Categorial Structure of The Word

Categorial structure of the word
 grammatical category – is a unit of grammar based on a morphological opposition

of grammatical meanings presented in grammatical forms.
Grammatical categories are semantic distinctions.
 grammatical meaning – is a general, abstract meaning which embraces classes of
words. The grammatical meaning depends on the lexical meaning. It is connected with
objective reality indirectly, through the lexical meaning. The grammatical meaning is
relative, it is revealed in relations of word forms, e.g. speak - speaks. The grammatical
meaning is obligatory. Grammatical meaning must be expressed if the speaker wants to
be understood.
 grammatical form – the grammatical meaning must have a grammatical form of
expression (inflexions, analytical forms, word-order, etc.). The term form may be used
in a wide sense to denote all means of expressing grammatical meanings. It may be also
used in a narrow sense to denote means of expressing a particular grammatical
meaning (plural, number, present tense, etc.).
 synthetical grammatical forms – are built by means of the morphemic composition
of the word. This includes the morphemic means: outer inflexion with the help of
adding grammatical suffixes to the stems of the words, e.g.: cat - cats; inner
inflexion, or vowel interchange inside the root, e.g.: goose - geese; and suppletivity,
when different roots are combined within the same paradigm, e.g.: go – went.
 analytical grammatical forms – are built by the combination of the notional word
with auxiliary words, e.g.: come - have come. Analytical forms consist of two words
which together express one grammatical meaning; in other words, they are
grammatically idiomatic: the meaning of the grammatical form is not immediately
dependent on the meanings of its parts.
 suppletive forms – carry the same grammatical meanings as other forms, e.g.
inflexions (sing – sang-sung; good – better – best; person – people, must – have to,
can – will be able to). They have identical or similar meanings and different roots.
 opposition – usually comprise two opposemes. These opposemes, or oppositional
members are characterized by two types of features: common features and
differential features.
 common features – serve as the basis for uniting the grammatical forms within the
same paradigm. In the example, cat and cats, the two forms are paradigmatically
united as forms of one and the same word, sharing the categorical grammatical
meaning of number.
 differential features – serve to differentiate the members of an opposition. For
example, the grammatical form of the plural – cats, has an inflection, or a
grammatical suffix, which the form of the singular, cat, has not.
 binary privative opposition – the term “binary” means, that the opposition
consists of two members, or forms. The term “privative” means that the members of
the opposition are characterized by the presence/absence of a certain differential
feature, which serves as the formal mark of one of its members; in the example cat –
cats, the ending of the plural is its formal mark.
 marked /strong / positive – the member of the opposition characterized by the
presence of the differential mark is called “marked”, “strong”, or “positive”
(commonly designated by the symbol +). In the category of number the strong,
marked member is the plural form, because it possesses a special formal mark (either
the productive suffix -(e)s, or other formal means, such as -en in children, etc.
 unmarked /weak / negative – the member of the opposition, characterized by the
absence of the differential feature, is called “unmarked”, “weak”, or “negative”
(commonly designated by the symbol -). In the category of number the weak,
unmarked member of the opposition is the singular form, which possesses no special
mark.
General Classification of the Parts of Speech
 morphological characteristics – the various forms of the word – its

grammatical categories and derivational patterns
 syntactical function – the function of word in a sentence (subject, predicate,
object, attribute, adverbial modifier).
 parts of speech – explain how a word is used in a sentence. There are eight
main parts of speech (also known as word classes): nouns, pronouns, adjectives,
verbs, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interjections.
 notional parts of speech – are fully lexical and self-dependent in the sentence:
Noun, Adjective, Numeral, Pronoun, Verb, Adverb
 functional parts of speech – have incomplete nominative meaning, they are non-
self-dependent in the sentence: Article, Preposition, Conjunction, Particle, Modal
Word, Interjection.
The noun
 the noun is a word that functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions,
qualities, states of existence, or ideas.
 substance the most important part of what someone has said or written
 singular relating to the form of a word used when talking or writing about one thing
 plural a word or form that expresses more than one
 gender
the grammatical arrangement of nouns, pronouns and adjectives into masculine, femini
ne, and neuter types in some languages
 subject the person or thing that performs the action of a verb, or is joined to
a description by a verb
 object a noun or noun phrase that is affected by the action of a verb or
that follows a preposition
 attribute a quality or feature of a person or thing, esp. one that is
an important part of its nature
 predicative The predicative is the significant part of the compound nominal predicate.
 masculine gender A noun that denotes MALE SEX
 feminine gender A noun that denotes FEMALE SEX
 neuter gender a gender that refers to inanimate objects neither masculine nor feminine
 morphological composition
 simple noun are nouns which have neither prefixes nor suffixes
 derived noun (derivatives) – are nouns which have derivative elements
 compound noun are nouns built from two or more stems.
 phrasal compound noun
 abbreviation involves shortening a word.
 proper noun individual names given to separate persons or things.
 common noun are names that can be applied to any individual of a class of persons or things
 class noun denote persons or things belonging to a class.
 animate noun A noun which refers to people, animals and living beings is an animate noun.
 inanimate noun refer to things that are not alive.
 human animate noun (person noun)
 non-human (animate and inanimate) noun (non-person nouns)
 collective noun is a collection of things taken as a whole.
 noun of material are names of materials or substances out of which things are made.
 abstract noun denoting an idea, quality, or state rather than a concrete object.
 countable noun are treated as separate items which can be counted
 uncountable noun some things are seen as a whole or mass
 common case is the ordinary base form of a noun—such as a cat
 genitive case is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying
another word, also usually a noun
 possessive case denotes ownership or possession

Categorial Structure of The Word

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Categorial Structure of The Word

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Categorial structure of the word

 grammatical category – is a unit of grammar based on a morphological opposition

General Classification of the Parts of Speech

 morphological characteristics – the various forms of the word – its

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