Lecture 3 - Parts of Speech Theory

1. Lecture 3: Parts of Speech Theory

Parts of Speech – lexico-semantic classes of words,
distinguished on the basis of their syntactic,
morphological and semantic characteristics
(L.V.Scherba).
Plato
a noun,
a verb,
an adjective

2. H. Sweet’s theory:

Declinables (nouns, adjectives, verbs)
morphological
Indeclinables (adverbs, prepositions,
criterion
conjunctions, interjections)
Noun words (nouns, noun-pronouns,
noun-numerals, infinitive , gerund
Adjective words (adjectives, adjectivepronouns, adjective numerals, participle
Verb-words (finite and non-finite forms)
syntactic
criterion

3. O. Jespersen’s theory of 3 ranks

A furiously barking dog
3
2
Criterion – functioning in the sentence
1

4. Ch. Fries’s theory

Criterion – position in the sentence
The concert was good. It was there.
1
2
3
4
Class 1: Nouns (he, reading, to read, the rich…)
Class 2: Verbs
Class 3: Adjectives
Class 4: Adverbs

5.

Group A: words, that can occupy the
position of “the”: no, their, John’s, each,
this…
Group B: words that occur in the position of
“may”: might, can, would, will..
Group C: “not”
Group G: the word “do-did-does”
Group H: - “there”
Group L: “yes”, “no”
Group M: attention-getting signals: listen,
look, say…

6.

Parts of Speech
Notional
Have lexical meaning,
Denote a notion
Functional
Demonstrate the relations
between the notional words
or specify the grammatical
meaning.

7. Disputable questions:

Category of State: It’s easy (warm)
Modal words: probably, perhaps…
Pronouns (this-that, one, each, other,
myself…) and particles (to, not,)
Article
Auxiliary verbs (to be, to have, to do…)
Functional parts of speech

8. Functional parts of Speech

Are distinguished on the basis of functional
commonness
Demonstrate the relations between the notional
words or specify the grammatical meaning
Denote subjective modality
Don’t denote a notion
Don’t have grammatical categories
Are characterized by a simple word structure and
usually have 1 syllable
Can’t be a member of the sentence
Not homogeneous: but-and-if / what-in order that

9. History:

VII – XI – noun, adjective, adverb,
numeral, pronoun, verb
XI – XV - + articles, Participle 1, 2,
Gerund
XV – XXI - + pronoun, preposition,
conjunction, particle

10.

Kobrina N., Korneeva E.:
The notional P of S:
the noun
the adjective
the stative
the pronoun
the numeral
the verb
the adverb
the modal words
the interjection
The functional P of S
the preposition
the conjunction
the particle

11.

Kaushanskaya V.
The notional P of S:
the noun
the adjective
the words of the category
of state
the pronoun
the numeral
the verb
the adverb
the modal words
the interjection
The functional P of S
the preposition
the conjunction
the particle
the article

12.

Krylova I.
The notional P of S:
The structural P of S
the noun
the pronoun
the adjective
the numeral
the verb
the adverb
the preposition
the conjunction
the article

13. Questions:

What are the 3 criteria according to which the words of a
language fall into parts of speech?
Give the definition of the parts of speech.
What are the 2 large groups the parts of speech are subdivided
into?
Characterize the notional and the functional parts of speech.
Consider the following classifications of the parts of speech of
the English language. What parts of speech are mentioned in
each classification?
What parts of speech are included only in some classifications?
What parts of speech of the English language are not mentioned
at all in all classifications?
Is there any difference with the classification of the parts of
speech in the Russian language?
Give the examples of the parts of speech which function as both
notional and structural. Use the dictionary.
Give the full classification of your own.