Lecture 1

5

Lecture 1. Introduction to Contrastive Grammar Studies

Contents

1. Linguistic status of Typology.

2. Practical aims of Contrastive Typology.

3. Fundamental terms and notions.

4. Contrastive Grammar as a part of contrastive linguistics.

5. Methods of research used in contrastive studies.

1. The course of Contrastive Grammar is aimed at the development of cross-cultural understanding of language phenomena. The main focus of the course is comparison of grammar phenomena of two or more languages from multi-aspect point of view.

Comparison typically uses "as" or "than" and compares things that may or may not be similar to show key differences. Contrast compares opposite things and is used to emphasize qualities of either of the two topics being compared.

Contrastive Grammar is a part of Contrastive Typology.

Typology as a branch of linguistics aims at establishing similar general linguistic categories serving as a basis for the classification of languages of different types, irrespective of their genealogical relationship.

Contrastive Typology (порівняльна типологія) aims at establishing the most general structural types of languages on the basis of their dominant (common) phonetical/phonetic, morphological, lexical and syntactic features. Contrastive Typology deals with dominant (common) and divergent (different) features which are found in the languages of the same structural types (syntactic, analytical, agglutinative, etc.), or in the languages of different structural type.

The number of languages which may be simultaneously subjected to typological contrasting at a time is not limited and is always predetermined by the aim pursued.

2. The final aims of Contrastive Typology research are the following:

1) to identify and classify accordingly the main isomorphic and allomorphic features characteristic of languages under investigation;

2) to draw from these common or divergent features respectively the isomorphic regularities (закономірності) and the allomorphic singularities (відмінності) in the languages contrasted;

3) to establish on the basis of the obtained isomorphic features the typical language structures and the types of languages;

4) to perform on the basis of the obtained practical data a scientific classification of the existing languages of the world;

5) to establish on this basis the universal features/phenomena, pertaining to each single language of the world.

3. Contrastive typology as a branch of linguistics employs some terms and notions of its own. The principal are as follows:

1. Absolute universals (абсолютні/повні універсали) i.e. features or phenomena of a language level pertaining to any language of the world (cf. vowels and consonants, word stress and utterance stress, intonation sentences, parts of the sentence, parts of speech, etc.).

2. Near universals (неповні/часткові універсалії) i.e. features or phenomena common in many or some languages under typological investigation.

3. Metalanguage (метамова) is the language in which the actual presentation/analysis of different features/phenomena of the contrasted languages is carried out.

4. Typologically dominant features (типологічні домінанти) are features or phenomena dominating at a language level or in the structure of the contrasted languages. Dominant in present-day English are known to be analytical means: rigid word order in word-groups and sentences, the prominent role of prepositions and placement as means of connection and expression of case relations and syntactic functions (cf. books for my friend, books to my friends, books by my friends; a nice flower-nice flowers, Peter came - Mary came), etc. The change of placement of the part of the sentence may completely change its sense.

In Ukrainian, on the contrary, case, gender and number categories are expressed by means of inflexions: братові книжки, братових книжок; він співав - вона співала, дитя співало; червона квітка - червоні квітки.

5. Typologically recessive features/phenomena (типологічнo рецесивні, втрачаючі колишню активну роль) are those losing their former dominant role as, for instance, case forms in English or the dual number forms of some nouns in present-day Ukrainian.

6. Isomorphic features/phenomena (ізоморфні риси/явища) are common features/phenomena in languages under contrastive analysis. Isomorphic in English and Ukrainian is, for example, the existence of consonants and vowels, and the categories of number, person, tense, as well as parts of speech, the existence of sentences, etc.

7. Allomorphic features/phenomena (аломорфні риси/явища) are observed in one language and missing in the other. For example: the dual number in Ukrainian, the gerund or the diphthongs and analytical verb forms in English, which are missing (allomorphic) in Ukrainian.

8. The etalon language is a hypothetic language created by typologists for the sake of contrasting any languages.

4. Contrastive Grammar (CG) of the English and Ukrainian languages, being a part of contrastive linguistics, has as its object the grammar structure of these two contrasted languages.

The subject matter of CG is the peculiarities of expression of the main grammatical categories and syntactic structures in both contrasted languages.

Grammatical phenomena of different languages can be contrasted according to the three aspects: 1) acc. to the content; 2) acc. to the expression means; 3) acc. to the type of functioning.

According to the content (gr. meanings, categories) languages can have the following differences:

a) one language can have a certain gr. category which is absent in another language (article);

b) a gr. category exists in certain two or more languages does not coincide acc. to the content and shades of meaning, or acc. to its subtypes (tense forms in English and Ukrainian).

According to the expression means ways of divergence can concern the correlation between the synthetic and analytical means of expression.

According to the type of functioning the divergence can be obvious in the following way:

a) in the correlation between grammar and vocabulary. Thus, in Ukrainian the forms of singularity and plurality are possessed only by countable nouns. In some other languages (in French) some words can acquire certain gr. categories non-compatible with their semantics, changing simultaneously their meaning (abstract nouns can acquire the plural form).

b) in the secondary functions of grammatical forms (the usage in secondary functions of different parts of speech, gr. categories, syntactic constructions). “I was told” is impossible in Ukrainian.

One of the most important notions of CG is the notion of gr. category . The grammatical category is the system of opposed to each other rows of grammatical forms with homogeneous meanings. The number of gr. categories can vary from language to language and depends on the language type.

The tasks carried out in CG studies are first of all corresponding to the demands of practical usage, that is: the methodology of language study, compiling different textbooks, dictionaries and reference books in translation techniques etc.

5. Contrastive typological investigations are carried out with the help of some methods. The main one is the method of contrastive analysis. It is usually used to make research of a restricted number of languages. This method is aimed at establishing isomorphic and allomorphic, dominant and recessive features of the languages compared and drawing conclusions as to their structural types.

Comparing is done on the basis of deduction and induction. Inductive method draws on the empirical facts: scientists observe the facts, make conclusions and verify these conclusions by more facts. Practically, this method needs no verification since the investigated phenomena were already proved by preceding generations of researchers.

Deductive method presupposes making conclusions on the basis of logical calculations which suggest all theoretically admissive variants of realization of a certain feature in contrasted languages and consequently need verification. For example, the existence of the attributive AN and NA structure word-group patterns in English and Ukrainian is indisputable. Cf. : the green pasture (пастбище) — the pasture green (Byron), зелене пасовисько — пасовисько зелене.

The (ICs) immediate constituents method is employed to contrast constituent parts of the language units. At the morphological level the ICs method helps determine morphemic structures of the words of the languages compared; cf. the nouns in-nova-tion-s and пере-напр-уг-а consist of 4 ICs.

The ICs method is often employed to single out constituent parts of the syntactic level units both at sentence level and at word-group level.

The transformational method is widely employed. Its reliability is clearly proved through translation. Transformation is a form of expressing some definite meaning. The simplest transformation is transcoding (перекодування іншими буквами). Cf. in English: Leeds, Liverpool (in Latin letters) and Лідс, Ліверпуль in Cyrillic or any other letters. The transformational method is employed:

a) to identify the nature of a language unit in the source language or in the target language. Thus, the type of the Ukrainian sentence Знаю, прийду, may be understood and treated differently: 1) as a definite personal sentence with two homogeneous predicates; 2) as a definite personal main sentence (why shall I come?) because (I know it) or 3) as two co-ordinate definite personal clauses with the causal implicit meaning. When translated into English (i.e. transformed), this sentence acquires the following structural form: I know it and I shall come. Therefore, the original Ukrainian variant Знаю, прийду, may be identified as a definite personal sentence with two homogeneous i.e. co-ordinate clauses corresponding to (Я) знаю and (і я) прийду.

b) Transformation may reveal the difference in the form of expression in the contrasted languages: Вас запрошують взяти участь у науковій конференції (an indefinite personal sentence, active voice), which has for its equivalent in English You are invited to take part in the scientific conference (a definite personal sentence, passive voice).

Method of oppositions is used to establish grammatical categories. Opposition is made by two forms carrying two manifestations of one categorical meaning as works :: is working carry two particular manifestations (non-Continuous :: continuous) of the general categorical meaning of aspect.

The indexes method helps identify the quantitative co-occurrence or frequency of some feature or phenomenon in the contrasted languages. J. Greenberg selected some passages, among them one English and one Russian, each containing one hundred notional words and subjected them to various typologically relevant analyses. The parameters of his computations were as follows:

1. The degree of synthesis in the words. Thus, when the morphemes are lettered as M and the number of words in the passage as W, the M/W- ratio will express the synthetic structure index, which is in English between 1.62 to 1.68.

2. The second parameter constitute the ways in which various morphemes are joined in English notional words. Since one of the main ways in English is agglutination (lettered as A), it gives in relation to this kind of juncture (зрощування) (lettered J) an A/J ratio reflecting the degree of cohesion between the morphemes in these notional words. It goes without saying that the higher the index, the greater the role of agglutination and the lower their fusion (i.e. synthetism) in any language.

3. The productivity degree of the form-building morphemes constitutes the third parameter. When the number of root morphemes is lettered as R, the number of words in the text as W, the R/W ratio will express the index of derivation. This index proves that the higher the number of root morphemes making the notionals, the lower is the degree of form-building in the system of words in the contrasted language.

4. The quantity of derivational morphemes (D) in direct relation to the number of words (W) in the text gives the D/W ratio indicating the word- forming capacity of a language.

5. The fifth parameter characterises the correlation of affixal morphemes in their relation to the number of words. So, the P/W ratio constitutes the index of prefixation and indicates the correlation between the number of prefixes and the number of words in the text.

6. Similarly, the S/W ratio with the letter S standing for suffixal morphemes will be the index of suffixation in the words of the text.

7. Finally when accidence, i. e. genuine form-building is lettered as Pi, then the Pi/N- ratio will designate the index characterizing the form-building capacity of words in the language.

8. Consequently, when the synthetic agreement is lettered as Co (concord), the Co/N ratio will represent the index of concord i.e. grammatical agreement in the selected by the researcher passage/text.