2. Lexical and grammatical valence in word groups]

All words in a language form word groups and sentences if word combinations do not violate syntax. A child smiles is a regular word combination in English but *a smiles child would be an ill-formed phrase. Yet, the correct syntax is not enough for a word group to be correct and accepted.

The sentence invented by N. Chomsky Green ideas sleep furiously is perfect from the point of view of syntax but the words do not come together because in this sentence immediate phrases do not make sense.

Our general knowledge of the world installs certain selectional restrictions on word usage. Words make word groups in speech if their semantic structures are compatible, too. Thus, a question can be urgent, delicate, disputable or serious, but noi*laughing, *soft, or *blue, the adjective deep 'extending far from surface downward' comes together with a noun well 'a pit or hole sunk into the earth to reach a supply of water' as they both have a common semantic component of 'having measure from surface to bottom' but such sequences as *a deep building or *a deep tree sound odd.

Restrictions on sequences of words may also be determined by the language structure, by the individual meaning of a word and the language norms, as in the case with the adjective blond described above.

For stylistic purposes, however, in order to create special verbal effects, to communicate about some uncertain vaguely structured concepts and to cause unusual and rich associations of ideas, writers and poets often violate conventional selection restrictions on word usage like in the following poem by E.E.Cumming:

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women and men (noth little and small) cared for anyone not at all they sowed their isn 't they reaped their same sun moon stars rain.

But lexicology deals with word groups that have a high degree of expectancy.

The conventional mutual expectancy of words in all types of word groups, irrespective of the degree of structural and semantic cohesion of their components, may be described, as in chemistry, by their valence - the power of a word to combine with another one in speech.

The aptness of a word to appear in a certain grammatical (syntactic) pattern may be termed as its grammatical valence.

Words are characterized by the ability to be used only in a definite grammatical context. The noun, for example, pencil, forming noun phrases may be used with an adjective (in a adj - n pattern): a red pencil, preposition and another noun (in a n - prep - n pattern): a pencil for present; in verb phrases this noun may be used in v — n patterns: to buy a pencil. The adjective clever may be used in a pattern adj - prep - n like in clever at mathematics and in a word group with a noun adj-n: a clever boy).

Though words' grammatical valence is predetermined to a large extent by grammar rules, it is still different for each particular word. Even synonyms may differ in their grammatical valence (cf.: similar v+n pattern in both the synonymic verbs propose and suggest as in propose a stroll and to suggest a plan; but different patterns in collocation with other words propose + infinitive, and suggest+that clause, or suggest+-ing form).

The grammatical valence of correlative words in different languages may differ greatly, too (to explain to somebody; to smile at somebody (v+prep+n/pron) in English but oo-bHcmmb KOMy-mo; yjibidambcn Komy-mo (v+n/pron) in Russian; to enter the room (v+n) in English, but eoumu e KOMnamy (v+prep+n) in Russian.

So, the differences in grammatical valence of correlative words are usually accounted for their semantic differences and differences in the structure of the languages.

Even when used in an appropriate grammatical pattern prescribed by language laws, a word may not form a natural sounding combination because it also has certain lexical restrictions on collocations with other lexemes.

The aptness of a word to appear in certain combinations with other lexemes may be called its lexical valence.

Every word is restricted in use and has a capacity to appear only in a certain lexical context. Yet there are some words, like good or bad, which have a great, almost unlimited

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lexical valence and they appear in combinations with various words. But some words, like shrug, blond are characterized by severe restrictions in combinability that should be memorized (to shrug shoulders, a blond/hair/skin/person).

Individual words have individual lexical valence. Even close synonyms display difference in collocability. Thus, lift and raise are synonyms and they are interchangeable in the context of to lift/raise one's arms but you cannot *lift a flag, you raise it, as you raise a question but do not *lift it. Likewise you say you do not lift a finger to help somebody but you cannot say that you *do not raise у our finger to do it.

Lexical valence of correlative words in different languages is usually different. You cannot say, for example, *room flowers in English as you say комнатные цветы in Russian. You have to say pot flowers or indoor/liouse plants because the word flower in English does not collocate with the word room.

In Russian the word украшать can be used with the words стол, салат, торт; in English the correlative word decorate can collocate with the word a cake but not with the words table (they dress tables) or salad (they garnish salads).

Some discrepancies in lexical valence are connected with differences in meaning structure of correlative words. Thus, the difference in combining ability of the English verb bury and the Russian verb хоронить (to bury the trash but not *хоронить мусор) may be due to difference in lexical meaning of these verbs. The meaning of the English word bury is broader than the meaning of the Russian word хоронить (bury 'to dispose of by depositing in the earth'; хоронить 'закапывать в землю, помещать в гробницу (тело умершего или его прах после кремации), обычно с соблюдением принятых обрядов').

Differences in the volume of word categories in different languages (cf. discussed above: украшать in Russian and decorate in English) may also account for some differences in lexical valence.

The impossibility of some word groups to be translated word-for-word may be connected with differences in semantic structures of correlative words. Thus the correlative words heavy and тяжелый have different semantic structures and hence different lexical valence (cf.: heavy beard but 'густая борода'; heavy eater but 'любитель поесть'; heavy cold but 'сильная простуда'; heavy bread but 'плотный по структуре и обильный по калориям \

So, all words form word groups but all of them have rule-governed and specific grammatical and lexical valence determined by specific language structure. Lexicology and phraseology are especially keen on words with highly restricted lexical and grammatical valence that form complexes and need memorizing.

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