3. The category of case.

Case expresses the relation of a word to another word in the word-group or sentence (my sister’s coat). The category of case correlates with the objective category of possession. The case category in English is realized through the opposition: The Common Case - The Possessive Case (sister - sister’s). However, in modern linguistics the term “genitive case” is used instead of the “possessive case” because the meanings rendered by the “`s” sign are not only those of possession.

To avoid confusion with the plural, the marker of the genitive case is represented in written form with an apostrophe: The man I saw yesterday’s son, where -`s is appended to the whole group (the so-called group genitive).

Different scholars stick to a different number of cases.

1. There are two cases. The Common one and The Genitive;

2. There are no cases at all, the form `s is optional because the same relations may be expressed by the ‘of-phrase’: the doctor’s arrival – the arrival of the doctor;

3. There are three cases: the Nominative, the Genitive, the Objective due to the existence of objective pronouns me, him, whom;

4. Ch.Fillmore introduced syntactico-semantic classification of cases. They show relations in the so-called deep structure of the sentence. According to him, verbs may stand to different relations to nouns. There are 6 cases.

4. The Problem of Gender in English

In the grammar of English there is no gender concord, and the reference of the pronouns he, she, it is determined by the classification of persons and objects as male, female or inanimate. Thus, the words husband and wife do not show any difference in their forms due to peculiarities of their lexical meaning. The difference between such nouns as actor and actress is a purely lexical one.

Still, other scholars (M. Blokh, John Lyons) admit the existence of the category of gender. The existence of the category of gender in Modern English can be proved by the correlation of nouns with personal pronouns of the third person (he, she, it). Accordingly, there are three genders in English: the neuter (non-person) gender, the masculine gender, the feminine gender.

LECTURE 6: THE ADJECTIVE

An adjective is a word that tells us more about a noun. An adjective "qualifies" or "modifies" a noun (a big dog). Adjectives can be used before a noun (I like Chinese food) or after certain verbs (It is hard). We can often use two or more adjectives together (a beautiful young French lady).

1. Kinds of Adjectives.

Adjectives may be divided into the following classes: 1. Adjectives of Quality (Descriptive Adjective) show the kind or quality of a person or thing. Adjectives of Quality answer the question: Of what kind? London is a large city. He is an honest man. Adjectives formed from Proper Nouns (e.g., French wines, Indian tea, Turkish tobacco) are sometimes called Proper Adjectives. 2. Adjectives of Quantity show how much of a thing is meant. I ate some rice. He has little intelligence. Take great care of your health. 3.A possessive adjective modifies a noun by telling whom it belongs to. It answers the question "Whose?": his, her, its, my, our, their, my and your:

Have you seen their house?

They are our friends.

4.The demonstrative adjectives that, these, this, those, and what answer the question "Which?"

I'm going to open that present.

Whose is this bag?

A demonstrative adjective may look like a demonstrative pronoun, but it is used differently in the sentence: it is an adjective, used to modify a noun or pronoun.

5.The interrogative adjectives are used with nouns to ask questions: what, which and whose:

What movie do you want to see?

Whose son is he?

An interrogative adjective may look like an interrogative pronoun, but it is used differently in the sentence.

6. Adjectives of Number (Numeral Adjective) show how many persons or things are meant, or in what order a person or thing stands: The hand has five fingers. Sunday is the first day of the week. Adjectives of Number are of three kinds: a)definite numeral adjectives, which denote an exact number: one, two, three, etc. (Cardinals denote how many) - first, second, third, etc. (Ordinals denote the order of things in a series). b)indefinite numeral adjectives, which do not denote an exact numbers: all, any, few, some, any, several, certain. c)distributive numeral adjectives, which refer to each one of a number, as: Each boy must take his turn. England expects every man to do his duty. Either pen will do.

7.An indefinite adjective gives indefinite, or general, information. Often, it answers the question "How much?" Some common indefinite adjectives are all, any, each, every, few, many, and some:

Many children like dinosaurs.

Is there any water in the bottle?

An indefinite adjective may look like an indefinite pronoun, but it is used to modify a noun or pronoun.