2

1. Paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations in Grammar. Grammatical meaning.

There are two fundamental types of relations between lingual units: paradigmatic and syntagmatic.

Syntagmatic relations imply a liner combination of units of the same level. (линейная комбинация)

Lingual units form various lingual strings or sequences: sounds within morphemes, words within phrases etc.

The other type of relations is called paradigmatic. The term is derived (образован) from the word paradigm and denotes the relations between elements in paradigms in the system of language. Classical grammatical paradigms are those making up grammatical categories of words or morphological categories.

For example, the category of number of the noun (tooth-teeth) , the category of tense of the verb etc.

Paradigm is a system of variants of the same unit which is called the invariant.

Paradigmatic relations are relations between the variants of the lingual unit within a paradigm.

Grammatical meaning

Grammatical meanings are connected with the most abstract and general parts of information, rendered by lingual units.

ex. The word books apart from its immediate lexical meaning bears some grammatical meanings: thingness, plurality.

Grammatical meanings of words are rendered by their grammatical forms.

ex. The meaning of the plural in English in regularly rendered by the grammatical element –s (books).

19 The “medial” voice types.

Besides passive and active constructions there are also the so called “medial” voice types, whose status is problematic (?). Semantically they are neither passive nor active though the verb used is formally active.

There are 3 medial voice-types in English:

1. “Reflective” – рефлексИв, возвратное значение.

2. „Reciprocal” – реципрОк, взаимное значение.

3. “Middle” – срединный.

In reflexive constructions the action performed by the referent of the subject is not passed to any outer object but to the referent itself (the subject of the action is the object of the action at the same time).

e.g. He dressed quickly

this meaning can be rendered explicitly (явно, материально) by the reflexive pronoun –self.

e.g. He dressed himself quickly

In reciprocal constructions, the subject denotes a group of agents whose actions are directed towards each other. Again, the subject of the action is its object at the same time.

e.g. They struggled. They quarreled

This meaning can be rendered explicitly with the help of reciprocal pronouns: each other, one another

e.g. They quarreled with each other

In middle constructions the subject combined with the transitive verb is neither the agent of the action nor its immediate object. The action takes place as if of its own accord.

e.g. The door opened. The concert began.