Grammatical meanings of notional words are rendered by their grammatical forms. For example, the meaning of the plural in English is regularly rendered by the grammatical suffix –(e)s: cats, books, clashes. Grammatical meanings of individual grammatical forms are established as such in paradigmatic correlations: the plural correlates with the singular (cat – cats), the genitive case of the noun correlates with the common case (cat – cat’s), the definite article determination correlates with the indefinite article determination (a cat – the cat), etc.
The generalized meaning rendered by paradigmatically correlated grammatical forms is called “categorial”. Category is a logical notion denoting the reflection of the most general properties of phenomena. Categorial meanings in grammar are expressed by grammatical paradigms. For example, within the system of the English noun the generalized, categorial meaning of “number” is expressed grammatically through the paradigmatic correlation (or, opposition in a paradigm) of two members, of two grammatical forms, each with its own grammatical meaning: the singular (e.g., cat) and the plural (cats).Thus, the definition of grammatical category is as follows: grammatical category is a system of expressing a generalized categorial meaning by means of
paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms. In other words, it is a unity of a generalized grammatical meaning and the forms of its expression.Paradigmatic correlations, as shown above, are exposed by “oppositions” of grammatical forms - the members of a paradigm. Oppositions are analyzed linguistically with the help of a special method known as “oppositional analysis”. N. S. Trubetzkoy, a member of the Prague Linguistic Circle,
developed it at the turn of the 20th century for the purposes of phonological research; later it became widely employed in the analysis of
grammatical categories. Opposition 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 above, the two forms, cat and cats, 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.
5. "sentence sequences"
Sentences are unified by a certain topic and are organized in speech according to a communicative purpose in a particular communicative situation. The linguistic description of the text is as follows: it is a speech sequence of lingual units interconnected semantically (topically) and syntactically (structurally); in other words, it is a coherent stretch of speech, characterized by semantic and
syntactic unity. Topical (semantic) unity and semantico-syntactic cohesion are the basic differential features (categories) of the text. On the basis of the communicative direction of their component sentences, sentence sequences in speech are divided into monologue sequences and dialogue sequences. In a
monologue, sentences are directed from one interlocutor (participant of communication) to another. In a dialogue, the sentences are directed from one interlocutor to another in turn, to meet one another. Cumulation in sentence sequences may be of two types: prospective (cataphoric) cumulation and retrospective (anaphoric) cumulation. Prospective or cataphoric cumulation presupposes the use of connective elements which relate the sentence in which they are used, to the sentence which follows. Retrospective or anaphoric cumulation presupposes the use of connective elements relating the sentence in which they are used to the one that precedes it. According to the connective means used, cumulation is divided into two types: conjunctive and correlative. Conjunctive cumulation is achieved by
functional or semi-functional conjunction-like words and word combinations. Conjunctive cumulation is always retrospective (anaphoric).
Correlative cumulation is achieved by a pair of elements, one of which, the “succeedent”, refers to the other, the “antecedent”.
Correlative cumulation may be either prospective or retrospective. Correlative cumulation can be divided into substitutional connection and representative connection. Substitutional correlation is based on the use of various substitutes. Representative cumulation is achieved by elements which are
semantically connected without the factor of replacement. Semantic unity and syntactic cohesion are supported by communicative unity of sentences, or theme-rheme arrangement (organization) of the cumuleme. There are two basic types of theme-rheme arrangement of sentences in textual sequences: linear
(progressive) connection and parallel connection of sentences. With linear connection of sentences, the rheme of the leading sentence becomes the theme of the sequential sentence, forming what is known as a theme-rheme chain.
"6. structure of the word
There are two basic types of means with the help of which grammatical forms are built: synthetical and analytical. Synthetical (synthetic) grammatical forms are built by means of the morphemic composition of the word. This includes the morphemic means, which were described in the previous unit: 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. Analytical grammatical forms are intermediary between words and word-combinations. Some analytical forms are closer to a word,
because the two parts are inseparable in their grammatical idiomatism; for example, the forms of the perfect aspect: come
- have come. The components of some other analytical forms are more independent semantically, and they are less idiomatic grammatically; for
example, the degrees of comparison: beautiful - more beautiful – most beautiful. Such combinations of an auxiliary component and a basic component are treated by some linguists as free word-combinations, but as they are correlative members of grammatical paradigms and express some specific grammatical meaning, they should be recognized as analytical grammatical forms too. Some lexical means regularly involved in the expression of common grammatical meanings can also be regarded as marginal cases of suppletivity or specific analytical forms, e.g.: the use of quantifiers with uncountable nouns or repetition groups – a bit of joy, the last two items of news, thousands and thousands, etc.