident.

d) Listen! Can you here music?

e) Did you hear a noise just now? – I can’t work here. There’s too much noise.

f) Enjoy your holiday. have a good time! – I can’t wair. I haven’t got time.

g) I’m looking for a job. – I’m looking for work.

h) A man and a woman were sitting opposite me. The man was American but I think the woman was British.

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 1049