The System of Parts of Speech

Noun

Meaning: thingness.

Form. Nouns have the category of number (singular and plural), though

some individual nouns may lack either a singular or a plural form. They also, in the

accepted view, have the category of case (common and genitive).

Function. (a) Combining with words to form phrases. A noun combines with

a preceding adjective (big house), or occasionally with a following adjective

(secrets unrevealed), with a preceding noun in either the common case (chocolate bar) or the genitive case (mother’s face), with a verb following it (children play) or preceding it (play games). Occasionally a noun may combine with a following or a preceding adverb (the guy outside; the then president). It also combines with prepositions (in a house; house of rest). It is typical of a noun to be preceded by the definite or indefinite article (the room, a room). (b) Function in the sentence. A noun may be the subject or the predicative of a sentence, or an object, an attribute, and an adverbial modifier. It can also make part of each of these when preceded by a preposition.

Adjective

Meaning. The adjective expresses property.

Form. Adjectives in Modern English are invariable. Some adjectives form

degrees of comparison (long, longer, longest).

Function. (a) Adjectives combine with nouns both preceding and (occasionally) following them (large room, times immemorial). They also combine with a preceding adverb (very large). Adjectives can be followed by the phrase

"preposition + noun" (free from danger). Occasionally they combine with a

preceding verb (died young). (b) In the sentence, an adjective can be either an

attribute (large room) or a predicative (is large). It can also be an objective

predicative (painted the door green).

Pronoun

(1) The meaning of the pronoun as a separate part of speech is somewhat

difficult to define. In fact, some pronouns share essential peculiarities of nouns

(e.g. he), while others have much in common with adjectives (e. g. which). This

made some scholars think that pronouns were not a separate part of speech at all

and should be distributed between nouns and adjectives. However, this view

proved untenable and entailed insurmountable difficulties. Hence it has proved

necessary to find a definition of the specific meaning of pronouns, distinguishing

them from both nouns and adjectives. From this angle the meaning of pronouns as

a part of speech can be stated as follows: pronouns point to the things and

properties without naming them.

Form. As far as form goes pronouns fall into different types. Some of them

have the category of number (singular and plural), e. g. this, while others have no

such category, e. g. somebody. Again, some pronouns have the category of case (he — him, somebody — somebody's), while others have none (something).

Function. (a) Some pronouns combine with verbs (he speaks, find him),

while others can also combine with a following noun (this room). (b) In the

sentence, some pronouns may be the subject (he, what) or the object, while others

are the attribute (my). Pronouns can be predicatives.

Numeral

The treatment of numerals presents some difficulties, too. The so-called

cardinal numerals (one, two) are somewhat different from the so-called ordinal

numerals (first, second).

Meaning. Numerals denote either number or place in a series.

Form. Numerals are invariable.

Function. (a) As far as phrases go, both cardinal and ordinal numerals

combine with a following noun (three rooms, third room); occasionally a numeral follows a noun (soldiers three, George the Third). (b) In a sentence, a numeral most usually is an attribute (three rooms, the third room), but it can also be subject, predicative, and object: Three of them came in time; "We Are Seven" (the title of a poem by Wordsworth); I found only four.

The verb

Meaning. The verb as a part of speech expresses a process.

Form. The verb is characterized by an elaborate system of morphological

categories, some of which are, however, controversial. These are: tense, aspect,

mood, voice, person, and number.

Function. (a) Verbs are connected with a preceding noun (children play) and

with a following noun (play games). They are also connected with adverbs (write quickly). Occasionally a verb may combine with an adjective (married young). (b) In a sentence a verb (in its finite forms) is always the predicate or part of it (link verb). The functions of the verbals (infinitive, participle, and gerund) must be dealt with separately.

The adverb

The meaning of the adverb as a part of speech is hard to define. Indeed,

some adverbs indicate time or place of an action (yesterday, here), while others

indicate its property (quickly) and others again the degree of a property (very). As, however, we should look for one central meaning characterising the part of speech as a whole, it seems best to formulate the meaning of the adverb as "property of an action or of a property".

Form. Adverbs are invariable. Some of them, however, have degrees of

comparison (fast, faster, fastest).

Function. (a) An adverb combines with a verb (run quickly), with an

adjective (very long), occasionally with a noun (the then president) and with a

phrase (so out of things). (b) An adverb can sometimes follow a preposition (from there). (c) In a sentence an adverb is almost always an adverbial modifier, or part of it (from there), but it may occasionally be an attribute.

Prepositions

Meaning. The meaning of prepositions is obviously that of relations

between things and phenomena.

Form. Prepositions are invariable.

Function. (a) Prepositions enter into phrases in which they are preceded by a

noun, adjective, numeral, stative, verb or adverb, and followed by a noun,

adjective, numeral or pronoun. (b) In a sentence a preposition never is a separate

part of it. It goes together with the following word to form an object, adverbial

modifier, predicative or attribute, and in extremely rare cases a subject (There were about a hundred people in the hall).

Conjunctions

Meaning. Conjunctions express connections between things and phenomena.

Form. Conjunctions are invariable.

Function. (a) They connect any two words, phrases or clauses. (b) In a

sentence, conjunctions are never a special part of it. They either connect

homogeneous parts of a sentence or homogeneous clauses (the so-called coordinating conjunctions), or they join a subordinate clause to its head clause (the

so-called subordinating conjunctions).

Particles

Meaning. The meaning of particles is very hard to define. We might say,

approximately, that they denote subjective shades of meaning introduced by the

speaker or writer and serving to emphasise or limit some point in what he says.

Form. Particles are invariable.

Function. (a) Particles may combine with practically every part of speech,

more usually preceding it (only three), but occasionally following it (for advanced students only). (b) Particles never are a separate part of a sentence. They enter the part of the sentence formed by the word (or phrase) to which they refer. (It might also be argued that particles do not belong to any part of a entence.)

Interjections

Meaning. Interjections express feelings (ah, alas). They are not names of

feelings but the immediate expression of them. Some interjections represent noises,

etc., with a strong emotional colouring (bang!).

Form. Interjections are invariable.

Function. (a) Interjections usually do not enter into phrases. Only in a few

cases do they combine with a preposition and noun or pronoun, e.g. alas for him!

(b) In a sentence an interjection forms a kind of parenthesis. An interjection may

also be a sentence in itself, e. g. Alas! as an answer to a question.

Generally speaking, the problem of words’ classification into parts of speech

is far from being solved. Some words cannot find their proper place. The most

striking example here is the class of adverbs. Some language analysts call it a

ragbag, a dustbin (Frank Palmer), Russian academician V.V.Vinogradov defined the class of adverbs in the Russian language as мусорная куча. It can be explained by the fact that to the class of adverbs belong those words that cannot find their place anywhere else. At the same time, there are no grounds for grouping them together either. Compare: perfectly (She speaks English perfectly) and again (He is here again). Examples are numerous (all temporals). There are some words that do not belong anywhere - e.g. after all. Speaking about after all it should be mentioned that this unit is quite often used by native speakers, and practically never by our students. Some more striking examples: anyway, actually, in fact. The problem is that if these words belong nowhere, there is no place for them in the system of words, then how can we use them correctly? What makes things worse is the fact that these words are devoid of nominative power, and they have no direct equivalents in Russian. Meanwhile, native speakers use these words subconsciously, without realizing how they work.

Lecture 3

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 1398