3.Modern e. Phraseology.

The basic features of word-groups are the lex. valency & the gram. valency. Words are used in certain lex. context, i.e. in combinations with other words. E.g. the noun “question” is often combined with such adj.s as vital, pressing, urgent, etc. this noun is a component of other word-groups. E.g. to raise a question (not to lift a question of the hour). The aptness of a word to appear in various combinations is described as its lex. valency. The range of the lex. valency of words is delimited by the inner structure of the E. words. Thus “to raise” & “to lift” are synonyms but only the former is collocated with the noun. Words habitually collocative in speech tend to form a cliché. The lex. valency in different languages is not identical because it depends on the inner stricture of the vocabulary. E.g. both the E. “flower” & the R. “цветок” may be combined with a number of similar words (garden flowers / hot house flowers – садовые цветы/оранжерейные цветы). But “pot flowers” – “комнатные цветы”. The aptness of a word to appear in specific gram. (or other syntactical structures) is called gram. valency. E.g. the adj. “heavy” can be followed by a known: heavy food, heavy storm, heavy box, but we can not say heavy to lift, to carry. The gr. valency of words may be different. It is delimited by the part of speech the word belongs to. E.g no E. adj. can be followed by a finite form of a verb. The gr. val-cy is also delimited by the inner structure of the language. E.g. “to suggest” – “to propose”. Both can be followed by a noun but only “to propose” can be followed by the infinitive – “to propose to do smth”.

The word-groups may be classified: according to their head-words: nominal group (red flower), adj. group (kind to people), verbal group (to speak well); according to their syntactical pattern: predicative (such word-groups as “he went” that have a syntactic structure similar to that of a sentence), non-predicative (all others). Non-predicative word-groups depending on the type of syntactic relations between the components are divided into: Subordinative (“a red flower”, “red” is dependent word); Coordinative (“day & night”, “do & die”)

The lex. meaning of the word-group may be defined as the combined lex. meaning of the component members. e.g. in the phrase “a blind man” the words “blind” & “man” have different meanings: unable to see, a human being. As a rule, the meanings of the component words are mutually dependent & the meaning of the word-group naturally predominance of the lex. meaning of the components.

Phras. units are defined as non-motivated word-groups that can not be freely made up in speech but are reproduced as ready-made units. The other essential feature of phras. units is stability of the lex. components & gram. structure. Unlike components of free word-groups, which may vary according to the needs of communication Member-words of phras. units are always reproduced as single unchangeable collocations. “a red flower”- adj. can be substituted for other adj., denoting colour. & the word-group will keep the meaning. But in the “red tape”(бюрократический метод) no such substitution is possible as a change of adj. would cause a complete change in the meaning of the group. It exists as ready-made linguistic unit, which doesn’t allow any change of its lex. component & its gram. structure. Still the basic criterion, accepted by most Rus. scholars today is comparatively lack of motivation or idiomaticity of the phras. units.

General class-ion of phras. units was suggested by Vinogradov mainly according to the degree of idiomaticity:

Phras. fusions. Completely non-motivated word-groups. The meaning of the components has no connection with the meaning of the whole group. Idiomatically combined with complete stability of the lex. components & the gram. structure of the fusion. E.g. to kick the bucket, to seeze an elephant (узнать жизнь).

Phras. unities. Practically non-motivated word-groups as their meaning can be understood through the metaphoric meaning of the whole phras. unit. E.g. to skate on thin ice (рисковать), as busy as a bee. They are marked by a comparatively high degree of stability of the lex. components & gram. structure.

Phras. combinations. Are (partially) motivated but they are made up of words having special lex. valency, which is marked by a certain degree of stability. They differ from the phras. unities by the fact that one of the components is used in its direct meaning, the other in indirect meaning & the meaning of the whole group dominates on the meaning of its components. E.g. to break a silence

Structural class-ion Phras. units may be defined as specific word-groups functioning as word-equivalents to definite classes of words. They have the part-of-speech meaning. Cf the free word-group (e.g. “a long day”) & the phras. unit (e.g. “in the long run”) we observe that in the free word-group the noun “day” & the adj. “long” preserve a part of speech meaning proper to this word taken in isolation. The whole group is viewed as composed of 2 independent units (A+N). In the phr.unit “in the long run” the part-of-speech meaning belongs to the group as a single whole. ‘In the long run’ is gram.ly equivalent to single adverbs (finally, firstly, etc.). so, we distinguish set-expressions that are: nominal phrases functioning like nouns(skeleton in the cupboard, Baker’s dozen);verbal phrases functioning like verbs:(to take the bull by the horn, to put a finger into every pie;adjectival phrases functioning like adj.s(cool as a cucumber, poor as a church mouse);adverbial phrases functioning like adverbs(before you can say “Jack Robinson”, by hook or by crook );conjunctional & prepositional phrases (As long as, as soon as, in spite of);interjectional phrases(like hell, my foot).

Etimological class-ion The sources of phras. units are different spheres of life: Sea life: Tell that to the Marines –ври больше; In deep waters – в беде. Fish & fishing: to fish in troubled wayers – ловить рыбку в мутной воде. Sport: the ball is with you – слово за вами, to have the ball at one’s feet – быть хозяином положения.

Besides phr. units the language has set phrases which are equivalents of sentences. They are proverbs, sayings, aphorisms. E.g. custom is second nature.

Proverbs are set phrases because they also are not created in the process of speech. They are part of the vocabulary which are created by folk. If we compare R. & E. proverbs & phr. fusions we’ll discover some interesting phenomena. Both languages have analogues proverbs:

Appetite comes with eating. Don’t look a gift horse into the mouth.

Sometimes the meaning are analogues but the semantic center of the phrases is different in R. & in E. E.g. Rome was not built in a day – Москва не сразу строилась.

Proverbs is a short saying usually well-known & h&ed down from ancient times, containing words of advice, warning or wisdom.