1.The Subject – matter of Syntax.Two levels in syntax.

It has been mentioned above that the syntactic level is divided into two: syntax – minor and syntax – major. The first one deals with sentence structure and the second – with text and its structure.

The term "Syntax - minor" is common one for both language and speech levels and their unit "sentence" is also one common term for language and speech.

The abstract notion "sentence" of language can have concrete its representation in speech which is also

called “sentence” due to the absence of the special term. Example: “An idea of John’s writing a letter” on the abstract language level can have its concrete representation in speech: John writes a letter. A letter is written by John.

Since one and the same idea is expressed in two different forms they are called "allo -sentences". Some authors call them grammatical synonyms. Thus, sentence is language and speech units on the syntax - minor level, which has a communicative function.

The basic unit of syntax - minor i.e. sentence often consists of some word -groups (or word - combinations):

The roundness of the earth is known all over the world.

1 .The sentence consists of two distinct word - combinations: "the roundness of the earth" and "is known all over the world". The same word - combinations may be used without any change in other sentences. The teacher explained the pupils the roundness of the earth. This means that word - combinations can be studied as a separate unit.

2. In utterances there may be simple sentences like "It was dark", "It began to rain".Sometimes they may be joined together, depending on the intensions of the speakers, as for example:

(a) It was dark, and it began to rain.

(b) When it was dark, it began to rain.

Though the structure of constituting sentences are identical when they are joined together the structure of joined units (a) and (b) are different. This means that such units (which are traditionally called composite or compound/complex sentences) may be also studied separately. Thus syntax - minor deals with simple sentences, with a smaller unit than the simple sentence i.e. word combinations and with the bigger unit than the simple sentence – composite sentences.

In the same way the level syntax - major can be explained. The unit of this level is text -the highest level of language and speech. "Syntax- major" represents both language and speech levels due to the absence of separate term as well as "text" is used homogeniously for both language and speech units

2.Word-Combinations and Their Types.Means of connecting words in word-combinations.

Word-combination (or phrase) is a syntactically connected group of notional words within the limits of sentence but which is not a sentence itself. (3),

B. Ilyish (15) defines it as follows: "Phrase is every combination of two or more words which is a grammatical unit but is not an analytical form of some word (as, for instance, the perfect forms of verbs)" and further Ilyish writes that "the difference between a phrase and a sentence is a fundamental one. A phrase is a means of naming some phenomenon or process, just as a word is.

Each component of a phrase can undergo grammatical changes in accordance with grammatical categories represented in it. Without destroying the identity of the phrase.".

"With a sentence things are entirely different. A sentence is a unit with every word having its definite form. A change in the form of one or more words would produce a new sentence". But if one takes into consideration that any phrase is a constituent of sentences then it is difficult to accept Ilyish's concept of phrases. Any change in the structure of a phrase may result the change in the sentence to which this phrase refers. In this case that sentence will become another sentence as per the concept of the author.

Following L. Barkhudarov's conception we distinguish three types of word- combinations:

1. Subordinate phrases the IC of which are connected by a subordination bond: cold water,reading a book, famous detective, smoked fish, and so on.

2. Co-ordinate phrases the IC of which are connected by a coordination bond: slowly but steadily; pen and pencils.

3. Predicative phrases the IC of which are connected by a predication bond: for you to go; breakfast over...

When he turned his head the two behind could see his lips moving. But phrases don't always consist of two elements; their IC may contain more than one word, as e.g. three black dogs

In the same phrase we find 3 words. IC are connected by a subordination bond. When I C of two or more membered phrases are connected by a similar bond we'll call elementary phrase, e.g. mighty entertaining story; teaching English Grammar: men, women and children... But very often certain phrases in their turn fall under some other phrases, 1C of which are connected by different bonds, as it is in the phrase. Red and blue pencils.

Here we find subordination and coordination. Such phrases are called compound phrases, e.g. brought pens and pencils. Subordinate phrases may be of different types which depend on the part of speech the head word is expressed by.

The Types of Co-ordinate Phrases

The coordinate phrases may be of two types: syndetically connected (free and happy) and asyndetically connected coordinate phrases (hot, dusty, tired out). In the structure of the first type, there’s always a word that connects the constituents of the phrase while in the second type there’s no connector.

The Types of Subordinate Phrases

The subordinate phrases are classified according to the head word. Thus there are noun phrases (cold

water), verb phrases (saw a house), adjective phrases (extremely red) and so on.

The Types of Predicative Phrases

The predicative phrases fall under:

Infinitive predicative phrases: I asked him to stay.

Gerundial predicative phrases: I saw him running.

Absolute predicative phrases: Everybody stood up, glass in hand.

As it is seen from the examples the types of predicative phrases depend on what non-finite form of the verb verbal part of them is expressed by.

3.The sentence definition.

Different views and their consistency. There are many definitions of the sentence and these definitions differ from each other because that the scientists approach from different view points to this question. Some of them consider the sentence from the point view of phonetics, others - from the point of view of semantics (the meaning of the sentence) and so on. According to the opinion of many grammarians the definition of the sentence must contain all the peculiar features of the smallest communicative unit. Some of the definitions of a sentence are given below.«The sentence – the minimum syntactic construction used in acts speech the communications, being characterized predicativity and realizing a certain block diagram» “The sentence is the immediate integral unit of speech built up of words according to a definite syntactic pattern and distinguished by a contextually relevant communicative purpose” The definitions which are mentioned above prove that B.A. Ilyish is quite right when he writes: “The notion of sentence has not so far received a satisfactory definition” (15) “A sentence is a unit of speech whose grammatical structure conforms to the laws of the language and which serves as the chief means of conveying a thought. A sentence is not only a means of communicating something about reality but also a means of showing the speaker's attitude to it.

“Unlike a word or the phrase which express the only various concepts, sentences express relatively finished thoughts and by that are used as communication units between people; saying (or representing on the letter) sentences, people report something, find out, induce each other to performance actions. The train moved out of the city.Are you ready? Put down the book. In order that the message on this or that fact, the phenomenon was full, finished, it is required to specify how this fact, the phenomenon, the event etc. belongs to reality, whether there is it actually or is thought as possible assumed, imagined, necessary etc., i.e. it is necessary to express a message modality. The modality by all means is available in any sentence». «The most important means of grammatical registration of the sentence is completeness intonations». Thus, concluding the above mentioned conceptions, we can say that in any act of communication there are three factors:

1. The act of speech;

2. The speaker;

3. Reality (as viewed by the speaker).

B. Khaimovich and Rogovskaya (22) state that these factors are variable since they change with every act

of speech. They may be viewed from two viewpoints:

1) from the point of view of language are constant because they are found in all acts of

communication;

2) they are variable because they change in every act of speech.

Every act of communication contains the notions of time, person and reality. The events mentioned in the communications are correlated in time and time correlation is expressed by certain grammatical and lexical means. Any act of communication presupposes existence of the speaker and the hearer. The meaning of person is expressed by the category of person of verbs. They may be expressed grammatically and lexico-grammatically by words: I, you, he... Reality is treated differently by the speaker and this attitude of the speaker is expressed by the category of mood in verbs. They may be expressed grammatically and lexically (may, must, probably...) According to the same authors the three relations - to the act of speech, to the speaker and to reality - can be summarized as the relation to the situation of speech. The relation of the thought of a sentence to the situation of speech is called predicativity. Predicativity is the structural meaning of the sentence while intonation is the structural form of it. Thus, a sentence is a communication unit made up of words /and word-morphemes/ in conformity with their combinability and structurally united by intonation and predicativity. Within a sentence the word or combination of words that contains the meanings of predicativity may be called the predication.

My father used to make nets and sell them.

My mother kept a little day-school for the girls.

Nobody wants a baby to cry.

A hospital Nursery is one of the most beautiful places in the world. You might say, it’s a

room filled with love.

Thus, by sentence we understand the smallest communicative unit, consisting of one or more syntactically connected words that has primary predication and that has a certain intonation pattern.

4.Types of sentences according to the structure, the purpose of utterance A sentence is a unit of speech whose grammatical structure conforms to the laws of the language and which serves as the chief means of conveying a thought. A sentence is not only a means of communicating something about reality but also a means of showing the speaker’s attitude to it. The classification of simple sentences is based on two principles:

(A) according to the purpose of the utterance;

(B) according to the structure. According to the purpose of the utterance we distinguish four kinds of sentences. 1. The declarative sentence.A declarative sentence states a fact in the affirmative or negative form. In a declarative sentence the subject precedes the predicate. Charles Dickens was born at Landport, Portsmouth. (Laing)There is asgreat difference between English and Russian negative tenses. Whereas in English the predicate of a sentence can have one negation, in Russian it can have more than one. He does not go anywhere, sever goes anywhere. Ofiterrogative sentence. An interogative sentence asks a question. It is formed by inversion, i. e. by placing the predicate (or part of it)before the subject (unless the subject of the interrogative sentence is an interrogative word, in which case there is no inversion;).There are four kinds of questions:

(C) General question requiring the answer yes or no and spoken with a rising intonation. They are formed by placing part of the: predicate, i. e. the auxiliary or modal verb before the subject of the sentence .Do you like art?

If the predicate is expressed by the verbs to be or to have (the latter expressing possession) used in a simple tense form, the question is formed by placing the predicate before the subject.Is he at home?Sometimes such questions have a negative form and express astonishment or doubt.Haven't you seen him yet?In Russian the particles paзвe, неужели are used in such questions. General questions are sometimes rhetoric questions, they do not require any answer, but are veiled statements expressing some kind of emotion.

Can you commit a whole country to their own prisons? Will youerect a gibbet in every field and hang men like scarecrows?Special questions beginning with an interrogative word and spoken with a falling intonation. The order of words is the same as in general questions, but the interrogative word precedes the auxiliary verb.Where do you Jive?When the interrogative word is the subject of the interrogative sentence or an attribute to the subject, the order of words is that of a statement, i. e. no inversion is used.Who lives in this room? Alternative questions, indicating choice and spoken with a arising intonation in the first part and a falling intonation in the second part.Do you live in town or in the country?Disjunctive questions requiring the answer yes or no and consisting of an affirmative statement followed by a negative question, or a negative statement followed by an affirmative question. The first part is spoken with a falling intonation and the second part with a rising intonation. You speak English, don’t you?3. The imperative sentence.1 An imperative sentence serves to induce a person to d thing, so it expresses a command, a request, an invitati Commands are characterized by a falling tone.Come to the blackboard!Requests and invitations are characterized by a rising intonation: Open the door, please!The exclamatory sentence.The exclamatory sentence expresses some kind of emotion or feeling.It often begins with the words what and how, it is always in the predicative form.What a lovely day it is!. According to their structure simple sentences are divided) into two-member and one-member sentences.A two-member sentence has two members —a subject and a predicate. If one of them is missing it can be easily understood from the context.Fleur had established immediate contact with an architect. A two-member sentence may be complete or incomplete. It is complete when it has a subject and a predicate. Young Jolyon could not help smiling. It is incomplete when one of the principal parts or both of them are missing, but can be easily understood from the context. Such sentences are called elliptical and are mostly used in collo¬quial speech and especially in dialogue. Best not to see her again. Best to forget all about her. A one-member sentence is a sentence having only one member which is neither the subject nor the predicate. This does not mean, however, that the other member is missing, for the one member j makes the sense complete. One-member sentences are generally used in descriptions and in emotional speech. If the main part of a one-member sentence is expressed by a noun, the sentence is called nominal. The noun may be modified by attributes. Dusk— of a summer night.The main part of a one-member is often expressed by an infinitive. No! To have his friendship, his admiration, but not at that price.§ 4. Simple sentences, both two-member and one-member, can be unextended and extended. A sentence consisting only of t primary or principal parts is called an unextended sentence.She is a student. An extended sentence is a sentence consisting of the subject the predicate and one or more secondary parts (objects, attribut or adverbial modifiers).The two native women stole furtive glances at Sarie. (Abraham The two white overseers ... had gone into the hills with t‘ natives to look for stray sheep.

5.The principal parts of the sentences: subject and predicate. The subject (abbreviated sub or su) is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e. the one associated with predicate logic and dependency grammars, the subject is the most prominent overt argument of the predicate. Both traditions see the subject in English governing agreement on the verb or auxiliary verb that carries the main tense of the sentence, as exemplified by the difference in verb forms between he eats and they eat.The subject has the grammatical function in a sentence of relating its constituent (a noun phrase) by means of the verb to any other elements present in the sentence, i.e. objects, complements and adverbials. The subject is a phrasal constituent, and should be distinguished from parts of speech, which, roughly, classify words within constituent. The subject is a noun phrase in the sentence and can be realised by the following forms

A determinerless noun phrase, also called a bare noun phrase. In English, this is mostly limited to plural noun phrases and noun phrases headed by a mass noun. Builders are at work. A noun phrase introduced by a determiner. This complex (determiner + noun phrase) is usually called a determiner phrase:The large car stopped outside our house.

A gerund. These can be shown to behave as noun phrases in many respects, for example, in being able to form determinerless phrases Eating is a pleasure. His constant hammering was very annoying. An infinitive. These can be shown to behave in many respects asembedded clauses, for example in allowing question words like "who." To read is easier than to write. Whom to hire is a difficult question. A full clause, introduced by the complementizer that, itself containing a subject and a predicate. That he had travelled the world was known by everyone.A direct quotation:I love you is often heard these days.The subject can also be implied. In the following command, the subject is the implied "you" that is the recipient of the imperative mood.Take out the trash! An expletive. These are words like it or there when they don't referto any thing or place. For example in the following sentence "it" doesn't refer to anything. It rains. A cataphoric it. This is the use of it when it is co-referent with a subordinate clause that comes after it.It was known by everyone (that) he had travelled the world.

The predicate is the second principal part of the sentence which expresses an action, state, or quality of the person or thing1 denoted by the subject. It is grammatically dependent upon the subject. As a rule the predicate contains a finite verb which may express tense, mood, voice, aspect, and sometimes person and number. According to the structure and the meaning of the predicate we distinguish two main types: the simple predicate and the com-pound predicate. The simple predicate.The simple predicate is expressed by a finite verb in a simple or a compound tense form.

It generally denotes an action: sometimes, however, it denotes a state which is represented as an action. There is a special kind of predicate expressed by a phraseological unit, such as to get rid, to take care, to pay attention, to lose sight, to have a wash, to give a push. The compound predicate.As can be seen from the term itself the compound predicate consists of two parts: (a) a finite verb and (b) some other part of speech: a noun, a pronoun, an adjective, a verbal (a participle, a gerund, an infinitive), etc. The second component is the significant part of the predicate.

The first part expresses the verbal categories of person, number, tense, aspect, mood and voice; besides it has a certain lexical meaning of its own. The compound predicate may be nominal or verbal. The compound nominal predicate denotes the state or quality of the person or thing expressed by the subject (e. g. He is tired, The book is interesting), or the class of persons or things to which this person or thing belongs (e. g. She is a student).

The compound nominal predicate consists of a link verb and a predicative (the latter is also called the nominal part of the predicate). The predicative. The predicative is the significant part of the compound nominal predicate. It can be expressed in different ways: 1. By a noun in the common case, occasionally by a noun in the possessive case. By an adjective.

He’s awfully dear and unselfish. (Galsworthy)Very often the predicative expressed by an adjective in English does not correspond to an adjective in Russian. It often cor¬responds to an adverb, serving as an adverbial modifier.

'ln this connection particular attention should be paid to the foltowing verbs as they are very often used in everyday English: to look, to feet, to sound, to smell, to taste. By a pronoun —personal, possessive, negative, interrogative, reflexive, indefinite, defining. By a word of the category of state. By a numeral, cardinal or ordinal.Prepositional phrase,infinitive phrase,costruction,gerund,participle 1,2,adverb. The Objective Predicative.

"'Besides the predicative referring to the subject, another type of predicative referring to the object can be found in English. It is generally called the Objective Predicative. It expresses the state or quality of the person or thing denoted by the object and is generally expressed by a noun, an adjective, a word denoting state, or a prepositional phrase. he compound verbal predicate. The compound verbal predicate can be divided into two types according to the meaning of the finite verb: the compound verbal modal predicate;the compound verbal aspect predicate. The compound verbal modal predicate shows whether the action expressed by a non-finite form of the verb is considered as possible, impossible, obligatory, necessary, desirable, etc. These shades of meaning are expressed by the first component of the predicate.The compound verbal modal predicate may consist of the following components: A modal verb and an infinitive. 2. Modal expressions: to be-\- Infinitive, to have+ Infinitive. A verb with a modal meaning 2 and an infinitive or a gerund. Modal expressions and an infinitive. The compound verbal aspect predicate.The compound verbal aspect predicate expresses the beginning, repetition, duration, or cessation of the action expressed by the non-finite form of the verb. It consists of such verbs as to begin, to starty to commence, to fall, to set about, to go on, to keep on, to proceed, to continue, to stop, to give up, to finish, to cease, to come and an infinitive or a gerund.Here also belong would and used + Infinitive, which denote a repeated action in the past. ixed types of predicate.Besides the compound nominal predicate, the compound verbal modal predicate and the compound verbal aspect predicate, there is a type of predicate in which we have elements of two types of predicates. Such predicates contain three components.Thus we have:The compound modal nominal predicate. The compound aspect nominal predicate. The compound modal aspect predicate.

6.The secondary parts of the sentences:object,attribute,adverbials.

The Object

The Object is a secondary part of the sentence expressed by a verb, a noun, a substantival pronoun, an adjective, a numeral, or an adverb, and denoting a thing to which the action passes on, which is a result of the action, in reference to which an action is committed or a property is manifested, or denoting an action as object of another action.

Objects differ form one another

by their morphological composition, by the parts of speech or phrases which perform the function of object

by the type of their relation to the action expressed by the verb (direct/indirect)

Classification of object:

Prepositional and non-prepositional objects

Morphological types (noun, pronoun, substantivized adjective, infinitive, gerund)

Direct/indirect, is applied only to objects expressed by nouns or pronouns. There are sentences in which the predicate is expressed by the verbs send, show, lend, give. These verbs usually take 2 different kinds of objects simultaneously: (1) an object expressing the thing which is sent, shown, lent, given, etc. (2) the person or persons to whom the thing is sent, shown, lent, given, etc. The difference between the 2 relations is clear enough: the direct object denotes the thing immediately affected by the action denoted by the predicate verb, whereas the indirect object expresses the person towards whom the thing is moved, e.g. We sent them a present. The indirect object stands 1st, the direct object comes after it.

In studying different kinds of objects it is also essential to take into account the possibility of the corresponding passive construction.

The Adverbial Modifier.

The term ‘adverbial modifier’ cannot be said to be a very lucky one, as it is apt to convey erroneous (wrong, incorrect) ideas about the essence of this secondary part. They have nothing to do with adverbs and they modify not only verbs.

There are several ways of classifying adverbial modifiers:

According to their meaning – not a grammatical classification. However it may acquire some grammatical significance.

According to their morphological peculiarities – according to the parts of speech and to the phrase patterns. It has also something to do with word order, and stands in a certain relation to the classification according to meaning.adverb,preposition + noun,a noun without a preposition,infinitive or an infinitive phrase

According to the type of their head-word – is the syntactic classification proper. The meaning of the word (phrase) acting as modifier should be compatible with the meaning of the head-word.

Adverbial modifier of:

Time and frequency,

Place and direction,

Manner and attendant

circumstances,

Cause,

Purpose,

Result,

Condition,

Concession,

Degree

The attribute

The problem of the attribute.The attribute is a secondary part of the sentence modifying a part of the sentence expressed by a noun, a substantivized pronoun, a cardinal numeral, and any substantivized word, and characterizing the thing named by these words as to its quality or property.

The attribute can either precede or follow the noun it modifies. Accordingly we use terms prepositive and postpositive attribute. The position of an attribute with respect to its head-word depends partly on the morphological peculiarities of the attribute itself, and partly on stylistic factors.

The size of the prepositive attributive phrase can be large in ME. Whatever is included between the article and the noun, is apprehended as an attribute.