ЛЕКЦІЯ № 5

THE NOUN

Questions to be discussed:

1. The noun as a part of speech

2. Types of the noun combinability.

3. The grammatical categories of English nouns:

a) the category of gender;

b) the category of number: Absolute singular. Absolute plural;

c) the category of case. Theories of cases.

The noun as a part of speech has the categorical meaning of “substance” or “thingness”.

The categorical functional properties of the noun are determined by its semantic properties. The most characteristic substantive function of the noun is that of the subject of the sentence. The function of the object is also typical of the noun as the substance word. Its other syntactic functions (attributive, adverbial and predicative) are performed with equal ease but are not the characteristic of its substantive quality. While performing the non-substantive functions, the noun essentially differs from the other parts of speech because of the transformations as a result of which the noun from various non-subject syntactic positions can be shifted into subject syntactic positions of the same general semantic value.

e.g. Mary is a flower-girl.

The flower-girl is Mary.

He lives in Glasgow.

Glasgow is his place of residence.

This happened three years ago.

Three years have elapsed since it happened.

The noun is characterized by some special types of combinability:

1. The prepositional combinability with another noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb:

e.g. an entrance to the house; to turn round the corner; red in the face; far from its destination;

b) the casal (possessive) combinability of the noun with another noun:

e.g. the speech of the President – the President’s speech;

the cover of the book – the book’s cover

c) combinability of the noun with another noun where the noun in preposition plays the role of a semantic qualifier to the noun in post-position:

e.g. a cannon ball; a sports event; film festival.

As a part of speech, the noun is also characterized by a set of formal features. It has its word-building distinctions, including typical suffixes, compound stem models, conversion patterns. It discriminates the grammatical categories of gender, number, case, article determination.

These formal features are relevant for the division of the nouns into several strictly delimited subclasses which are grouped into four oppositional pairs:

1. Proper and common nouns (the foundation of this division is type of “nomination”).

2. Animate and inanimate (“the form of existence”).

3. Human and non-human (“personal quality”).

4. Countable and uncountable (“quantitative structure”).

Somewhat less explicitly and strictly realized is the division of English nouns into concrete and abstract.

The category of gender

The category of gender is expressed in English by the obligatory correlations of nouns with the personal pronouns of the 3^rd person. These are specific gender classifiers of nouns.

The category of gender is strictly oppositional. It is formed by two oppositions related to each other on a hierarchical basis:

• one opposition functions in the whole set of nouns, dividing them into person (human) nouns and non-person (non-human) nouns;

• the other opposition functions in the subset of person nouns only, dividing them into masculine and feminine.

Thus, the first, general opposition can be referred to as the upper opposition in the category f gender, while the second - partial opposition - can be referred to as the lower opposition in this category.

As a result of the double oppositional correlation, a specific system of three genders arises:

• the neuter (i.e. non-person) gender,

• the masculine gender,

• the feminine gender.

The strong member of the upper opposition is the human subclass of nouns, its mark being “person” or “personality”. The weak member of the opposition comprises both inanimate and animate non-person nouns. Here belong such nouns as: tree, mountain, love; cat, swallow, ant; society, crowd, association; bull and cow, cock and hen.