Defining the preposition, linguists usually point out three main proper­ties: 1) the preposition is a functional part of speech, i.e. a preposition cannot perform an independent syntactic function; 2) the preposition is a word ex­pressing subordinate relations between lexical parts of speech; 3) the preposition is a word with an obligatory pre-nounal position: it may […]

Semantic functions of the definite and the indefinite articles – Part 1 After all, most of his happiness was in his home, and it was a very con­siderable happiness. (Cary) As for the various uses of nouns without an article, from the semantic point of view they all should be divided into two types. In […]

The main semantic function of the article is that of correlation of a no­tion with the world described in a text (or with the situation of communica­tion). Obviously the speaker’s choice of the article is situation-dependent. Specifically, the definite article the and the indefinite article a(n) have three meaningful characterizations of the nounal referent: one […]

Article: Grammatical meaning – Part 1 Thus, the article should obviously be regarded as a phenomenon that can­not be fully referred either to morphology or to syntax. On the one hand, it is a part-of-speech marker of the noun, which makes it close to the morpheme. On the other hand, the article is a function-word […]

The article presents many difficulties to linguists. The problem of its grammatical meaning and its place in the language system is one of the most complicated in English grammar. Firstly, it is not quite clear whether the article should be treated as a separate word and what exactly its relation to the noun is. Secondly, […]

The interjection is a grammatically unchangeable part of speech that ex­presses human emotions, states of mood and volition without naming them. The latter property makes it possible for some scholars to contrast interjec­tions with so-called “intellectual words”. Interjections differ from all other parts of speech in their origin, specific nomination, phonetic structure as well as […]

According to their derivational pattern, English interjections are as a rule divided into primary (simple) and secondary (derivative). Primary interjections (ah, hush, oh, ouch, ugh, wow) stem from reflex involuntary exclamations and sounds that represent the speaker’s immediate reaction to a certain event. Contrary to reflex exclamations and sounds that do not belong to the […]

English interjections tend to be used as independent word-sentences ei­ther in the principal clause, which they make more emotional, or in isolation. Used with the principal clause, interjections occur, as a rule, in pre-position, or – sometimes – in post-position. Used in isolation, an interjection retains its relations with the utterance, since this part of […]

Modal words are morphologically unchangeable words that function as parenthesis and express the correlation between the content of an utterance with the real-world situation as seen by the speaker. Therefore, modal words are treated as a lexico-grammatical means of the category of modality. One of their specific properties is that modal words are predominantly derived […]

Modal words in English – Part 1 Compound modal words are formed syntactically, i.e. from set expres­sions acquiring gradually properties of a word. The set expressions may be of various types. Sometimes, these are of the “preposition + noun” structure. One of the conditions that enable this word combination to transform into a modal word […]