14. The verb.Verbals. The adverb.

Gramatically the verb is the most complex part of speech. This is due to the central role it performs in the expression of the predicative functions of the sentence.The general categorial meaning of the verb is process presented dynamically,i.e. developing in time.The gram. categories: the c. of finitude dividing the verb into finite & non-f. forms;the c. of person,number,tense,aspect,voice,mood. In so far as the verbals (infinitive, gerund, and participle) make up a part of the English verb system, they have some features in common with the finite forms, and in so far as they are singled out amid the forms of the verb, they must have some peculiarities of their own.It is clear that none of the verbals has any category of person or mood. The English verbals have no category of number, but have the categories of aspect, tense, correlation, voice. The infinitive is the non-finite form of the verb which combines the properties of the verbwith those of the noun,serving as the verbal name of a process.The infinitive has the category of aspect, there is a distinction between the common and the continuous aspect. To speak-to be speaking, to have spoken- to have been speaking.The gerund and participle have no such distinction but sometimes a cont. participle is found(being dancing) and it seems to be a mean of giving prominence to the fact that the actions indicated were actually happening at that very moment.The problem of the category of tense and that of correlation have to be considered together.In the infinitive we find the following oppositions:(to) speak — (to) have spoken (to) be speaking— (to) have been speaking, and in the gerund and the participle the oppositions: speaking — having spoken, being spoken — having been spoken. The question now is, what category is at the base of these oppo­sitions? If this view is accepted it follows that the category of correla­tion is much more universal in the Modern English verb than that of tense: correlation appears in all forms of the verb, both finite and non-finite, except the imperative, while tense is only found in the indicative mood. Since the verbals are hardly ever the predicate of a sentence, they do not express the category of tense in the way the finite verb forms do. We will therefore endorse the view that the opposition between (to) speak and (to) have spoken is based on the category of correlation. Like the finite forms of the verb, the verbals have a distinction between active and passive, as. will readily be seen from the fol­lowing oppositions:(to) read — (to) be read, (to) have read — (to) have been read, reading — being read, having read — having been read. As to other possible voices (reflexive, reciprocal, and middle) there is no reason whatever to treat the verbals in a different way from the finite forms. Thus, if we deny the existence of these voices in the finite forms, we must deny it in the verbals.To sum up,we can say that all of them have the catego­ries of correlation and voice: the infinitive, in addition, has the category of aspect. None of the verbals has the categories of tense, mood, person, or number. The adverb expresses either the degree of a property, or the property of an action, or the circumstances under which an action takes place.In adopting this definition, we have not included under 'adverbs words expressing the speaker's view of the action spoken of in the sentence, and have classed them under modal words. Among the adverbs there are some which admit of degrees of comparison, and others which do not.In that case, there would be only two types of degrees of comparison in adverbs:1)the suffix type(faster,fastest)and (2) the supplitive type represented, by a few adverbs( well,best worst)Adverbs may sometimes be preceded by prepositions, which means that they become partly substantivized. This is seen in such phrases as from here, from there, since when, up to now, etc.

15. Grammatical meaning. Notional words first of all verbs and nouns possesses some morphemic features expressing grammatical meanings. These features determine the grammatical form of the word. Grammatical meanings are very abstract, very general. The grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics. Gr. category- a system of expressing a generalized gr. m-g by means of paradigmatic correlation of gr. forms. The set of gr. forms expressing a categorical function constitutes a paradigm. The paradigmatic correlations of gr. forms in a category are exposed by “gr. oppositions” (generalized correlations of lingual f-s by means of which a cert. function is expressed) the gr. categories can be innate for a given class (immanent) or only be expressed on the surface of it, serving as a sign of correlation with some other class (reflective of a second, derivative, semantic value).Gr. cat-s can be constant (unchangeable, “derivational”- the cat. of gender); variable (changeable- degrees of comparison). The words of lang., depending on var. formal and sem. features are divided into gr. classes (parts of speech). P. of sp. Are discriminated on the basis of 3 criteria: “sem.” (the evaluation of the generalized m-g, which is characteristic of all the subsets of w-s of a given p. of sp.); “formal” (provides for the exposition of the specific inflexional and derive(word building) features of all the lexemic subsets of a p. of sp.); “functional” (syntac. role of w-s in the sent. typical for a p. of sp.)- words on the upper level classification: notional, functional. Notional (noun, adj., numeral, pron-n, verb, adv)- words of complete nominal meaning char-d by self-dependent functions in the sent. Functional (the article, prep., conj., particle, modal w-d, interjection)- words of incomplete nomin. meaning and non-self-dependent mediatory func-s in the sent.; unchangeable words. Each p. of sp. is further subdivided into subseries in according var. partic. semantico-func. and formal feat-s of the constituent w-s. Eg. N: proper and common; animate and inanimate; countable and uncountable; concrete and abstract, etc. V: fully and partially predicative; transitive and intran.; actional and statal; purely nominative and evaluative, etc