Study questions
1. What do you understand by “grammatical structure of a language”?
2. What is the difference between synthetic and analytical languages?
3. What are the basic grammatical means of the English language?
4. Describe all the grammatical means of English.
5. Compare the grammatical structure of English with the grammatical structure of your native language?
6. What is the difference between lexical and grammatical meanings?
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Lecture 3
The Morphemic Structure of the English Language
Problems to be discussed:
- what operation is called "Morphemic analysis?
- language and speech levels and their corresponding units
- morpheme-morph-allomorph
- types of morphemes from the point of view of their:
a) function
b) number correlation between form and meaning.
There are many approaches to the questions mentioned above. According to Zellig Harris(27)
"The morphemic analysis is the operation by which the analyst isolates minimum meaningful elements in
the utterances of a language, and decides which occurrences of such elements shall be regarded as
occurrences of "the same" element".
The general procedure of isolating the minimum meaningful elements is as follows:
Step 1. The utterances of a language are examined (obviously) not all of them, but a sampling which we hope will
be statistically valid. Recurrent partials with constant meaning (ran away in John ran away and Bill ran away) are
discovered; recurrent partials not composed of smaller ones (way) are alternants or morphs. So are any partials not
recurrent but left over when all recurrent ones are counted for. Every utterance is composed entirely of morphs. The
division of a stretch of speech between one morph and another, we shall call a cut.
Step 2. Two or more morphs are grouped into a single morpheme if they:
a) have the same meaning;
b) never occur in identical environments and
c) have combined environments no greater than the environments of some single alternant in the language.
Step 3. The difference in the phonemic shape of alternants of morphemes are organized and stated; this constitutes
morphophonemics
Compare the above said with the conception of Ch. Hockett.
Ch. Hockett (28):
Step 1. All the utterances of the language before (us) the analyst recorded in some phonemic notation.
Step 2. The notations are now examined, recurrent partials with constant meaning are discovered; those not
composed of smaller ones are morphs. So are any partials not recurrent but left over when all recurrent ones are accounted
for: therefore every bit of phonemic material belongs to one morphs or another. By definition, a morph has the same
phonemic shape in all its occurrences; and (at this stage) every morph has an overt phonemic shape, but a morph is not
necessarily composed of a continuous uninterrupted stretch of phonemes. The line between two continuous morphs is a cut.
Step 3. Omitting doubtful cases, morphs are classed on the basis of shape and canonical forms are tentatively
determined.
Step 4. Two or more morphs are grouped into a single morpheme if they fit the following grouping - requirements:
a) they have the same meaning;
b) they are in non-contrastive distribution;
c) the range of resultant morpheme is not unique.
Step 5. It is very important to remember that if in this procedure one comes across to alternative possibilities,
choice must be based upon the following order of priority:
a) tactical simplicity
b) morphophonemic simplicity
c) conformity to canonical forms.
Thus the first cut of utterance into the smallest meaningful units is called morph. The morphs that
have identical meanings are grouped into one morpheme. It means the morphs and morphemes are
speech and language units that have both form (or shape) and meanings. The smallest meaningful unit of
language is called a morpheme while the smallest meaningful unit of speech is called a morph. There’s a
notion of allomorph in linguistics. By allomorphs the linguists understand the morphs that have identical
meanings and that are grouped into one morpheme. There may be another definition of the allomorphs:
the variants (or options, or alternants) of a morpheme are called allomorphs.
Compare the above said with Harris’s opinion. (27)
Some morphs, however, and some may be assigned simultaneously to two (or more) morphemes. An empty
morph, assigned to no morpheme. (All the empty morphs in a language are in complementary distribution and have the
same meaning (none). They could if there were any advantages in it, be grouped into a single empty morpheme (but one
which had the unique characteristic of being tactically irrelevant), must have no meaning and must be predicable in terms
of non-empty morphs. A portmanteau morphs must have the meanings of two or more morphemes simultaneously, and
10
must be in non-contrastive distribution with the combination of any alternant of one of the member morphemes and any
alternant of the other (usually because no such combination occur).
The difference in the phonemic shape of morphs as alternants of morphemes are organized and
stated; this (in some cases already partly accomplished in Step 1) constitutes morphophonemics.
In particular, portmanteaus are compared with the other alternants of the morphemes involved, and if
resemblances in phonemic shape and the number of cases warrant, morphs of other than overt phonemic content are
recognized, some of the portmanteaus being thus eliminated.
The Types of Morphemes
Morphemes can be classified from different view-points:
1. functional
2. number correlation between form and content
From the point of view of function they may be lexical and grammatical. The lexical morphemes
are those that express full lexical meaning of their own and are associated with some object, quality,
action, number of reality, like: lip, red, go, one and so on. The lexical morphemes can be subdivided into
lexical - free and lexical - bound morphemes. The examples given above are free ones; they are used in
speech independently. The lexical-bound ones are never used independently; they are usually added to
some lexical-free morphemes to build new words like- friend-ship, free-dom, teach-er, spoon-ful and so
on. Taking into account that in form they resemble the grammatical inflections they may be also called
lexical - grammatical morphemes. Thus lexical - bound morphemes are those that determine lexical
meanings of words but resemble grammatical morphemes in their dependence on lexical - free
morphemes. The lexical - bound morphemes are means to build new words.
The grammatical morphemes are those that are used either to connect words in sentences or to
form new grammatical forms of words. The content of such morphemes are connected with the world of
reality only indirectly therefore they are also called structural morphemes, e.g., shall, will, be, have, is, -
(e)s, -(e)d and so on. As it is seen from the examples the grammatical morphemes have also two
subtypes: grammatical - free and grammatical - bound. The grammatical - free ones are used in sentences
independently (I shall go) while grammatical - bound ones are usually attached to some lexical - free
morphemes to express new grammatical form, like: girl's bag, bigger room, asked.
From the point of view of number correlation between form and content there may be overt, zero,
empty and discontinuous morphemes.
By overt morpheme the linguists understand morphemes that are represented by both form and
content like: eye, bell, big and so on.
Zero morphemes are those that have (meaning) content but do not have explicitly expressed
forms. These morphemes are revealed by means of comparison:
ask – asks
high -higher
In these words the second forms are marked: "asks" is a verb in the third person singular which is
expressed by the inflection "s". In its counterpart there's no marker like "s" but the absence of the marker
also has grammatical meaning: it means that the verb "ask" is not in the third person, singular number.
Such morphemes are called "zero". In the second example the adjective "higher" is in the comparative
degree, because of the "- er" while its counterpart "high" is in the positive degree, the absence of the
marker expresses a grammatical meaning, i.e. a zero marker is also meaningful, therefore it's a zero
morpheme.
There are cases when there's a marker which has not a concrete meaning, i.e. there's neither
lexical nor grammatical meaning like: statesman. The word consists of three morphemes: state - s - man.
The first and third morphemes have certain meanings. But "s" has no meaning though serve as a
connector: it links the first morpheme with the third one. Such morphemes are called empty. Thus empty
morphemes are those that have form but no content.
In contemporary English there are cases when two forms express one meaning like:
He is writing a letter
Two morphemes in this sentence "is" and " - ing" express one meaning: a continuous action.
Such morphemes are called discontinuous.
Thus there are two approaches to classify morphemes: functional and number correlation between form and
content.
The first one can be shown in the following scheme:
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Morphemes
lexical
grammatical
free
bound
free
bound
The second one can also be shown in the same way:
Morphemes
overt
Zero
empty
discontinuous
form
+
-
+
++
meaning
+
+
-
+
Study questions
1. What operation is called "morphemic analysis?"
2. What are the procedures for revealing morphemes suggested by Z. Harris and Ch. Hockett?
3. What is a morpheme?
4. What is a morph?
5. What is an allomorph?
6. What are the criteria to classify morphemes?
7. What morphemes do you know according to the functional classification?
8. What types of morphemes are distinguished according to the criterion of number correlation between form and content?
12
Lecture 4
The Grammatical Categories
Problems to be discussed:
- what is categorization
- what linguistic phenomenon is called a "grammatical category"?
- what is "opposition"?
- the types of grammatical categories.
Any research presupposes bringing into certain order the material being studied. The issue under
the consideration is also an attempt to generalize the grammatical means of language.
There are many conceptions on the problem today. According to B. Golovin (13) “a grammatical category is a real
linguistic unity of grammatical meaning and the means of its material expression”. It means that in order to call a linguistic
phenomenon a grammatical category there must be a grammatical meaning and grammatical means.
M.Y. Blokh (6), (7) explains it as follows: “As for the grammatical category itself, it presents, the
same as the grammatical "form", a unity of form (i.e. material factor), and meanings (i.e. ideal factor)
and constitutes a certain signemic system.
More specifically the grammatical category is a system of expressing a generalized grammatical
meaning by means of paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms.
The paradigmatic correlations of grammatical forms in a category are exposed by the so - called “grammatical
oppositions”.
The opposition (in the linguistic sense) may be defined as a generalized correlation of lingual
forms by means of which a certain function is expressed. The correlated elements (members) of the
opposition must possess two types of features:
common features and differential features. Common features serve as the basis of contrast while
differential features immediately express the function in question.
The grammatical categories are better to explain by comparing them with logical categories. The grammatical
categories are opposed to logical ones. The logical categories are universal for all the languages. Any meanings can be
expressed in any language. For instance there's a logical category of possession. The meaning of possession can be
expressed in all the languages, compare: My book (English) - Моя книга (Russian) - Менинг китобим (Uzbek).
As it is seen from the examples the meaning of possession in English and Russian is expressed, by the possessive
pronouns (lexical means) while in Uzbek it can be expressed either by the help of a discontinuous morpheme (...нинг ...им)
or by one overt morpheme (…им). This category is grammatical in Uzbek but lexical in the other two languages. Thus the
universal logical categories can be expressed by grammatical and non - grammatical (lexical, syntactic) means. The
grammatical categories are those logical ones that are expressed in languages by constant grammatical means.
The doctrines mentioned above one - side approach to the problem. It is a rather complicated
issue in the general linguistics. But unfortunately we don't have universally acknowledged criteria to
meet the needs of individual languages.
One of the most consistent theories of the grammatical categories is the one that is suggested by L. Barkhudarov.
(2), (3)
According to his opinion in order to call a linguistic phenomenon a grammatical category there must be the
following features:
- general grammatical meaning;
- this meaning must consist of at least two particular meanings;
- the particular meanings must be opposed to each - other:
- the particular meanings must have constant grammatical means to express them.
Thus, any linguistic phenomenon that meets these requirements is called a grammatical category.
English nouns have a grammatical category of number. This category has all the requirements that are
necessary for a grammatical category:
1. it has general grammatical meaning of number;
2. it consists of two particular meanings; singular and plural;
3. singular is opposed to plural, they are antonymous;
4. singular and plural have their own constant grammatical means:
singular is represented by a zero morpheme and plural has the allomorphs like (s), (z), (iz). There are some other means to
express singular and plural in English but they make very small percentage compared with regular means. Schematically
this can be shown as follows:
Number
0
(s), (z), (iz)
singular
plural
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Another example. In English adjectives there's one grammatical category - the degrees of
comparison. What features does it have?
1. It has a general grammatical meaning: degrees of comparison;
2. The degrees of comparison consist of three particular meanings: positive, comparative and superlative;
3. They are opposed to each - other;
4. They have their own grammatical means depending on the number of syllables in the word.
If in the category of number of nouns there are two particular meanings, in the grammatical
category of degrees of comparison there are three.
Thus, a grammatical category is a linguistic phenomenon that has a general grammatical meaning consisting of at
least two particular meanings that are opposed to each - other and that have constant grammatical means of their own to
express them.
Study questions
1. Why do we categorize the grammatical meanings?
2. Is there one conception of grammatical categories that is shared by all the scientists or are there many approaches?
3. Whose conceptions on grammatical category do you know?
4. What are the main requirements for the grammatical category?
5. Comment the grammatical categories of case of nouns; voice, aspect, order of verbs.
6. What types of grammatical categories do you know?
14
Lecture 5
The Parts of Speech
Problems to be discussed:
- brief history of grouping words to parts of speech
- contemporary criteria for classifying words to parts of speech
- structural approach to the classification of words (the doctrine of American descriptive School)
- notional and functional parts of speech
A thorough study of linguistic literature on the problem of English parts of speech enables us to
conclude that there were three tendencies in grouping English words into parts of speech or into form
classes:
1. Pre - structural tendency;
2. Structural tendency;
3. Post - structural tendency;
1. Pre - structural tendency is characterized by classifying words into word - groups according to
their meaning, function and form. To this group of scientists H. Sweet (42), O. Jespersen (33), (34), O.
Curme (26), B. Ilyish (15) and other grammarians can be included.
2. The second tendency is characterized by classification of words exclusively according to their
structural meaning, as per their distribution. The representatives of the tendency are: Ch. Fries (31), (32),
W. Francis (30), A. Hill (44) and others.
3. The third one combines the ideas of the two above-mentioned tendencies. They classify words
in accord with the meaning, function, form; stem-building means and distribution (or combinability). To
this group of scientists we can refer most Russian grammarians such as: Khaimovitch and Rogovskaya
(22), L. Barkhudarov and Shteling (4) and others. (25)
One of the central problems of a theoretical Grammar is the problem of parts of speech. There is
as yet no generally accepted system of English parts of speech. Now we shall consider conceptions of
some grammarians.
H. Sweet's (42) classification of parts of speech is based on the three principles (criteria), namely
meaning, form and function. All the words in English he divides into two groups: 1) noun-words: nouns,
noun-pronouns, noun-numerals, infinitive, gerund; 2) verbs: finite verbs, verbals (infinitive, gerund,
participle)
I. Declinable Adjective words: adjective, adjective pronouns, adjective-numeral, participles
II. Indeclinable: adverb, preposition, conjunction, interjection
As you see, the results of his classification, however, reveal a considerable divergence between his
theory and practice. He seems to have kept to the form of words. Further, concluding the chapter he
wrote: "The distinction between the two classes which for convenience we distinguish as declinable and
indeclinable parts of speech is not entirely dependent on the presence or absence of inflection, but really
goes deeper, corresponding, to some extent, to the distinction between head - word and adjunct-word.
The great majority of the particles are used only as adjunct-words, many of them being only form-words,
while declinable words generally stand to the particles in the relation of headwords.
O. Jespersen. (34)
According to Jespersen the division of words into certain classes in the main goes back to the Greek and Latin
grammarians with a few additions and modifications.
He argues against those who while classifying words kept to either form or meaning of words, he
states that the whole complex of criteria, i.e. form, function and meaning should he kept in view. He
gives the following classification:
1. Substantives (including proper names)
2. Adjectives
In some respects (1) and (2) may be classed together as "Nouns ".
3. Pronouns (including numerals and pronominal adverbs)
4. Verbs (with doubts as to the inclusion of "Verbids")
5. Particles (comprising what are generally called adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions- coordinating and
subordinating - and interjections).
15
As it is seen from his classification in practice only one of those features is taken into
consideration, and that is primarily form. Classes (1-4) are declinable while particles not. It reminds
Sweet's grouping of words. The two conceptions are very similar.
Tanet R. Aiken kept to function only. She has conceived of a six-class system, recognizing the
following categories: absolute, verb, complement, modifiers and connectives.
Ch. Fries' (31), (32) classification of words is entirely different from those of traditional grammarians. The new
approach - the application of two of the methods of structural linguistics, distributional analysis and substitution - makes it
possible for Fries to dispense with the usual eight parts of speech. He classifies words into four form - classes, designated
by numbers, and fifteen groups of function words, designated by letters. The form-classes correspond roughly to what most
grammarians call noun and pronouns (1
st
clause), verb (2
nd
clause), adjective and adverbs, though Fries warns the reader
against the attempt to translate the statements which the latter finds in the book into the old grammatical terms.
The group of function words contains not only prepositions and conjunctions but certain specific words that more
traditional grammarians would class as a particular kind of pronouns, adverbs and verbs. In the following examples:
1. Woggles ugged diggles
2. Uggs woggled diggs
3. Diggles diggled diggles
The woggles, uggs, diggles are "thing", because they are treated as English treats "thing" words -
we know it by the "positions" they occupy in the utterances and the forms they have, in contrast with
other positions and forms. Those are all structural signals of English. So Fries comes to the conclusion
that a part of speech in English is a functioning pattern.
1
All words that can occupy the same "set of
positions" in the patterns of English single free utterances (simple sentences) must belong to the same
part speech.
Fries' test-frame-sentences were the following:
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