- •Contents
- •In English and Ukrainian languages 79
- •Fundamentals
- •1. Basic units of language and speech
- •2. Word as a basic language unit. The structure of words
- •3. The classification of words
- •4. The combinability of words
- •6. Part of speech as one of the main grammatical notions
- •7. Contrastive studies of languages
- •8. Contrastive linguistics as a science and an academic
- •9. Contrastive grammar as a part of contrastive
- •10. Methods of research, used in contrastive studies
- •12. Parts of speech classification in English and Ukrainian languages
- •Chapter 1 Noun as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages
- •1. Noun as a part of speech: general characteristics
- •3. The category of case
- •4. The category of gender
- •5. The category of the names of living beings and lifeless objects
- •IV. Define the type of declension (I, II, III or IV) and the gender of the given Ukrainian nouns. Think up at least five sentences, using some of these nouns, and render these sentences
- •Into English. Do the case and gender characteristics coincide in both languages?
- •V. A) Define to which semantic group of Singularia Tantum nouns belong the following English and Ukrainian nouns:
- •Languages
- •1. Adjective as a part of speech: general characteristics. Grammatical categories of adjective
- •2. Degrees of comparison of adjectives
- •II. Find all the adjectives in the following piece of writing. Classify these adjectives being either qualitative or relative (if possible other type); comment on their grammatical characteristics.
- •III. Identify whether adjectives used in each sentence are in the positive, comparative or superlative form. Define whether each form is synthetic or analytical.
- •Languages
- •1. Numeral as a part of speech: general characteristics
- •2. Grammatical categories of numeral
- •II. Find all the numerals in the following piece of writing. Classify these numerals being either cardinal or ordinal (is pos sible other type); comment on their grammatical characteristics.
- •III. Classify the given numerals being either cardinal or ordinal (if possible other type).
- •IV. Comment on the grammatical characteristics of Ukrainian numerals, using the text given below. Stress on the isomorphic and allomorphic features of English and Ukrainian numerals.
- •Languages
- •1. Pronoun as a part of speech: general characteristics. Grammatical categories of pronoun
- •2. Personal and possessive pronouns
- •3. Reflexive and strengthening pronouns
- •4. Demonstrative pronouns
- •6. Indefinite and negative pronouns
- •7. Allomorphic classes of pronouns in English and
- •II. Underline the pronoun in the following pieces of text, conversation. Identify the type of each pronoun; comment on their grammatical characteristics.
- •1. Verb as a part of speech: general characteristics
- •2. The category of person
- •4. The category of aspect
- •4. The category of aspect
- •5. The category of tense
- •5.1. The Present Tense
- •5.2. The Past Tense
- •5.3. The Future Tense. The tense form "Future-in-the-past" and sequence of tenses of the English language.
- •6. The category of voice
- •7. The category of mood
- •7.1. The Indicative and Imperative moods
- •7.2. The Conditional mood
- •VI. Underline all the verbs in the following pieces of text. Analyze them according to the grammatical meaning they express (tense, aspect, voice, person, number, mood).
- •VI. Underline all the verbs in the following pieces of text. Analyze them according to the grammatical meaning they express (tense, aspect, voice, person, number, mood).
- •Languages
- •2. Infinitive in English and Ukrainian languages
- •4. The English gerund
- •Languages
- •1. Adverb as a part of speech: general characteristics
- •2. Degrees of comparison of adverbs
- •3. Words of the category of state (statives or adlinks)
- •VI. Underline each adverb in the text below and identify its semantic category (qualitative, quantitative, circumstantial, or some other type).
- •VIII. Form adverbs from the following word combination. Think of their English equivalents.
- •Languages
- •1. Preposition as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages
- •3. Particle as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages
- •4. Modal words as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages
- •5. Interjection as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages
- •6. The English article
- •II. Underline prepositions in the sentences/passages below. Comment upon the types of found prepositions.
- •III. Underline conjunctions in the sentences/passages below. Comment upon the types of found conjunctions.
- •V. Underline parenthetic words and word-combinations in the sentences below. Analyze them according to the modal meaning they express in the sentence.
- •1. Sentence as the basic unit of syntax
- •2. The expression of syntactic relations
- •3. The classification of sentences as to their structure
- •1. The subject
- •2. The predicate
- •2.1. The simple predicate
- •3. The object
- •4. The attribute
- •5. The adverbial modifier
- •6. Complex parts of the sentence
- •1. The composite sentence
- •2. The compound sentence with conjunctions
- •2.1. The copulative compound sentence.
- •2.2. The disjunctive compound sentence.
- •2.5. Compound sentences with the meaning of suddenness (складносурядне речения i3 значениям раптовостГ)
- •3. Compound sentences with asyndetically joined clauses (складносурядш речения без сполучникав)
- •1. The subject clause / Шдметове шдрядне речения
- •2. The predicative clause / Присудкове пвдрядне
- •3. The object/objective clause / Шдрядне додаткове
- •4. Attributive clauses / гНдрядш означальш речения
- •5. Adverbial clauses / Пвдрядш обставинш речения
- •5.1. Adverbial clauses of place / шдрядш речения мкщя.
- •5.6. Adverbial clauses of cause / шдрядш реченЩ причини.
- •5.7. Adverbial clauses of condition / пщрядш речения умови.
- •5.9. Adverbial clauses of result / шдрядш речении наелвдку.
- •II. Identify complex sentences in the passages below. Dwell upon the types of clauses in these sentences; describe the means of connection of subordinate clauses to the matrix clause.
- •References
6. The English article
The article is also considered to be a semi-notional part (or functional) of speech. The two English words a (an), the form a separate group or class characterized by:
1. the lexico-grammatical meaning of "definiteness/indefini-
teness";
the right-hand combinability with nouns;
the function of noun specifiers [24; 214].
Unlike Ukrainian in which there is no article as well as in the majority of other Slavonic languages, the English language has the definite article (the) and the indefinite article (a, an). The article is the most widely used determiner of the English noun.
A special feature of the English noun is the fact that it is less independent than the noun in Ukrainian. The English noun almost cannot function in the sentence without being strengthened by some determiners. Except for articles, such determiners in some cases can be possessive and indefinite pronouns (some, any).
In such languages of the Germanic family, as, for example, the German language, the article can express the gender, the number and the case of the noun. In the English language the article does not have any of these categories; it is altogether unchangeable.
The grammatical nature of the English article, and its "linguistic nature" have not been still finally determined. The question concerning the place of article in the system of lexical-grammatical classes of words is still a disputable one. A lot of grammars treat article as a special part of speech. Though we can notice a striking difference of the article both from notional words (повнозначт слова), such as nouns, pronouns etc, and from functional words
(preposition, conjunction) which express syntactic relations between words or sentences.
Yu.O. Zhluktenko agrees with the English philologist B.O. Ilyish that the English article is on the border between the word and the morpheme. Though the article in the German language is undoubtedly a separate word, since it changes according to gender, number and cases [5; 48].
All functions of the English article are directed towards either determining the meaning of the noun or its grammatical relations. Its semantic function is considered to be its ability to point out the generalization or specification (узагальнетсгь або конкретнють) of some notion, expressed by the noun. Its morphological function is to serve the index (слугувати показником) of the noun as a part of speech (compare: rich (богатый) and the rich (багачг)). Its syntactic function is to separate the noun group with its attribute from other parts of sentence. So, the English article is the auxiliary word-morpheme which functions in the sphere of one part of speech - the noun, serving as its formal index. (Це дополпжне слово-морфема, яка функцюнуе у сфер! одше'1 частини мови - {менника, обслуговуючи й' як формальний показник).
In reality, the article does not have a lexical-grammatical meaning, as true words, but only a grammatical-functional meaning, which is realized, like by morphemes, by its connection with the noun and is the component part of the common meaning of this combination.
The research highlighted in some linguistic works opposes the theory of existence of three articles in the English language. According to this theory the English language posseses besides the definite and the indefinite article also the so-called "zero article" (that is the meaningful absence of the article before the noun). In reality some special meaning is acquired in some special cases by the noun itself which can be easily proved by the example of the proper names noun class that are used without articles.
The cases of article usage in the English language are very different. Along the distinct grammar function of the article, we can also observe in many word groups a lot of such cases when the article
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has a purely lexical meaning, that is it, in fact, has become the constituent part of the word and its usage is practically unmotivated (for example, the usage of the article with river names or in such names as the Crimea, the Hague).
The main functions of the definite article in English are to determine and to generalize (визначальна та узагальнювальна).
When the function of the article is to determine, it shows that the object, the person or the phenomenon, denoted by a noun, have some individual features that separate them from other objects, persons or phenomena of the same class, for example: The boy is holding a little flag. ((Цей) хлопчик держишь прапорецъ).
Being used in the function to generalize, the definite article gives to the noun in the singular form the meaning of the generalized notion - of the whole class of such subjects (persons, phenomena), e.g.: the pine does not grow here/ сосна тут не росте.
The main function of the indefinite article is to classify (класифшацшна). The indefinite article singles out a separate object (person) from the class which it belongs to, not ascribing to it any individual features in comparison with other objects (persons) of this class. The object is considered not from the point of view of its individual peculiarities, but as one of the objects that make up the following class: a book - "книжка esazani або якасъ книжка" на eidjumy eid зошита, газеты, журналу тощо.
The absence of the article in Ukrainian does not mean that similar notions cannot be expressed in it with the help of other means. Such means are usually word order, intonation and different lexical means. Very often those functions, performed in English with the help of definite and indefinite articles, are expressed by the word order in Ukrainian. In particular, when we mention some object or person in the classifying meaning for the first time, this noun is usually put at the end of the sentence, e.g.:
Вас чекаехлопчик. (Compare: A boy is waiting for you). When the name of the object or person is used in the same sentence with the individualized meaning, then it is placed at the beginning of the sentence, e.g.:
Хлопчик чекае на вас. (Compare: The boy is waiting for you).
The same with sentences: Там зупинилася машина. Машина дуже красива.
(Compare: A car has stopped there. The car is very beautiful.)
In all these cases the noun is correspondingly singled out with intonation.
Alongside with the word order and intonation the Ukrainian language possesses a number of words - pronouns of different types that are used similarly as the English article is used. Ukrainian demonstrative pronouns (вказ1вш займенники - той, цей) are used in the function similar to the function of the English definite article; the function, close to the function of the English indefinite article is performed by Ukrainian pronouns якийсь, який-небудь, один, кожен, будь-який. Compare:
Have you an interesting book? - € у вас (якасъ) цжава книжка?
I've bought a very interesting book. - Я купив (одну) дуже цтаву книжку.
A child can understand that. — (Будъ-яка, кожна) дитина зможе це зрозумгти.
Here is the book you want to read. - Ось (та) книжка, яку ей хочете читати.
The boy ran home. — (Цей) хлопецъ nodiz додому.
The difference lies in the fact that in English the presence of the article is obligatory in the mentioned cases, whereas in Ukrainian the usage of the mentioned pronouns is optional. The meaning of the sentence does not change whether they are present before the noun or not.
Sometimes the Ukrainian sentence sounds better if before a noun there is a pronoun, equivalent to the English article: Xmo це прите? — Якийсь маленький хлопчик. Compare: Маленький хлопчик.
In many cases the presence of such pronouns before nouns is felt as unnecessary, though possible according to the sense of the sentence, and makes the Ukrainian sentence less common. Compare: Коли я йшов додому, я зустргв якусь жтку. Ця жтка несла якусь велику
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корзину. Ця корзина була, мабуть, дуже важка ... It would be more natural to say: Коли я ihuoe додому, я зустргв жтку. Жтка несла велику корзину. Корзина була, мабуть, дуже важка...
When the usage of some of the pronouns цей, той, якийсъ, який-небудь, будъ-який, кожен, один before the noun is obligatory, that is it cannot be omitted without changing the meaning of the sentence, then the corresponding English sentence will not contain an article but one of pronouns this, that, any, every, each or the numeral one on this place. Compare, e.g.:
Bu можете взяти будь-яку книжку. - You may take any book.
Thus, the mentioned above Ukrainian determiners of a noun have more independent meaning regarding it, than the article regarding the noun in the English language.
While in Ukrainian the meaning of definiteness or indefiniteness is rendered in such cases beyond the boundaries of a separate word but within the boundaries of a word combination, in English this tint of meaning is brought in by an article, a word-morpheme, into the meaning of a separate word. (Yoni як в укра'шськш mobi значения означеност1 або неозначеносп в под1бних випадках передаеться поза межами окремого слова в межах словосполучення, в англшськш MOBi цей вщтшок вноситься артиклем, тобто словом-морфемою, в значения окремого слова.) [5; 48-51].
Discussion questions and exercise tasks: I. Consider your answers to the following:
Characterize prepositions as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages. What type of relations do they express?
What are the groups of prepositions differentiated according to their structure in the English language?
What types of Ukrainian prepositions can be singled out according to their origin?
Characterize conjunctions as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages. What type of relations do they express?
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5. What types of conjunctions can be differentiated in English and Ukrainian languages?
Describe particles as a part of speech in English and Ukrainian languages.
Dwell upon the types of particles in two contrasted languages. Point out towards similarities and differences in distinguishing groups of particles.
Characterize "modal words" as a part of speech. What type of modality do they express?
What are the groups of modal words differentiated in the English language?
Dwell upon the problems of differentiating "modal words" into a separate part of speech in Ukrainian.
Characterize interjections as a part of speech.
What is the difference between "primary" and "secondary" interjections in English and Ukrainian languages?
Present the classification of interjections based on the semantic principle. Provide examples in both languages.
Characterize the English article as a part of speech. Dwell upon the problems of its grammatical nature description in the English language in comparison with other Germanic languages.
What are the means of rendering the English article into the Ukrainian language?