- •Morphology and syntax as parts of grammar. Grammatical units.
- •Paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations of words
- •Main grammatical notions.
- •Method of opposition. Types of oppositional reduction.
- •Structure of words. Types of morphemes.
- •Means of form-building in English.
- •Parts of speech. Principles of classification.
- •H.Sweet’s classification of words into parts of speech.
- •Notional and functional classes of words.
- •General characteristics of the noun as a part of speech.
- •Ch.Frie’s syntactico-distributional classification of words.
- •The number category of the noun.
- •The theory of positional cases.
- •16.The theory of the possessive postposition.
- •17. Semantic subtypes of the genetive case.
- •18.The noun. Gender
- •19.The article. General Characteristics.
- •20. Different approaches to the number and meaning of the article.
- •21. General characteristics of the verb as a part of speech.
- •22. Categories expression time in English.
- •23. The aspect cateory. Different views on the number and kinds of aspects in Enlish.
- •24. The voice category. General characteristics.
- •25. Different views on the number and kinds of voices in English.
- •26. Peculiarities of passive constructions in English.
- •28. Means of expressing modality in English.
- •29. The cateory of mood. The Imperetive mood.
- •30. The Subjunctive mood.
- •31. Verbals. The Infinitive
- •32. The Participle.
- •33. The Gerund.
- •34. General characteristics of the adjective as a part of speech.
- •35. The degree category of the adjective.
- •36. The adverb. General characteristics.
- •37. The degree category of the adverb.
- •38.The Adlink. General characteristics.
- •39. The preposition.
- •40. The conjunction.
- •41. The phrase. General characteristics.
- •42. Principles of classification of phrases and types of relations between its constituents.
- •43. Ways of expressing syntactical relations between components of a phrase.
- •44. The sentence as a main unit of syntax.
- •45. Predicativity. Predication.
- •48. Syntactic categories. Sentence paradigm.
22. Categories expression time in English.
The category of tense in Modern English denotes the relation of an action to the moment of speaking. Relative time is expressed by special forms (future-in-the-past, perfect forms, sometimes continuous forms), which are very often also treated as tenses.
The two main approaches to the category of Tense in Modern English are: 1) there are three tenses: present, past, future; 2) there are two tenses: present and past (O.Jespersen, L.S.Barkhudarov).
According to the second view shall, will+ infinitive cannot be treated as analytical forms, as shall and will preserve their modal meaning. There are proofs that shall and. will may denote pure futurity (B.A.Ilyish), so they may be regarded as auxiliary verbs.
However the recognition of the analytical forms of the future does not mean the recognition of the three-tense system, because in Modern English there are two correlated forms, denoting future actions: future and future-in-the-past. Future-in-the past correlates an action not with the moment of speaking but with a moment in the past, so it cannot be included into the system of tenses. Moreover, if it is treated as a tense-form, there will be two tenses in one form (future and past), which is impossible. On the other hand, future and non-future forms constitute an opposition:
comes — will come
came — would come
This opposition reveals a special category, the category of posteriority (prospect). Will come denotes absolute posteriority, would come — relative posteriority.
23. The aspect cateory. Different views on the number and kinds of aspects in Enlish.
English verbs have special forms for expressing actions in progress, going on at a definite moment or period of time, i.e. for expressing limited duration — continuous forms.
When I came in he was writing.
Continuous forms have been traditionally treated as tense-forms (definite, expanded, progressive) or as tense-aspect forms.
Consider the opposition: comes — is coming
Members of the opposition are not opposed as tenses (tense is the same). They show different character of an action, the manner or way in which the action is experienced, or regarded: as a mere fact or as taken in progress. The opposition common — continuous reveals the category of aspect.
Tense and aspect are closely connected, but they are different categories, revealed through different oppositions:
comes — came
comes — is coming.
The fact that the Infinitive has the category of aspect (to come — to be coming) and has no category of tense also shows, that these are different categories.
The category of aspect is closely connected with the lexical meaning. R. Quirk divides the verb into dynamic (having the category of aspect) and stative (disallowing the continuous form). Stative verbs denote perception, cognition and certain relations: see, know, like, belong. Dynamic verbs may be terminative (limitive), denoting actions of limited duration: close, break, come, and durative (unlimitive), denoting actions of unlimited duration: walk, read, write, shine. With durative verbs the aspect opposition may be neutralized.
When I came in he sat in the corner.
When I came in he was sitting in the corner.