Grammatical Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Modern English. A Field Approach

Grammatical Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Modern English. A Field Approach

Grammatical Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Modern English. A Field Approach

Introduction1. Grammatical Categories and Functional-Semantic Fields

.1Nature of grammatical categories

.2Typology of grammatical categories

.3The theory of functional-semantic fields2. The Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Terms of Field Structure

.1 Functional-semantic field of number in Modern English

.2 Functional semantic field of case in Modern English

.3 Functional-semantic field of gender in Modern English

words of every language are divided into several word classes, or parts of speech, such as nouns, verbs and adjectives etc. The words of a given class exhibit two or more forms in somewhat different grammatical circumstances. These forms are not interchangeable and each can be used only in a given grammatical situation. This variation in form is required by the existence of a grammatical category applying to that class of words. Thus a grammatical category is "a linguistic category which has the effect of modifying the forms of some class of words in a language" [53, 32]. For example, English nouns have the grammatical category of number. Thus the singular `dog' and the plural `dogs' exist but are not interchangeable in a sentence. A noun can be used only in its singular or plural form as there is no possibility of another form. English adjectives vary for degree; verbs for tense; pronouns for case etc. grammarians divide the words of English into eight classes or parts of speech- noun, pronoun, adjective, verb, preposition, conjunction, adverb, etc.grammatical category is an analytical class within the grammar of a language, whose members have the same syntactic distribution and recur as structural unit throughout the language, and which share a common property which can be semantic or syntactic. In traditional structural grammar, grammatical categories are semantic distinctions; this is reflected in a morphological or syntactic paradigm. But in generative grammar, which sees meaning as separate from grammar, they are categories that define the distribution of syntactic elements. For structuralists such as Roman Jakobson grammatical categories were lexemes that were based on binary oppositions of "a single feature of meaning that is equally present in all contexts of use" [51, 37]. Another way to define a grammatical category is as a category that expresses meanings from a single conceptual domain, contrasts with other such categories, and is expressed through formally similar expressions. Another definition distinguishes grammatical categories from lexical categories, such that the elements in a grammatical category have a common grammatical meaning - that is, they are part of the language's grammatical structure.topic of this paper has been chosen to be “Grammatical Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Modern English. A Field Approach”.topicality of this work caused by several important points. The concept of ‘semantic field’, like the concept of ‘semantic frame’, opened up new domains of semantic research, first in Germany in the 1930s and then in the United States in the 1970s. Both concepts brought about ‘revolutions’ in semantics, and provided semanticists with new tools for the study of semantic change and semantic structure. Although there have been several historical accounts of the development of field semantics, there exists no detailed study linking and comparing the development of field and frame semantics. In this article we shall reconstruct the contexts in which the concepts of ‘field’ and ‘frame’ appeared for the first time and highlight the similarities as well as the differences between the semantic theories built on them. One of the main differences between the older and the modern traditions is that the latter no longer study how lexical fields carve up a relatively amorphous conceptual mass, as most older traditions had done, but how lexical fields are conceptually and pragmatically ‘framed’ by or grounded in our bodily, social and cultural experiences and practices. In doing so they establish forgotten links with certain communicational and functional conceptions of semantic fields developed in the past.object of the investigation - grammatical categories of number, case, and gender in Modern English.subject of the investigation - field approach to the study of the English language grammatical categories.based upon the actuality of the theme we are able to formulate the general goal of our qualification work - to investigate grammatical categories of number, case, and gender in Modern English with the field approach of the topic investigation.tasks of the investigation are the following:

to investigate the nature of grammatical categories;

to consider typology of grammatical categories;

to characterize the theory of functional-semantic fields;

to analyze the categories of number, case, and gender in terms of field structure.of the investigation - analysis of theoretical and practical materials on the topic under investigation, comparative analysis.of the investigation and its sources. Sentences, selected from the business discourse, required for the analysis of grammatical categories.practical significance of the work can be concluded in the following items:work could serve as a good source of learning English by young teachers at schools and colleges.lexicologists could find a lot of interesting information for themselves.who would like to communicate with the English-speaking people through the Internet will be able to use the up-to-date words with the help of our qualification work.said about the linguists studied the material before we can mention that our qualification work was based upon the investigations made by a number of well known English and Russian lexicologists as M.D. Stepanova, J.Trier, S. Atkins, Charles J. Fillmore and some others.we say about the methods of scientific approaches used in our work we can mention that the method of typological analysis was used.theoretical significance of the investigation is predetermined by the summarization of the theoretical material on English grammatical categories in accordance with the field approach.novelty of the investigation in characterized by the analysis of the English language grammatical categories with the field approach on the basis of business discourse materials.practical value of the research lies in the fact that it is impossible to reach high level of competence without understanding the nature of the concept grammatical categories in Modern English.volume of the investigation. The volume of the investigation includes 60 pages.structure of the investigation. The paper consists of the introduction, two chapters, conclusion, bibliography and summary.

1. Grammatical Categories and Functional-Semantic Fields

.1Nature of grammatical categories

grammatical signals have a meaning of their own independent of the meaning of the notionalwords. This can be illustrated by the following sentence with nonsensical words: Woggles ugged diggles.to Ch. Fries [44] the morphological and the syntactic signals in the given sentencemake us understand that “several actors acted upon some objects”. This sentence which is a syntacticsignal, makes the listener understand it as a declarative sentence whose grammatical meaning is actor -action - thing acted upon. One can easily change (transform) the sentence into the singular (A woggleugged a diggle.), negative (A woggle did not ugg a diggle.), or interrogative (Did a woggle ugg adiggle?) All these operations are grammatical. Then what are the main units of grammar - structure.us assume, for example, a situation in which are involved a man, a boy, some money, an actof giving, the man the giver, the boy the receiver, the time of the transaction - yesterday...one of the units man, boy, money, giver, yesterday could appear in the linguistic structure as subject.man gave the boy the money yesterday.boy was given the money by the man yesterday.money was given the boy by the man yesterday.giving of the money to the boy by the man occurred yesterday.was the time of the giving of the money to the boy by the man.

"Subject" then is a formal linguistic structural matter., the grammatical meaning of a syntactic construction shows the relation between the words in it.have just mentioned here "grammatical meaning", “grammatical utterance”. The whole complex of linguisticmeans made use of grouping words into utterances is called a grammatical structure of the language [43].the means which are used to group words into the sentence exist as a certain system; they are interconnectedand interdependent. They constitute the sentence structure.the words of a language fall, as we stated above, under notional and functional words.grammatical category is a property of items within the grammar of a language; it has a number of possible values (sometimes called exponents, or grammemes), which are normally mutually exclusive within a given category. Examples of frequently encountered grammatical categories include tense (which may take values such as present, past, etc.), number (with values such as singular, plural, and sometimes dual), and gender (with values such as masculine, feminine and neuter).terminology is not always consistent, a distinction should be made between these grammatical categories (tense, number, etc.) and lexical categories, which are closely synonymous with the traditional parts of speech (noun, verb, adjective, etc.), or more generally syntactic categories. Grammatical categories are also referred to as (grammatical) features.name given to a grammatical category (as an uncountable noun) is generally also used (as a countable noun) to denote any of the possible values for that category. For example, the values available in a given language for the category "tense" are called "tenses", the values available for the category "gender" are called "genders", and so on.given constituent of an expression can normally take only one value from a particular category. For example, a noun or noun phrase cannot be both singular and plural, since these are both values of the category of number. It can, however, be both plural and feminine, since these represent different categories (number and gender).may be described and named with regard to the type of meanings that they are used to express. For example, the category of tense is considered to serve to express time of occurrence (as in past, present or future). However, purely grammatical features do not always correspond simply or consistently to elements of meaning, and different authors may take significantly different approaches in their terminology and analysis. For example, the meanings associated with the categories of tense, aspect and mood are often bound in up verb conjugation patterns that do not have separate grammatical elements corresponding to each of the three categories; see Tense-aspect-mood.may be marked on words by means of inflection. In English, for example, the number of a noun is usually marked by leaving the noun uninflected if it is singular, and by adding the suffix -s if it is plural (although some nouns have irregular plural forms). On other occasions, a category may not be marked overtly on the item to which it pertains, being manifested only through other grammatical features of the sentence, often by way of grammatical agreement.example:bird can sing./The birds can sing.the above sentences, the number of the noun is marked overtly by the absence or presence of the ending -s.sheep is running./The sheep are running.the above, the number of the noun is not marked on the noun itself (sheep does not inflect according to the regular pattern), but it is reflected in agreement between the noun and verb: singular number triggers is, and plural number are.bird is singing./The birds are singing.this case the number is marked overtly on the noun, and is also reflected by verb agreement.:sheep can run.[36]this case the number of the noun (or of the verb) is not manifested at all in the surface form of the sentence, and thus ambiguity is introduced (at least, when the sentence is viewed in isolation).of grammatical categories are often expressed in the same position or 'slot' in the word (such as prefix, suffix or enclitic). An example of this is the Latin cases, which are all suffixal: rosa, rosae, rosae, rosam, rosā ("rose", in nominative, genitive, dative, accusative and ablative).can also pertain to sentence constituents that are larger than a single word (phrases, or sometimes clauses). A phrase often inherits category values from its head word; for example, in the above sentences, the noun phrase the birds inherits plural number from the noun birds. In other cases such values are associated with the way in which the phrase is constructed; for example, in the coordinated noun phrase Tom and Mary, the phrase has plural number (it would take a plural verb), even though both the nouns from which it is built up are singular.traditional structural grammar, grammatical categories are semantic distinctions; this is reflected in a morphological or syntactic paradigm. But in generative grammar, which sees meaning as separate from grammar, they are categories that define the distribution of syntactic elements.[1] For structuralists such as Roman Jakobson grammatical categories were lexemes that were based on binary oppositions of "a single feature of meaning that is equally present in all contexts of use". Another way to define a grammatical category is as a category that expresses meanings from a single conceptual domain, contrasts with other such categories, and is expressed through formally similar expressions.[17] Another definition distinguishes grammatical categories from lexical categories, such that the elements in a grammatical category have a common grammatical meaning - that is, they are part of the language's grammatical structure.

"Grammatical category is a linguistic category which has the effect of modifying the forms of some class of words in a language. The words of everyday language are divided up into several word classes, or parts of speech, such as nouns, verbs and adjectives. It often happens that the words in a given class exhibit two or more forms used in somewhat different grammatical circumstances. In each such case, this variation in form is required by the presence in the language of one or more grammatical categories applying to that class of words.

"English nouns are affected by only one grammatical category, that of number: we have singular dog but plural dogs, and so on for most (but not all) of the nouns in the language. These forms are not interchangeable, and each must be used always and only in specified grammatical circumstances. And here is a key point: we must always use a noun in either its singular form or its plural form, even when the choice seems irrelevant; there is no possibility of avoiding the choice, and there is no third form which is not marked one way or the other. This is typically the case with grammatical categories."

"It is important to keep in mind that a grammatical category is a linguistic, not a real-world, category, and that there is not always a one-to-one correspondence between the two, though they are usually closely related. For example 'tense' is a linguistic category, while 'time' is a category of the world. While past tense usually expresses past time (as in I saw a movie last night), the past-tense auxiliary in the following expresses future time: I wish you would go. And the present-tense verb of I leave tomorrow expresses future time."[21]

"Words are assigned to grammatical categories in traditional grammar on the basis of their shared semantic, morphological and syntactic properties. The kind of semantic criteria (sometimes called 'notional' criteria) used to categorise words in traditional grammar are illustrated in much-simplified form below:denote actions (go, destroy, buy, eat etc.)denote entities (car, cat, hill, John etc.)denote states (ill, happy, rich etc.)denote manner (badly, slowly, painfully, cynically etc.)denote location (under, over, outside, in, on etc.), semantically based criteria for identifying categories must be used with care: for example, assassination denotes an action but is a noun, not a verb; illness denotes a state but is a noun, not an adjective; . . . and Cambridge denotes a location but is a noun, not a preposition."[41]research presupposes bringing into certain order the material being studied. The issue underthe consideration is also an attempt to generalize the grammatical means of language.are many conceptions on the problem today. According to B. Golovin [21] “a grammatical category is a reallinguistic unity of grammatical meaning and the means of its material expression”. It means that in order to call a linguisticphenomenon a grammatical category there must be a grammatical meaning and grammatical means..Y. Blokh [37] explains it as follows: “As for the grammatical category itself, it presents, thesame as the grammatical "form", a unity of form (i.e. material factor), and meanings (i.e. ideal factor)and constitutes a certain signemic system.specifically the grammatical category is a system of expressing a generalized grammaticalmeaning by means of paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms.paradigmatic correlations of grammatical forms in a category are exposed by the so - called “grammaticaloppositions”.opposition (in the linguistic sense) may be defined as a generalized correlation of lingualforms by means of which a certain function is expressed. The correlated elements (members) of theopposition must possess two types of features:common features and differential features. Common features serve as the basis of contrast whiledifferential features immediately express the function in question.grammatical categories are better to explain by comparing them with logical categories. The grammaticalcategories are opposed to logical ones. The logical categories are universal for all the languages. Any meanings can beexpressed in any language. For instance there's a logical category of possession. The meaning of possession can beexpressed in all the languages, compare: My book (English) - Моя книга (Russian) - Менинг китобим (Uzbek).it is seen from the examples the meaning of possession in English and Russian is expressed, by the possessivepronouns (lexical means) while in Uzbek it can be expressed either by the help of a discontinuous morpheme (...нинг ...им)or by one overt morpheme (…им). This category is grammatical in Uzbek but lexical in the other two languages. Thus theuniversal logical categories can be expressed by grammatical and non - grammatical (lexical, syntactic) means. Thegrammatical categories are those logical ones that are expressed in languages by constant grammatical means.doctrines mentioned above one - side approach to the problem. It is a rather complicatedissue in the general linguistics. But unfortunately we don't have universally acknowledged criteria tomeet the needs of individual languages.of the most consistent theories of the grammatical categories is the one that is suggested by L. Barkhudarov.to his opinion in order to call a linguistic phenomenon a grammatical category there must be thefollowing features:

general grammatical meaning;

this meaning must consist of at least two particular meanings;

the particular meanings must be opposed to each - other:

the particular meanings must have constant grammatical means to express them [15]., any linguistic phenomenon that meets these requirements is called a grammatical category.nouns have a grammatical category of number. This category has all the requirements that are necessary for a grammatical category:

. it has general grammatical meaning of number;

. it consists of two particular meanings; singular and plural;

. singular is opposed to plural, they are antonymous;

. singular and plural have their own constant grammatical means:is represented by a zero morpheme and plural has the allomorphs like (s), (z), (iz). There are some other means toexpress singular and plural in English but they make very small percentage compared with regular means.example. In English adjectives there's one grammatical category - the degrees ofcomparison. What features does it have?

. It has a general grammatical meaning: degrees of comparison;

. The degrees of comparison consist of three particular meanings: positive, comparative and superlative;

. They are opposed to each - other;

. They have their own grammatical means depending on the number of syllables in the word.in the category of number of nouns there are two particular meanings, in the grammaticalcategory of degrees of comparison there are three.introductions to syntax or linguistics in general even mention the grammatical categories of tense, aspect, mood, case, number, gender and voice, or transitivity, to use the current term. models of syntax are unenlightening on such topics and most undergraduate courses in linguistics in the UK do not offer courses on grammatical categories. Nonetheless the categories are studied by language typologists; tense, aspect and mood have long attracted serious attention among cognitive scientists, discourse analysts and philosophers; and two recent semantics textbooks make room for tense, aspect, mood and case [31]. include grammatical categories in an undergraduate linguistics programme? Grammatical categories connect grammar and semantics. They are central to the syntactic structure of clauses; in logic they are important for the analysis of propositions. Briefly, case has to do with the relations between the verb in a given clause and the nouns; aspect has to do with the type of situation and whether the speaker presents a situation as on-going or completed; tense has to do with events being located in past, present or future time by the speaker; mood has to do with whether the speaker presents an event as a fact, a possibility or a necessity, with whether the speaker witnessed a given event directly or has merely heard about it - in short, with the attitudes and expectations of speakers regarding states of affairs and propositions.grammars of particular languages devote much space to grammatical categories but little or none to constituent structure. Constituent structure does not cause major problems for the non-native learners of a given language but its systems of case-marking, mood, tense and aspect do. All reference grammars for non-native learners covertly use theories of tense, aspect, etc. and a useful exercise for students of languages and linguistics is to compare a given reference grammar with theoretical work on a given category. [32]categories bear on various major issues. Logicians are concerned with truth and falsity. The analysis of, e.g., tense, aspect and case must be anchored in truth-conditions but detailed analysis of natural languages raises fundamental questions about language, the extra-linguistic world, mental representations and metaphor.currently salient topic of research is grammaticalisation. The central idea is that constructions with abstract meanings develop historically from constructions with concrete meanings. Grammaticalisation is relevant not just to semantics and historical change but to language and cognition, first language acquisition and the origin and evolution of language., a grammatical category is a linguistic phenomenon that has a general grammatical meaning consisting of atleast two particular meanings that are opposed to each - other and that have constant grammatical means of their own toexpress them.

.2Typology of grammatical categories

grammatical category organizes grammatical functions into different categories. The functions might affect words in different ways due to their varied morphology, but they perform the same basic grammatical function. There are a total of 20 grammatical functions in linguistics; not all languages have all these functions, and they are often manifested in different ways. Such functions include tense, plurality, time and gender.is a term given to the structural rules governing a language. Such rules are explained in textbooks and grammar books, and they are taught to new language learners, however, they are understood instinctively by native speakers. The use and importance of grammar came relatively late to the English language. From 1066 until the 15th century, it was the language of the lower classes, and grammatical theory was not applied to it until the 17th century. English grammar has since been inspired chiefly by Latin grammar, leading to problems such as the split infinitive.first grammatical category is animacy. Animacy is used to indicate whether a noun is animate or inanimate. It often affects the verb used with the noun. The aspect grammatical category adds a specific or general sense of time and is related to, but distinct from, tense.indicates whether a noun is the subject, object or possessor in a sentence. Clusivity indicates whether a first-person pronoun such as ‘we’ is inclusive or exclusive. For example, languages with clusivity can differentiate between we meaning ‘all of us’ and we meaning ‘us, but not you.’ The definiteness grammatical category tells the reader/listener how definite or not an action is. For example, it differentiates between ‘I listened to a song’ and ‘I listened to the song.’degree of comparison regulates the three main types of adjectives and adverbs. These are divided into positive, comparative and superlative like ‘big,’ ‘bigger’ and ‘biggest.’ Evidentiality indicates if the sentence is based on evidence or not, and if so, to what degree. Focus relates information in one sentence to information given previously [33].is used in various languages to indicate the gender of the speaker, subject or object by modifying nouns, adjectives and verbs. It used to be present in Old English, but has disappeared from modern English. The grammatical category mirativity is used in some languages to indicate surprise within a sentence by using suffices or other indicators rather than exclamation marks and intonation.allows a speaker or reader to analyze a sentence by the use of auxiliary verbs and adverbs. Verbs signal moods created by modality using changes from the grammatical category called mood. A noun class organizes nouns by either their meaning or by their morphological aspects. Person defines the usage of pronouns and, therefore, affects verb and noun forms.is a grammatical category that distinguishes between positive and negative aspects. In English, the negative is shown as ‘not,’ such as, ‘Dave does not play tennis.’ Topic defines what the sentence is about and is usually linked to the subject of the sentence or clause. Transivity demonstrates the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs. The final grammatical category is voice, which structures the relationship between the verb and the subject and object of a sentence.there are relatively many English verb tenses, verbs in English come in many forms that provide different shades of meaning. However, English verbs comprise a much easier verb system than that of other languages that have distinct inflectional verb endings for different persons and number, or even change the verb stem with various tenses and aspects. In English only one verb ending remained, for verbs in the third person singular in the Present Simple tense.cooks dinner for us 3 times a week.

[3rd person, singular, present, simple, indicative, active, meaning: habit in the present]we were cooking for hours on end.

[1st person, plural, past, progressive, indicative, active, meaning: action in the past that continued over an extended period of time]would have cooked, if you had asked her to.

(but in reality you didn’t ask so she didn’t cook)

[would have cooked: 3rd person, singular, past, conditional, active,meaning: hypothetic outcome in the past, contrary to fact]

[had asked: 2nd person, singular, past, perfect, subjunctive, active,meaning: hypothetic assumption in the past, contrary to fact]suggest that dinner be cooked no later than 20:00.

[3rd person, singular, present, subjunctive, passive,meaning: strong recommendation, which will not necessarily be fulfilled]wrote the letters.wrote two letters.unbuttoned his shirt.reread the chapter.the last section, we saw that morphemes can be divided into those with relatively specific meanings and belonging to large, open-ended classes - lexical morphemes - and those with very abstract meanings and belonging to small, closed classes - grammatical morphemes. In this section and the next, we'll look more closely at some of the meanings and functions that grammatical morphemes have [27]. Grammatical morphemes are always associated with a particular lexical morpheme. They may be combined with the lexical morpheme to form a single word, as in apples or walked, or they may form a separate word that belongs to the same phrase as the lexical morpheme, as in the apple or is walking. morphemes have two basic kinds of functions distinguished from one another in terms of how the morphemes relate to the lexical morpheme that they combine with. One function, the subject of the next chapter, is the creation of a new concept based on the meaning of the lexical morpheme. For example, in shorten, the -en takes the meaning of the adjective short and turns it into a change of state along the dimension of length. In the process -en makes a verb out of the adjective. This function of grammatical morphemes is called derivation. other function of grammatical morphemes, the subject of the rest of this chapter, is similar to modification; the grammatical morpheme specifies some very abstract feature of the category that is the meaning of the lexical morpheme. In other words, its meaning is a very abstract grammatical category. For example, in walked, the -ed specifies that the walking took place before the time of speaking; it assigns the feature past to the event. In other words, past, contrasting with present and future, is a grammatical category in English. The combination of a grammatical morpheme with a lexical morpheme to form a word, as in walked, is called inflection. As we'll see, though, grammatical categories can also be defined by grammatical morphemes that are separate words. differ quite strikingly in terms of which grammatical categories are built into their morphology. In this section I'll describe a few of the kinds of grammatical categories that play a role in noun phrases. In the next section, I'll describe some grammatical categories that are marked on verbs. not only have the capacity to recognize individual objects in their environment and categorize them as apples, stones, people, etc. They have the ability to recognize sets of objects that share a category, for example, sets of apples, stones, or people. Though an individual and a set seem to be very different things, the categorization process for the individual and for the elements of the set must be similar. This is reflected in an apparently universal property of human language: the same morpheme is used for individual objects belonging to a category and for sets of objects whose members belong to that category. In English, the morpheme apple is applied both to individual apples and to sets of apples. have a further ability; they can assign a cardinality to a set, that is, they can tell (or estimate) how many elements are in the set. And apparently all languages have systems of numerals such as two and eight. Each numeral is a label for a category of set, independent of what kinds of members the set has. For example, eight labels the category of sets consisting of eight elements. let's imagine two tribes of Grammies. One uses common nouns like apple and tiger and numerals like two and eight, as well as adjectives like many, to talk about individuals and sets and finds that these forms suffice. They say things like give me apple whether they want one or several, and when it matters, they say things like give me two apple or give me several apple. another tribe, for one reason or another, a subgroup of members begins to explicitly mention whenever they are talking about a set rather than an individual. So they say things like give me apple, some whenever they want more than one and give me apple when they want exactly one. But they leave out the some when there is a numeral because the numeral makes it clear that more than one is intended. This practice catches on, and eventually two things happen. First, because the some doesn't convey very much information, it gets pronounced more and more quickly and carelessly, and eventually all that's left of it is the s at the beginning. This s is pronounced as if it were part of the noun that it follows, and it even assimilates to the voicing of the last phone in the noun, so it is pronounced /z/ in apples. Second, the members of the tribe find it weird to say apple whenever they mean more than one, even when the context makes it clear that they do. So now they say things like give me two apples. [37]though this story is completely fictitious, it illustrates what has apparently happened in two kinds of modern languages. English is a language of the second type. It is ungrammatical in English to say apple when more than one apple is referred to. It is of course equally ungrammatical to say apples when only one apple is referred to. English grammar makes a two-way distinction in the way objects are referred to: individual objects and sets of objects are referred to differently. That is, English has the grammatical dimension number with two values or grammatical categories, singular and plural. English nouns are inflected for number, and number inflection is obligatory. Thus three apple and lots of person are ungrammatical in English. grammar of a language may "force" its speakers to use certain morphemes in certain contexts, even when they seem to contribute nothing to the meaning. that in the case of the phrase three apples, the plural morpheme, -s, doesn't really carry any information; the numeral already makes it clear that more than apples is being referred to. That is, the grammatical morpheme is redundant. Redundancy is a frequent property of grammatical morphemes. Because they are obligatory, Speakers in a sense do not ask themselves whether they are necessary when producing sentences; they insert them in any case. It may seem odd that language would allow redundancy, but it is probably helpful to Hearers. Redundancy permits Hearers to understand the message even when they miss some part of it. appears in English grammar in multiple places. a dimension such as number is part of the grammar of a language, it often turns up in more than one place. This is true for number in English. Consider the following sentences. apple is on the table.apples are on the table.and apples are preceded by the words an and some. These words are called indefinite articles; both function roughly to say that the thing referred to is not already known to the hearer. But they differ in another way: an (or a) is used only before singular nouns, while some is used before plural nouns (and also before some singular nouns; more about this below). That is, these words also distinguish singular from plural. The verbs in the two sentences are also different. Is is appropriate only when the subject is singular, whereas are is used when the subject is plural. Again, the distinction between singular and plural matters somewhere in the grammar of the language. English we can say lots of milk, lots of sand, and lots of salt, but not normally lots of milks, lots of sands, and lots of salts. On the other hand, we can say lots of girls, lots of trees, and lots of rivers, but not normally lots of girl, lots of tree, and lots of river. is another grammatical dimension with two values in English that is tied up with the use of plural and the distinction between a(n) and some. Consider these sentences. rice is on the table.piles of rice are on the table.that in sentence 5, rice is singular, and the verb is also in the singular form is. However, instead of a, the noun is preceded by some, the form used with a plural noun in sentence 4. In fact no matter how much there is on the table, we still won't say some rices. If the Speaker wants to mention the amount of rice, they have to use another noun such as pile or bowl or cup, putting that noun in the plural, as in sentence 6. the English lexicon, peas are like beans and potatoes; rice is like sugar and vinegar. English has two kinds of nouns. One kind, count nouns, is used mainly for objects (and for abstract things that are construed as object-like). In the singular these nouns may be preceded by the article a(n), and they are always pluralized when more than one of the objects is referred to. The other kind, mass nouns, is used mainly for masses (and for abstract things that are construed as mass-like). These nouns are always singular except in the special sense of 'multiple kinds' (for example, wines referring to different brands or varieties of wine), and they may be preceded by the article some. Of course there is a gray area between clear cases of objects and clear cases of masses, and in this area, a noun can go either way. Thus rice, as we have seen, is a mass noun. But pea, which designates something that, like rice, consists of small objects usually gathered together in a group, is a count noun. (In fact pea, in the form pease, used to be a mass noun like rice.) English has the dimension of countability built into its grammar. But note that it appears in the language in two places, in the grammatical forms that go with one or the other category (a(n) with singular, some with plural for count; some with singular and no plural for mass) and in the lexicon, where most nouns belong to one or the other type. That is, there is a strong tendency in English for the count grammatical patterns to go with certain nouns (such as apple and house) and the mass grammatical patterns to go with other nouns (such as rice and milk). have seen three ways in which languages may divide the things that speakers talk about into two very general categories, on the basis of whether they are individuals or sets, on the basis of whether they are masses or objects, and on the basis of a single conceptual property (biological gender) that is extended more or less arbitrarily to cover all labeled categories of things. Another possibility, found in many languages, is a somewhat finer-grained grouping into a larger set of categories, each of which is still more general than the kind of category represented by a noun such as apple, baby, or paper. Each of these abstract categories is represented by a grammatical morpheme called a classifier. The most common basis for the classification of things appears to be shape, but it may also be based on orientation, animacy, function, or cardinality (for sets) [34]. [38] argues for a particular type of cross-linguistically valid grammatical categories, which he calls generic categories. Generic categories are categories encompassing conceptually related notions, e.g. present, past, and future, or epistemic and deontic. These can be described in terms of some more abstract notion that is used to define the category, such as tense or modality. categories are commonly used in linguistic analysis, but a great deal of controversy exists about what exact generic categories should be posited, for instance whether or not evidentiality can be regarded as a category in its own right. Boye argues that this is because proposals about generic categories are usually based on arbitrary notional criteria. Instead, generic categories should correspond to linguistically significant generalizations, that is, they should capture some organizing principle in the grammar of individual languages. In fact, Boye argues, generic categories are necessary in linguistic analysis precisely because they appear to play a role in a number of grammatical phenomena cross-linguistically. Claims about generic categories should be based on semantic maps, because the fact that the notions encompassed by a generic category cover a continuous region on a semantic map is evidence that the category corresponds to a linguistically significant rather than a linguist's arbitrary generalization. what follows, I will argue that Boye's proposal, along with much of the current literature on grammatical categories, does not distinguish between two possible senses of the notion of grammatical category, and that this distinction is essential to a proper understanding of what evidence can actually be used to posit individual categories, including evidence from semantic maps. principle, grammatical categories can be conceived of either as a linguist's classification device, or as components of the grammatical organization of individual languages, as presumably specified at some level of mental representation. In the first sense, individual categories, e.g. tense or evidentiality, are labels indicating that a number of linguistic elements share some selected property. This is a descriptive generalization over observed grammatical patterns, which does not imply that the relevant elements form a class in a speaker's mental representation. In the second sense, grammatical categories are classes that have psychological reality, that is, they exist in a speaker's mind independently of a linguist's description of observed grammatical patterns. [38] claims that he regards generic categories as a linguist's theoretical construct rather than cognitive entities with ontological reality. This suggests that he is using the notion of generic category in the descriptive sense, that is, to classify particular grammatical patterns rather than to make hypotheses about a speaker's mental representation. In this case, however, what generic categories (or grammatical categories in general, for that matter) should be posited for a language is basically a conventional issue which depends on what parameters are selectedto define individual categories, and any parameter can be chosen provided that it is applied consistently. 's claim that generic categories should correspond to linguistically significant generalizations implies that positing particular generic categories should not be a matter of convention, and that these categories should rather play a role in the grammar of individual languages. There is, however, only one possible sense in which a category can be assumed to exist in the grammar of a language independently of a linguist's descriptive convention, namely, the category must have some form of mental reality for the speakers of the language. This may be either because the category is part of a speaker's mental representation of individual constructions, or because it plays a role in the diachronic processes that lead speakers to create particular contructions, even if it is not part of a speaker's mental representation of already attested constructions. , if generic categories are assumed to capture linguistically significant generalizations, they must be assumed to have some form of mental reality.'s first argument for generic categories is that, in a number of languages, forms encoding notions within the same generic category do indeed display the same distributional properties (for example, Ngyambaa evidential clitics are characterized by specific ordering restrictions). These properties single out the forms as a separate class within the grammar of the language, which can be taken as evidence that the relevant generic categories (e.g. evidentiality) play a role in that grammar [38]. fact that elements within the same semantic domain have the same distributional properties, however, does not mean that these properties are related to the corresponding generic categories. For example, it is well known that different forms within the domain of tense, aspect, or modality may all develop from verbs [39]. As a result, these forms may all be subject to ordering restrictions that reflect the position that verbs occupy or used to occupy in the clause. These restrictions will be different from those pertaining to forms that originated from sources other than verbs, and they will single out the relevant forms as a distinct grammatical class in the language. This, however, is due to the position of verbs in the clause, not any generic category of tense, aspect, or modality that can be used to describe the semantics of the forms. examples, which could easily be multiplied, do not exclude that particular grammatical phenomena may actually be based on generic categories. The point is, however, that the fact that forms within the same semantic domain have the same distributional properties is not per se evidence for the corresponding generic categories, because the properties may be independent of these categories. Whether and in what ways generic categories play a role in particular grammatical phenomena should rather be demonstrated on a case-by-case basis. 's second argument for generic categories presents a similar problem. The fact that particular semantic maps (e.g. those for indefinite pronouns) encompass notions that can be described in terms of generic categories, Boye argues, is evidence that these categories play a role in the grammar of the relevant languages [38]. From this, he concludes that semantic maps can be used to test claims about generic categories, because the members of a generic category should always cover a continuous region on a semantic map.

.3The theory of functional-semantic fields

field principle conception of the system organization of linguistic facts is fairly considered to be one of the most significant achievements of the XX century linguistics. The concept of “field” traces back to the definition of language as the system, representing complex mechanism, which was theoretically explained by I.A. Boduen de Kurtene and F. de Saussure. Field approach to the stock of words (lexis) is more than half-century history of development. Researchers of different generations, national schools and directions, interpret the term of “field” differently, which points to different experience of the problem development, rather than the differences of fundamental theoretical character [41].promoters of this direction in the study of language were G.Ipsen and J. Trier, German scientists. Originally the term “semantic field” was noticed on the pages of G. Ipsen’s work “Der alte Orient und die Indogermanem”, in 1924, where it was determined as the assembly of words, possessing the same meaning [45].. Trier’s conception was of a great popularity abroad. After F. de Saussure, Trier regards that the language of a certain period is a stable and relatively completed system, where words possess meanings not independently, but because other words, closely-spaced with former ones, possess them as well. Trier’s merit is regarded to be the clearage of the terms of “lexical field”, divided into elementary items - concepts. He also introduced these terms into linguistic use. The fields of this kind are rightfully named paradigmatic ones.is regarded to be rightful for some scientists to confirm the existence of several types of fields. But there are also points of view, when preference is given to those semantic fields, which elements possess common meaning. So, O. Dukhachek considers that the word stock of any language represents a structural entire, where each word lies in a proper place owing to its semantic structure and attitude to other words. The linguist draws attention to generally recognized thesis, that the unity of form and content is realized in the word, owing to which words are connected to each other based on some collectivity of form and certain affinity of meaning. Therewith meaning is regarded as complex and determined as the realization of summation of national base and all conceptual, emotional, expressive, grammar and stylistic secondary components. It allows O. Dukhachek to postulate the two main types of linguistic fields: verbal linguistic fields, a centre of which is a word, and conceptual linguistic fields, where words are linked by the fact, that they contain one common meaning (elementary fields) and some close meanings (complex fields) in their semantics.fields are divided by O. Dukhachek into morphological, syntactical (syntagmatic) and associative. In morphological fields their separate elements are grouped around frame word (it represents the field centre, shaping the whole unit based on relationship or similarity). Homographs, homophones, paronyms, words, derived from single radical, words, formed by dint of identical prefixes or suffixes or not having inflexions common in form, belong to this [44]. Within syntagmatic fields words are linked with central member with the help of associations, built upon formal or semantic likeness, and sometimes upon both of these simultaneously.task of synchronous research of fields is, in particular, the definition of the field structure in question in certain language, except that special interest, in O. Dukhachek’s opinion, is represented by the study of that, how the words, close in meaning, influence each other, changing their semantic volume. The aim of diachronic research, as O. Dukhachek regards, is the clearing up of the kind of the role, which the appearance of some and disappearance of other lexical items within this field play. Undoubtedly, positive aspect in O. Dukhachek’s conception is the fact, that he places importance on the phenomenon of semantic attraction, though it isn’t reflected in the field definition: “Linguistic field is the assembly of words, which being connected to each other by certain relationship, form a structural hierarchic unity”. Semantic attraction is interpretated by O. Dukhachek as a phenomenon, determining the words meaning change in consequence of its phonetic closeness to another word and influencing the place of other lexical items in group.is worthwhile noting that the foundations of the field theory building in grammatical language structure were established by V.G. Admoni; the principles of field research were methodically applied by V.G. Admoni in his works on the German language formation in its historical development and modern condition. Admoni’s conception on the field’s structure of grammatical facts is of great interest in native linguistics. In “The Foundations of Grammar Theory” V.G. Admoni points that for the field structure it is characteristically to have a centre balance, formed by optimal concentration of all features, coincidental in this phenomenon, and periphery, which consists of formations with incomplete number of these marks, along with possible variation of their intensity [1].G.S. Shur’s opinion, field is “the way of existence and grouping of linguistic elements, belonging to different language levels, possessing general (invariant) qualities, alongside with the features, differentiating these linguistic items from each other” [32, 68]..V. Gulyga and E.I. Shendels, speaking of lexico-grammatical field, emphasize a dominant as a field constituent in its structure a) the most speaking for this meaning expression; b) showing it in the most univocal way; c) used systematically [18, 10].Z.N. Verdieva writes, field in linguistics is represented as a sum-total of the words of different parts of speech, united by the community of one concept expression. It is the concept that acts as the base of words integration in the field. The correlation of lexical items and concepts, lying in the base of field integration, can be different. A word can express a meaning and be associated with it indirectly through subordinative components of its semantic structure. Word sign, in the semantic structure of which, a feature occupies a dominant position, coincidental with the concept, integrating the field, form its centre. Word signs, containing this feature in a subordinative position, refer to the field periphery [15].view of the fact, that the structure of the majority of lexical fields consist of rather great amount of features, they can belong to a lot of conceptual fields, equal to the amount of its semantic features, and the fields as the variety of word signs intercross and don’t have well-managed borders. Wide amount of literature is devoted to semantic fields; it deals with both the history of the problem development and achieved results.theories, analyzed therein before, generally interpret field as a single-level formation, including units of any level (lexical, word-formative, syntactical). It made the first stage of the field development. However, nowadays the tendency to consider the field as a combined structure consisting of the units of different levels is becoming evident. Mostly distinct this tendency developed in the approach to regard the field as a split-level formation, which was in the picture in the theory of functional-semantic fields and signalized the second stage in the field theory development.advantage of functional-system approach is preeminently in the fact, that it enables to research linguistic phenomena not only from the point of their inner structure, but in the sphere of its functioning, connections with the environment. Such approach gives the opportunity to study language in its concrete realization, in action, research means of transporting extralinguistic phenomena and situations. Functional-system approach suits natural facilities of conversation as well, when different linguistic means are used in their inextricable connection.

“Functional-semantic field is a concrete linguistic two-side unity, which plane of content includes semantic elements in this language interpretation” [12]. In the base of each functional-semantic field, as A.V. Bondarko regards, there is some certain semantic category, representing semantic invariant, uniting dissimilar language means and stipulating their correlation. .M. Pavlov determines field as a cognitive absorption of linguistic formations of “double” character in the sphere of their fundamental qualities. “Doubleness” of these qualities, in the eyes of V.M. Pavlov, is made up of their representing the unity of contrasts. Thereby they act as the branches of linguistic system, through which the links of other branches come. It follows that field covers not only strictly delimited and contrasting formations, but passing places between these formations, dissolving boundaries between them [26, 22].the above reasoning it is clear that it’s rightfully to draw the following conclusions:

● the term of “linguistic field”, firstly, contains the idea of grouping (of serially ordered set) of dissimilar linguistic means;

● the features of elements connection and interdependence are the most important inner qualities;

● field is of systematic character and represents some place, where the centre (nucleus or frame), basing on grammar category and characterizing with density and maximum features concentration specific for this field, is separated, around which other (peripheral) means are grouped, and the zones of interception (passages) of other fields are marked., it can be said that grammatical categories play an important role in the English language. It is important to keep in mind that a grammatical category is a linguistic, not a real-world, category, and that there is not always a one-to-one correspondence between the two, though they are usually closely related. Number, gender and case are the most popular grammatical categories in English; all three categories are conflated together in paradigms of declension.Case agreement is not a significant feature of English.

2. The Categories of Number, Case, and Gender in Terms of Field Structure

.1 Functional-semantic field of number in Modern English

linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions (such as "one", "two", or "three or more").[1] In many languages including English, the number categories are singular and plural. Some languages also have a dual number or other arrangements.count distinctions typically, but not always, correspond to the actual count of the referents of the marked noun or pronoun.word "number" is also used in linguistics to describe the distinction between certain grammatical aspects that indicate the number of times an event occurs, such as the semelfactive aspect, the iterative aspect, etc. For that use of the term, see "Grammatical aspect".languages of the world have formal means to express differences of number. One widespread distinction, found in English and many other languages, involves a simple two-way number contrast between singular and plural (car/cars, child/children, etc.). Discussion of other more elaborate systems of number appears below.number is a morphological category characterized by the expression of quantity through inflection or agreement. As an example, consider the English sentences below:apple on the table is fresh.two apples on the table are fresh.number of apples is marked on the noun-"apple" singular number (one item) vs. "apples" plural number (more than one item)-on the demonstrative, "that/those", and on the verb, "is/are". Note that, especially in the second sentence, all this information can seem redundant, since quantity is already indicated by the numeral "two".language has grammatical number when its nouns are subdivided into morphological classes according to the quantity they express, such that:noun belongs to a unique number class. (Nouns are partitioned into disjoint classes by number.)modifiers (such as adjectives) and verbs have different forms for each number class and must be inflected to match the number of the nouns to which they refer. (Number is an agreement category.)is the case in English: every noun is either singular or plural (a few, such as "fish", can be either, according to context), and at least some modifiers of nouns-namely the demonstratives, the personal pronouns, the articles, and verbs-are inflected to agree with the number of the nouns to which they refer: "this car" and "these cars" are correct, while "*this cars" or "*these car" are ungrammatical and, therefore, incorrect. Only count nouns can be freely used in the singular and in the plural. Mass nouns, like "wine", "silverware", and "wisdom", are normally used in only the singular.[2] Many languages distinguish between count nouns and mass nouns.all languages have number as a grammatical category. In those that do not, quantity must be expressed either directly, with numerals, or indirectly, through optional quantifiers. However, many of these languages compensate for the lack of grammatical number with an extensive system of measure words.is a hierarchy among number categories: no language distinguishes a trial unless having a dual, and no language has dual without a plural.category of number is expressed by the paradigmatic opposition of two forms: the singular and the plural. The strong member in this opposition, the plural, is marked by special formal marks, the main of which is the productive suffix - (e) s which exists in three allomorphs - [s], [z], [iz], eg: cats, boys, roses. The term "productive" means that new nouns appearing in English form the plural with the help of this suffix. Non-productive means of expressing the plural are either historical relics of ancient number paradigms, or borrowed, eg: the suppletive forms with interchange of vowels (man - men, tooth - teeth), the archaic suffix-en (ox - oxen), a number of individual singular and plural suffixes of borrowed nouns (antenna - antennae, stratum - strata, nucleus - nuclei, etc.); in addition, a number of nouns have a plural form homonymous with the singular (sheep, fish, deer, etc.). The singular is regularly unmarked (possesses a "zero suffix"). grammatical meaning of the singular is traditionally defined in a simplified way as "one", and the meaning of the plural - as "many (more than one)". This is true for the bulk of the nouns, namely those denoting simple countable objects (table - tables). But the noun in the singular can denote not only "one discrete separate object", but also substances (water), abstract notions (love), units of measure (hour) and other referents. The same applies to the meaning of the plural: plural forms do not always denote "more than one object", but express some other meanings, such as feelings (horrors of war), sorts of substances (wines), picturesqueness (sands, waters), etc. Thus, the broader understanding of the grammatical meaning of the singular can be defined as the non-dismembering reflection of the referent and the grammatical meaning of the plural as potentially dismembering reflection of the referent; or, in other words, the singular forms of nouns present their referents as indivisible, and the plural forms - as divisible.

.A constant analysis (singular) of the trends (plural) in the world and domestic retail trade markets led the company’s managers(plural) to a decision to create and develop the network of supermarkets to meet the highest world standards.

. According to business practice shareholders (plural) of the Company have the right to allocate a part of profit for employee benefits (plural), including payment of bonuses (plural) and contributions to the Company’s social benefits funds (plural).

. According to market analysts (plural), in 2007 the growth of foreign trade, especially import (singular), will become faster.

. According to the explanation, these are “commercial entities (plural) that conduct economic operations (plural) based on contractual and accounting documents (plural) that conceal their true goals (plural)and tasks(plural)”

. Accordingly, we assess all our suppliers (plural) of products (plural) and services (plural) in terms of their compliance with the established standards (plural)of quality, environmental protection and health and safety at work.

.Accretion of the federal centre power (singular) in the region as well as readiness of central bodies (plural) of state power to invest financial resources (plural) for facilitation of the investment activities (plural)in the region (singular).

.Additionally, enterprise activity (singular) is on the rise, which is likely to influence operating revenues (plural) in the corporate segment (singular).

. All these led to enhancement (singular)of the information flow (singular), allowed us to clearly define the course of action (singular) in many areas (plural) of the Company’s activities (plural) through the development (singular)of procedures (plural), instructions (plural) and other relevant documents (plural).

.An annual throughput of over 10 million tones (plural), a strong and stable position (singular) on the retail market (market) and in other areas(plural) of trading - all these factors (plural)will form a basis for a significantly higher valuation (singular)of the Company (singular).

. An individual approach (singular) to each customer(singular), high quality (singular), cost optimization (singular) and the shortest terms of work (singular) performance (singular) are the most important components (plural)of the image (singular) of the company(singular).

. Analysts (plural) say the acceleration (singular) in investment (singular) shows that the company(singular) has entered a mature phase (singular) of the business cycle (singular) and there is no indication (singular) that this positive trend (singular) will end any time (singular) soon.

. And despite the relocation (singular) of some production (singular) to lower-range countries (plural) to the east, studies (plural) unanimously find that the opening of new markets (plural) has, on the whole, benefited the country (singular) as a business location(singular), rather than hurt it.

.Appropriate corporate supervision (singular) forms (plural) an appropriate background for the Management Board (singular) to pursue objectives (plural) that are to the best interest (singular) of the company (singular) and its shareholders(plural); it also ensures effective performance monitoring which further encourages the managers to use the company’s resources (plural) and capabilities (plural) in a more efficient manner(singular).

. As a result, bank services (plural) have become more universal and apart from housing loans (plural), banks(plural) also offer mortgage (singular) loans(plural), consolidation loans (plural) and refinancing loans(plural).

.As at the date (singular) of these financial statement (plural) s, the Group (singular) is in the process (singular) of determining the effect (singular) of the changes (plural) resulting from the first time application (singular) of the above standards (plural) or interpretation (singular) on the consolidated financial standards(plural).

. As the stock-exchange requirements (plural) are very strict, our ability (singular) to comply with them demonstrates our prowess (singular) in conducting business (singular) in a competitive environment (singular), and is also one of the cornerstones(plural) on which the Company (singular) value (singular) is built.

. At the beginning great effort (singular) was spent on building proper working procedures (plural), setting up mature software development (singular) methodology (singular), and establishing effective communication (singular) with customers (plural) .

. Business manager (singular) of the company (singular) told that a slight decline (singular) of the net financing result (singular) was included to the factors (plural)driving the net profit(singular) growth(singular).

. By purchasing shares (plural)in investment funds(plural), every buyer (singular)indirectly becomes an investor (singular)on the stock market(singular), but without having to spend long hours analyzing companies(plural), markets (plural)and macroeconomic data(plural).

.Companies (plural)producing permanent list (singular)of goods (plural)can obtain a General Certificate of Origin from the Special Economic Zone for all the goods (plural)produced by these enterprises (plural)for the period (singular)of up to one year(singular). we can see that the in the sentences, given above, we observe the prevailing of the plural form.semantic types of the singular and the plural, some of which were shown above, are dependent on the lexico-semantic differences between individual nouns, namely, the characteristics of their "quantitative structure". For countable nouns the category of number is a variable feature category, or relative, since countable English nouns have both singular and plural correlative forms (table - tables). Uncountable nouns can be used either only in the singular or only in the plural; for them the category of number is absolute, or a constant feature category. The two groups of uncountable nouns are respectively defined as singularia tantum, or, absolute singular nouns and pluralia tantum, absolute plural nouns. absolute singular nouns usually denote the following referents: abstract notions - love, hate, despair, etc.; Names of substances and materials - snow, wine, sugar, etc.; Branches of professional activity - politics, linguistics, mathematics; some collective objects - fruit, machinery, foliage, etc. There are some other singularia tantum nouns, that are difficult to classify, eg, advice, news and others. As the examples above show, the nouns themselves do not possess any formal marks of their singularia tantum status: their form may either coincide with the regular singular - advice, or with the regular plural - news. Their singularia tantum status is formally established in their combinability, being reflected by the adjacent words: all singularia tantum nouns are used with the verbs in the singular; they exclude the use of the numeral "one" or of the indefinite article. Their quantity is expressed with the help of special lexical quantifiers little, much, some, any, a piece, a bit, an item, eg: an item of news, a piece of advice, a bit of joy, etc. As mentioned earlier, this kind of rendering the grammatical meaning of number with uncountable nouns is so regular that it can be regarded as a marginal case of suppletivity. absolute plural nouns usually denote the following: objects consisting of two halves - scissors, trousers, spectacles, etc.; Some diseases and abnormal states - mumps, measles, creeps, hysterics, etc.; Indefinite plurality, collective referents - earnings, police , cattle, etc. The nouns belonging to the pluralia tantum group are used with verbs in the plural; they cannot be combined with numerals, and their quantity is rendered by special lexical quantifiers a pair of, a case of, etc., Eg: a pair of trousers, several cases of measles, etc. terms of the oppositional theory one can say that in the formation of the two subclasses of uncountable nouns, the number opposition is "constantly" (lexically) reduced either to the weak member (singularia tantum) or to the strong member (pluralia tantum). Absolute singular nouns or absolute plural nouns are "lexicalized" as separate words or as lexico-semantic variants of regular countable nouns. For example: a hair as a countable noun denotes "a threadlike growth from the skin" as in I found a woman's hair on my husband's jacket; hair as an uncountable noun denotes a mass of hairs, as in Her hair was long and curly. Similar cases of oppositional neutralization take place when countable nouns are used in the absolute singular form to express the corresponding abstract ideas, eg: to burst into song; or the material correlated with the countable referent, eg: chicken soup; or to express generic meaning , eg: The rose is my favourite flower (= Roses are my favourite flowers). The opposite process of the restoration of the number category to its full oppositional force takes place when uncountable nouns develop lexico-semantic variants denoting either various sorts of materials (silks, wines), or manifestations of feelings (What a joy!), Or the reasons of various feelings (pleasures of life - all the good things that make life pleasant), etc. of the absolute plural form of the noun can be illustrated with the following examples: colours as an absolute plural noun denotes "a flag"; attentions denotes "wooing, act of love and respect", etc. Oppositional neutralization also takes place when regular countable collective nouns are used in the absolute plural to denote a certain multitude as potentially divisible, eg: The jury were unanimous in their verdict. Cases of expressive transposition are stylistically marked, when singularia tantum nouns are used in the plural to emphasize the infinite quantity of substances, eg: the waters of the ocean, the sands of the desert, etc. This variety of the absolute plural may be called "descriptive uncountable plural". A similar stylistically marked meaning of large quantities intensely presented is rendered by countable nouns in repetition groups, eg: cigarette after cigarette, thousand upon thousand, tons and tons, etc. This variety of the absolute plural, "repetition plural" can be considered a specific marginal analytical number form.

is a grammatical category whose value reflects the grammatical function performed by a noun or pronoun in a phrase, clause, or sentence. In some languages, nouns, pronouns and their modifiers take different inflected forms depending on what case they are in. English has largely lost its case system, although case distinctions can still be seen with the personal pronouns: forms such as I, he and we are used in the role of subject ("I kicked the ball"), while forms such as me, him and us are used in the role of object ("John kicked me").such as Ancient Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, Russian and Finnish have extensive case systems, with nouns, pronouns, adjectives and determiners all inflecting (usually by means of different suffixes) to indicate their case. A language may have a number of different cases (Latin and Russian each have at least six; Finnish has 15). Commonly encountered cases include nominative, accusative, dative and genitive. A role that one of these languages marks by case will often be marked in English using a preposition. For example, the English prepositional phrase with (his) foot (as in "John kicked the ball with his foot") might be rendered in Russian using a single noun in the instrumental case, or in Ancient Greek as τῷ ποδί tōi podi, meaning "the foot" with both words (the definite article, and the noun πούς pous, "foot") changing to dative form.a language evolves, cases can merge (for instance in Ancient Greek genitive and ablative have merged as genitive), a phenomenon formally called syncretism.[1]formally, case has been defined as "a system of marking dependent nouns for the type of relationship they bear to their heads."[2]:p.1 Cases should be distinguished from thematic roles such as agent and patient. They are often closely related, and in languages such as Latin several thematic roles have an associated case, but cases are a morphological notion, while thematic roles are a semantic one. Languages having cases often exhibit free word order, since thematic roles are not required to be marked by position in the sentence.is the grammatical function of a noun or pronoun. There are only three cases in modern English, they are subjective (he), objective (him) and possessive (his). They may seem more familiar in their old English form - nominative, accusative and genitive. There is no dative case in modern English. Yippee!more good news. You cannot really go wrong here, we got rid of most of our cases and as a result English is easier than many other languages because nouns and some indefinite pronouns (anyone, someone, everyone, and so on) only have a distinctive case form for the possessive. There are a few remnants of old English though, and pronouns have distinctive forms in all three cases and should be used with a bit more care.pronoun cases are simple though. There are only three:-

. Subjective case: pronouns used as subject.

. Objective case: pronouns used as objects of verbs or prepositions.

. Possessive case: pronouns which express ownership.

pronouns, and who and its compounds, are the only words that are inflected in all three cases (subjective, objective, possessive). In nouns the first two cases (subjective and objective) are indistinguishable, and are called the common case. One result of this simplicity is that, the sense of case being almost lost, the few mistakes that can be made are made often, even by native speakers, some of them so often that they are now almost right by prescription.is that form of a noun (or pronoun) which tells us about its grammatical function in a sentence.there are forms and functions.Case Formsyou notice the different forms of the first person pronoun I and the noun poet in the two sets of sentences below?1saw the boy.boss called me.book is mine....2poet came here.called the poet.book is the poet's., me, and mine are different forms of the first person pronoun I and poet, and poet's are different forms of the noun poet.different forms illustrated above are associated with different functions in sentences.is used for the subject and me for the object.cannot say...

*Me saw the boy. (* means grammatically incorrect)

*The boss called I., me, mine and poet, poet's are called Case forms. These forms signal to us the functions performed by nouns and pronouns in sentences.what you have to do boils down to...the forms and their associated functions.of English Case formsEnglish, there is no one-to-one correspondence between forms and functions. See the word poet performing two functions in the sentences we have seen above.are five cases in English...but all of them do not have unique sets of forms today.case.case. (for the nouns you have the same form for both nominative and accusative)casecase (In modern English, the dative is identical to the accusative)Case (this case has the same form as the nominative)modern Englishdative case has the same form as that of the accusative.vocative case form is identical to the nominative.in a sentence E-learning Personal Loan Learn Spanishwe consider grammatical case functions.Nominative Case is used for the following functions:of a verbcomplement (predicate nominative)Accusative Casefor these functions:of a transitive verbof a prepositionof a non-finite verbcomplementGenitive Case is used for showing:Dative Case is used for the indirect object of a ditransitive verb.Vocative Case is used when we address someone.is important in grammar is to learn first the different forms and then the functions associated with those forms.Case is expecially important because it relates to the noun's syntax, i.e. its relationship with other words in a sentence.

.Convenient location (nominative) of central office (genitive) of the company (genitive) provides the clients (accusative) with an opportunity to hold negotiations(accusative), meetings(accusative), presentations(accusative), and conferences(accusative).

. Corporate governance (nominative) aims at ensuring effective development (accusative) of the company (genitive) and preserving the balance (accusative) between all stakeholders in the company, including investors, employees and suppliers.

. Creation (nominative) of favourable environment (accusative) for entrepreneurship, development, stimulation of business initiatives, strengthening of positions (possessive) of small and medium businesses (possessive)are considered as one of primary tasks.

.Currently representatives (nominative) of industrial enterprises (possessive) are very interested in the activities of vocational schools (possessive), because these schools supply skilled workers.

. Domestic demand (nominative) is expected to be the main driving force behind the growth and this particularly applies to investment, whose growth is expected to exceed 16 percent in the second quarter of 2007.

.Due to skillfully developed marketing program the enterprise has managed to completely pay off state taxes (namely a VAT and a land tax) and arrears of wages (possessive) of enterprise employees (possessive).

.During periods of hyperinflation, assets (nominative) and liabilities (nominative) are restated to reflect the changes (accusative) in the general price index.

. Expenditures (nominative) for modernization of machinery grew rapidly and, in 2001, more than 13 billion dollars were invested into machine inventory, resulting in approximately 40% of the total investment in the industry.

. Finally, fictitious firms (nominative) are practically irreplaceable when underground cash conversation centers are set up, as well as schemes to reimburse VAT from the state budget or customs clearance (or transit processing) of goods (possessive).

.Financing from the European Regional Development Fund (nominative) and other structural funds is unrepaid support; financial support is allocated through development programs which consist of collections of fundable measures(possessive).

. Fiscal regulations (nominative) are subject to numerous changes (accusative) which quite often result in ambiguities in interpretation of tax legislation and difference in opinions between entrepreneurs and tax authorities.

.Following implementation of its strategy, the LOTOS Group (nominative) will become an important element of the government policy aimed at increasing energy security of the country (possessive).

.Following implementation of the key strategic programs(possessive), if the adopted market assumptions prove correct, the Group (nominative) will generate high revenues.

. Foreign investors (nominative) also participate in the operation of the company: two Leipzig energy companies (nominative) are shareholders of the company(possessive), the value of their shares increased by 5 per cent in 2003.

. From the floatation of the Company shares in June 2005 to the year’s end, the share price (nominative) skyrocketed by 52% which was one of the strongest rises (possessive)over to be recorded by large-capitalization companies.

. Furthermore, there is a significant range (nominative) of the value of the provisions(possessive) for the reclamation of the land, as assessed by the environmental expert.

. GDP growth (nominative) should continue to run at 5 percent thanks to internal investments supported by structural funds, foreign direct investments and exports.

.Goods (nominative) imported to the territory of the Special Economic Zone (possessive) from other countries are exempt from import customs duties and other payments applied at customs clearance (except for customs tax).

.Higher economic efficiency (nominative) of the LOTOS Group (possessive), stronger position (nominative) among European refineries, and creation (nominative) of a technological platform (possessive)are necessary to satisfy the quality requirements prevailing on the domestic and European markets.

. Highly qualified experienced personnel (nominative) of the enterprise (possessive)constantly looks for new solutions, applies up-to-date technologies and collaborates with leading scientific organizations and specialists(possessive). Modern English the problem of case is reduced to the dispute whether the case category exists as such. Open to thought and questioning, this prob­lem has always been much debated. The solution of the problem depends mainly on grammarians’ interpretation of the term “case”. As we will see below, some scholars consider it to be possible to speak only of case as a paradigm of a word formed by synthetic markers, i.e. by endings. Other scientists believe that the term “analytical case” is justified: analytical cases are formed by prepositions introducing a noun.category is expressed in English by the opposition of the form -’s, usually called the possessive case, or more traditionally, the genitive case, to the unfeatured form of the noun, usually called the common case. The apostrophized -s serves to distinguish in writing the singular noun in the possessive case from the plural noun in the common case: the man s duty, the President’s decision. The possessive of the bulk of plural nouns remains phonetically unexpressed: the few exceptions concern only some of the ir­regular plurals: the actresses ‘dresses, the mates ‘help, the children s room., the forms of the English nouns designated as “case forms” relate to one another in an extremely peculiar way. The peculiarity is that the common form is absolutely indefinite from the semantic point of view, whereas the possessive form is restricted to the functions which have a par­allel expression by prepositional constructions. Thus, the common form, as appears from the presentation, is also capable of rendering the possessive semantics, which makes the whole of the possessive case into a kind of sub­sidiary element in the grammatical system of the English noun. This feature stamps English noun declension as something utterly different from every conceivable declension in principle. In fact, the inflectional oblique case forms as normally and imperatively expressing the immediate functional parts of the ordinary sentence in “noun-declensional” languages do not exist in English at all.there is no wonder that in the course of linguistic investigation the category of case in English has become one of the vexed problems of theo­retical discussion.special views advanced at various times by different scholars should be considered as successive stages in the analysis of this problem.first view may be called the “theory of positional cases”. This the­ory is directly connected with the old grammatical tradition, and its traces can be seen in many contemporary school textbooks in the English-speak­ing countries. Linguistic formulations of this theory may be found in the works of Nesfield, Deutschbein, Bryant and others.accord with the theory of positional cases, the unchangeable forms of the noun are differentiated as different cases by virtue of the functional positions occupied by the noun in the sentence. Thus, the English noun, on the analogy of classical Latin grammar, would distinguish, besides the inflectional possessive case, also the non-infiectional, i.e. purely positional cases: nominative, vocative, dative and accusative. The uninflectional cases of the noun are taken to be supported by the parallel inflectional cases of the personal pronouns:(subject) Rainfalls(address) Will you be there, Ann?(indirect object) I gave Anna book.(direct object) They killed a bear.prepositional object They broke the window with a stone.blunder of this theory is that it substitutes the functional character­istics of the part of the sentence for the morphological features of the word class, whereas the case form, by definition, is a variable morphological form of the noun. What this theory does prove is that the functional meanings ren­dered by cases can be expressed in language by other grammatical means, in particular, by word-order.second view may be called the “theory of prepositional cases”. It is also connected with the old school grammar teaching, and was advanced as a logical supplement to the positional view of the case.accord with the prepositional theory, combinations of nouns with prepositions in certain object and attributive collocations should be under­stood as morphological case forms. To these belong first of all the “dative” case (to + N, for + N) and the possessive case (of + N). These prepositions are inflectional prepositions, i.e. grammatical elements equivalent to case forms. The would-be prepositional cases are generally taken as coexist­ing with positional cases, together with the classical inflectional genitive completing the case system of the English noun. The prepositional theory, though somewhat better grounded than the positional theory, nevertheless can hardly pass a serious linguistic trial. In other languages all preposi­tions do require definite cases of nouns (prepositional case-government). It should follow from this that not only the of, to and fог-phrases but also all other prepositional phrases in English must be regarded as “analytical” cas­es. As a result of this approach, illogical redundancy in terminology would arise: each prepositional phrase would bear then another, additional name of “prepositional case”, the total number of the “said” cases running into dozens upon dozens without any gain either to theory or practice., prepositions may have various meanings depending on the con­text, which makes it possible for a preposition to correlate with several cas­es. For example, in English the preposition by, formerly a purely local form (He stood by the window) came to acquire a sense of means or instrument. The Oxford English Dictionary suggests that this preposition acquired its in­strumental sense via expressions such as She read by candlelight where the йу-phrase, originally a locative (Where did she read?), was reinterpreted as instrumental (How did she read it?). It is not hard to find situations that allow a locative or instrumental interpretation and which could facilitate a loca­tive or instrumental form adopting both functions. Here are some examples: wash the cloth in/with water, cook meat on/in/with fire, come on/by horse.third view of the English noun case recognizes a limited inflectional system of two cases in English, one of them featured and the other one un-featured. This view may be called the “limited case theory”. This theory is at present most broadly accepted among linguists both in this country and abroad. It was formulated by such scholars as Sweet, Jespersen, and has since been radically developed by Smirnitsky, Barkhudarov and others.limited case theory is based on the explicit oppositional approach to the recognition of grammatical categories. In the system of the English case the functional mark is defined, which differentiates the two case forms: the possessive or genitive form as the strong member of the categorical op­position and the common, or “non-genitive” form as the weak member of the categorical opposition. The opposition is shown as being effected in full with animate nouns, though a restricted use with inanimate nouns is also taken into account.there are grammatical instruments such as a case system. Maybe in most cases it really isn't much of a problem when you don't immediately recognize the part of speech a word belongs to. But at times a case system might come in handy.that change verbs and nouns's not claim that because Icelandic and German still have more or less strong verbal paradigms, grammatical gender and a case system, and because English once had it all as well, we should reintroduce these things into modern English.let's say there's a radio program called Grammar Matters. Is matters a noun in the plural or a verb in the "third person singular present tense, indicative mode, active voice" -- Wait a minute -- Present tense "it matters" as opposed to, say, past tense "it mattered". So, there still are a few endings like -s and -ed after all, called inflections that give a word a twist in its meaning.quickly: Indicative mode "it matters" as opposed to subjunctive mode "it may matter" which used to be recognizable by the ending of the verb, here: matter or its equivalent, as opposed to needing an auxiliary verb, here: may -- active voice "she is taking a photo" as opposed to passive voice "a photo is being taken".Shapes of Verbs and Nouns, the as yet fictitious radio program Grammar Matters could mean that it is about grammar things-- matters, subjects, issues to do with grammar. Here, in these constructions, it becomes clear that matters is a noun in the plural. Or Grammar Matters could mean: "Grammar is important". You cannot tell without more background information or before hearing it being pronounced by the program's host.good example why a case system can be a useful thing to have, instead of just "providing the learner with a set of mistakes to make" as it was once put, can be seen in a sentence like this: "He called his neighbor a doctor."sentence is ambiguous because there are no case markers at the end of neighbor and doctor to tell us who is actually called what, or who is called for whom, or who is involved in what's happening. Here are a few remnants, however, that made it into modern English, or PDE, Present-Day English: who as opposed to whom, "he" as opposed to his or him. What we are dealing with here are the subjects, and the direct and indirect objects of a sentence.sentence "Could you give me the key, please." isn't any trickier than "Could you give the key to me, please," though the second sentence could be understood as stressing the "to me" object. The "key" is the thing given, and the "me" is the part of the sentence that is involved in the giving and that probably benefits from receiving the key., the Case of Involvementlearners of Latin the term dative of advantage would be used but, depending on the circumstances, however, there are many further datives, but they all basically boil down to the case of involvement, one way or another., the indirect object, "me" in this case, is involved. It is not the thing being given; because that's the key, which is therefore the direct object (in the accusative), even though one cannot conclude this from its mere shape any longer, but one can from its position in the sentence.doctor example would be less ambiguous if the words had case markers, let's say:neighbor is reading.is *thes neighbores* newspaper.give it to *them neighbore*.can see *thone neighbor*.we have here in these four sample sentences with a *funky new grammar* are the cases called nominative (1), genitive (2), dative (3) and accusative (4).might call the nominative the who case, the agent of an action, as the neighbor who is doing something. We might call the genitive the possessive case, the whose case, whose is it. The dative case, also called the indirect object, is the to-whom case, that's the part of the sentence that is involved in the action.accusative case, also called the direct object, is the part of the sentence that is immediately affected. Here, it's the newspaper, it's the one that is being given, changes ownership, or is being read to pieces.is perfectly normal for a Germanic language to have words that in this fourth case have a shape like the one in the first case, the nominative. But don't despair. For one, this isn't the whole story yet, anyway, for another, we have the newspaper's article to help us.Specify Nouns and their Functionsfrom being what's written on any of the paper's pages, the noun's definite articles instead are: the, *thes, them, thone*. If we see something like this: "The neighbor sees me." then we know that "the neighbor" is the one doing something. But if we see: "I can see *thone neighbor*." then we know that it is "I" doing something and "thone neighbor" is the object., a change in word order used to not change the meaning, but simply give some stress to the object. Look here: "*Thone* neighbor I see." This would be much like: "It is the neighbor whom I see." or even "...who I see." or just "... I see." We would, however, these days feel a little uneasy about "The neighbor I see", wouldn't we.there are some more examples.

.However, the balance sheet structure(nominative) outlined above seems to be only temporary, as it is bound to undergo considerable changes in the immediate future related to the execution of projects (possessive)critical to the Group’s further development (accusative).

. If to talk about the company's strategy, this is, no doubt the breaking of old stereotypes (possessive)and introducing of new progressive technologies (possessive)into the building.

.Imports are expected to grow at a slightly slower rate than exports (accusative), and foreign trade is expected to continue to favourably impact GDP growth, through far less markedly than in previous years.

. In addition to banks, an increasing role (nominative) in the development of the financial market (possessive)is being played by other intermediary institutions such as brokerage houses or leasing firms.

.In fact, what we are talking about is a sphere (nominative) of illegal financial services (possessive)meant to reimburse VAT at the expense of state budget, to convert capital into cash, to carry out schemes with securities (possessive) and insurance (possessive) (more accurately, export money, using reinsurance (accusative)), etc.

.In follows from the observation of the investment and construction market(possessive) that, despite fluctuations in the construction volume, the crisis (nominative)in the construction sector has been overcome and that the upturn will continue in the coming months.

.In order to make full use of these types of resources (accusative), it will be necessary to have a customs or export expert provide the firm with a reliable view and opinion as to the Harmonized System classification numbers applicable to the firm’s products.

. In recent years, an initiative (nominative) emerged to set up investors' clubs to bring individual investors together, help them learn more about investing in the capital markets and then aid them in putting their knowledge to use.

.In September, the current account (nominative) showed a 195-million-euro surplus (accusative) even though most economists had expected a deficit.

.3 Functional-semantic field of gender in Modern English

English, grammatical gender is a property of only nouns and pronouns. It is one of the simplest parts of English grammar for the concept is clear and consistent.is because gender in English is based on natural gender (i.e. maleness and femaleness) rather than grammar (i.e. morphology).is not so in many other languages, where the concept of grammatical gender is based on morphology and may apply not only to nouns and pronouns but also to other parts of speech such as adjectives and verbs.is Gender in English?English, the idea is simple.male person or male animal belongs to one gender-class; a female person or female animal belongs to another. Simple, isn't it?English had grammatical gender then nouns, pronouns, even other parts of speech would have belonged to different gender groups depending upon their word-endings-and even these would have had exceptions!, English is much simpler than those languages.at these sentences...gets upset. She remains calm.lioness stays with the cubs. The lion goes out to hunt.man is an actor. The woman is an actress.pronoun he and the nouns lion, man, actor refer to male persons or animals. They belong to one class of gender. The pronoun she and the nouns lioness, woman, and actress refer to female persons or animals. Hence these belong to another class of gender.this mean that English has only two gender-classes?. English has four.fact makes it easy for us to have clear divisions. The simplicity of this part of grammar in English comes from having four classes. I will explain this to you in a moment.is of Four Kinds in English.divides nouns and pronouns into four genders in this way::males (and only males) are said to belong to the masculine gender. (examples: boy, man, landlord, god, tiger, horse, rooster, stag, he, etc):females (and only females) belong to this gender category. (examples: girl, woman, goddess, landlady, tigress, mare, hen, doe, hind, she, etc):and pronouns that belong to this gender are either male or female, but we are not concerned about it. (examples: teacher, child, worker, baby, infant, human being, person, etc):nouns and pronouns to which maleness or femaleness doesn't apply belong to this gender category. (Material things: stone, table, gold, book; all abstract nouns: e.g. childhood, independence, intelligence, chairmanship, etc.)some words in the Masculine Gender are used as Common Gender. Everybody doesn't do it, but if you follow this trend, you will be considered modern!wish to give a few examples:- Used for both male and female-traditionally, actor and actress; poet for both poet and poetess. The purpose is to avoid gender bias about which people are very conscious today.- for both male and female. This is perhaps because the woman ruler of a province would not like the word 'governess' to be used for her lest people misunderstand that she is someone employed in a rich family to teach its children.- for both male and female. A modern ordained clergywoman would not like to be called a 'priestess.' I think, the word reminds people of temple prostitution in ancient cultures.Problem.at this example.teacher should not say lies. ________ should always speak the truth.you put a he or a she in the blank space? English uses the pronoun 'he' for masculine, 'she' for feminine, and 'it' for neuter. These words are all singulars.has no pronoun to use for common gender, singular, and third person .nature of this problem and the various solutions offered, even strange ones such as the 'singular they' (the use of which has now become respectable) is another story.the linguistic realization of gender differences is one of the burning matters in social spheres, being at the same time the issue of constant misunderstandings. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to view the present-day status of the grammatical category of gender in Modern English as a result of language historical development as well as due to the pragmatic distinguishing of certain gender forms in different communicative situations.is known, English gender is realized as masculine, feminine and neuter forms in order to explain the relations between the animate noun and its external referent. In different languages including English there are two basic types of gender systems: strict semantic system, or semantic gender, where the meaning of the noun determines its gender, and formal system, or grammatical gender, when the noun assignments depend on formal criteria - either word-structure or sound-structure.is important to state that the grammatical gender was widely used in the structure of Old English but it started disappearing between the Periods of Middle and Modern English. In Modern English the linguistic notion of grammatical gender is distinguished from the biological and social notionsof natural gender, although they interact closely in many languages, affecting their linguistic systems.English the category ofgender has a binary hierarchical classification presented by upper (person: non-person) and lower (masculine::feminine) oppositions. The members of the oppositions are differentiated in some languages (e.g. German, Ukrainian) by means of formal markers, e.g. inflections and articles. In Modern English there are no formal markers to distinguish the strong and the weak members of gender oppositions. They can be distinguished semantically: nouns of the neuter gender in the upper level of the opposition are more abstract if compared to the nouns of masculine and feminine genders; they are the weak member of the opposition and are naturally used in the position of neutralization.follows that gender in Modern English exists as the semantic category preserving some features of the grammatical gender that existed in Old English. Due to this, it is also termed the pronominal category since personal pronouns qualify the gender of its noun-referent in the certain context.The pronouns he/she/who are used in order to denote personal nouns while the pronouns it/which denote non-personal nouns.pronominal gender is greatly influenced by extralinguistic factors, such as context, time conditions and the speaker.Gender in the language reflects the social constructions of gender learned, maintained and perpetuated by speakers. Social constructions of gender represent combinations of features inherent in reality and of society’s attitudes toward those features. There is no clear correlation of gender with sex: the choice of the pronoun that is used to denote the certain gender form depends not on characteristics of the noun or of its referent, but depends instead entirely on speaker-dependent factors, which are variable and unpredictable., the forms of gender indication are lexico-semantic (change of words: man -woman, bull-cow, etc.) and morphological (inflections: host - hostess, hero -heroine; addition of a word: male cat - female cat, he cat - she cat,etc.).

.In the guidelines (neuter) for the 2007 budget bill, presented in June, the government (common) proposed a gradual reduction in the budget deficit after 2006.

.In the third quarter, the company (neuter) launched yet another cost cutting program (neuter), but this has yet to translate into a tangible improvement in the company’s financial performance.

. Instead of issuing stock certificates for each individual (common) share issued to a shareholder, a stock company can issue a single document (neuter) representing the aggregate number of shares owned by the individual shareholder.

. It is hoped that the improved geopolitical situation (neuter), advantageous financial conditions (neuter), flexible macroeconomic policy (neuter), structural reforms (neuter) will condition (neuter) faster EU development (neuter) in the nearest years (neuter).

. It (neuter) maintains relations (neuter) with similar national and foreign organizations (neuter) and embassies (neuter) and helps its members (common) to find partners (common), organizes trips (neuter) to exhibitions (neuter) and trade missions (neuter).

. It should be noted that almost 50% of products (neuter) are bought by individuals (common) and small building firms (neuter), i.e. those who build “for themselves” and that is why carefor the quality (neuter) of future buildings (neuter) very mach.

.It turns out that the generally favourable assessment (neuter) of both domestic and foreign demands (neuter) promotes decisions (neuter) to expand one’s business (neuter).

. Keeping the budget (neuter) balanced means keeping tight control (neuter) of all expenses (neuter) and delaying investment (neuter) in the infrastructure (neuter) end social sector (neuter).

.Local authorities (common) may also collect revenue (neuter) from a number of local taxes (neuter), such as advertisement tax (neuter), community development tax (neuter), hotel tax (neuter), parking tax (neuter), recreation tax (neuter), and other taxes (neuter).

.Many indicators (neuter) influencing investment attractiveness (neuter) were considered in the ranking, including access (neuter), transportation (neuter), human resources (neuter), labour costs,(neuter) the size (neuter) of the market (neuter), business infrastructure(neuter), the condition (neuter)of the environment (neuter) and the activity (neuter) of provincial authorities (common) in attracting investors (common).

.Moreover, the values (neuter) of the acquired companies’ (neuter) liabilities (neuter) and contingent liabilities (neuter) which had not been disclosed in the financial statements (neuter) of the companies (neuter) or were disclosed in lower amounts (neuter) was also increased as a result (neuter) of the valuation (neuter).

.Most favoured regime (neuter) means that foreign subjects (neuter) of economic activities have the same volume of rights (neuter) , preferences(neuter) and privileges (neuter) concerning taxes (neuter)and duties(neuter), which will be used or are already used by a foreign subject of international activities (neuter) who was given the above mentioned regime(neuter)..

.Movables (neuter) were valued using the multiples method (neuter),taking into account (neuter) the adjusted initial value (neuter) of tangible assets(neuter), the technical condition (neuter), the technical and economic wear and tear(neuter), and the effect (neuter)of macroeconomic factors(neuter).

. On the first half of December (neuter) 2006, the company (neuter)will transport its one-million passenger (common) for the current year(neuter); this is a record (neuter)not only for this company (neuter) itself, but also for the whole airline industry (neuter).

.Once the decision (neuter) is made to re-issue a license (neuter) due to informational changes (neuter), the licensing body (neuter) will annul the original license (neuter) and introduce the corresponding entry (neuter) into the unified license register (neuter) by the next workday (neuter).

. One of key objectives (neuter) is to find an optimal and constructive balance (neuter) between the needs (neuter) of businesses (neuter) and the interests (neuter) of employees (common), as well as to create conditions (neuter) that allow domestic enterprises (neuter) to be as successful and competitive as possible.

. Our product (neuter) is a range of high-quality services (neuter) aimed at meeting of the interests (neuter) of investors (common) and subjects (neuter) of investments (neuter) in implementation (neuter) of prospective investments projects (neuter).

. Packaging (neuter) and logistics (neuter) are becoming more important with rapid market changes (neuter) and customers (common) now demand a package (neuter) of goods (neuter) and services (neuter) consisting of projection (neuter) , delivery (neuter), installation (neuter) and after-sales-service (neuter) with financing also becoming a decisive factor (neuter).

. PricewaterhouseCoopers’ service (neuter) includes a full line of legal and tax services (neuter); audit, advisory services (neuter); corporate finance and human resources advisory services (neuter).

. Probably the growth (neuter) of real wages (neuter) in the first two quarters (neuter) of next year (neuter) will also be slightly slower, at around 3.2 percent (neuter).

.Proceeds (neuter) from the investment (neuter)were used to modernize the plant’s second production line(neuter), allowing the company (neuter)to double its production capacity (neuter).

. Regional representative offices (common) allow within the short terms (neuter) and as fast as possible to solve different technical, legal and organizational questions (neuter) in the course of project implementation (neuter) at all levels (neuter) of state and regional administration bodies (neuter). stated above proves that the category of gender in Modern English is realized as semantic category, represented by means of lexico-semantic and morphological gender forms as well as pronouns used according to extralinguistic factors.

set of grammatical categories includes, among others, tense, aspect, mood, case. They connect grammar and semantics and play an essential role in the syntactic analysis of clauses and the semantic analysis of clauses and propositions. Their study leads to general issues such as the source of grammatical categories, the evolution of language, language and cognition, metaphor and first language acquisition.meaning in English--and in any other language--starts with a noun. The noun working syntactically as subject is always present, although that can happen explicitly, indirectly--via pronouns--or implicitly.are presented in this page according to the following simplified structure:

. Categories of Nouns

. The Number of the Noun

. The Gender of the Noun

. The Case of the Nounare principal sentence elements, while articles, adjectives, pronouns, and numerals, are secondary sentence elements. Studying the noun cluster facilitates understanding a few, very important, grammatical notions:

. grammatical category of "number"

. grammatical category of "gender"

. grammatical category of "case"category of gender of the noun is expressed in English through two oppositions: the first presupposes dividing the nouns into human and nonhuman. The non-human nouns represent the neuter gender. The lower division of the nouns is into nouns of masculine a feminine genders. The peculiar feature of English gender is its semantic character while the peculiar feature of gender in Russian is its formal feature. category of Number is compressed by the opposition of the plural form ofthe noun to the singular form. The problem is simple with the countable nouns when the plural forms by odding “s” to the singular form of the noun. the category of number has some pecularities. Just there exist besides common singular and plural so called singularia tantum and pluralia tantum expressing generally the ability of this or that noun to be used only in singular or only in plural. There are also rather many cases when one and the same noun can be used in common singular and/or plural and as absolute singular and/or absolute plural., we can see that English categories of case, number and gender are closely interconnected. That is why they must be considered together in order to produce the most efficient results in the course of linguistic material analysis.

Theoretical literature

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У магістерській роботі ми ґрунтовно дослідили граматичні категорії числа, відмінка, і роду в сучасній англійській мові із застосуванням польового підходу.

У сучасному мовознавстві намітилася тенденція до висвітлення порівняння у функціонально-семантичному напрямку. Запорукою успіху на шляху до систематизації всіх наявних у мові засобів вираження порівняння вважаємо розроблену О.В.Бондарком ідею функціонально-семантичного поля, оскільки вона уможливлює функціональне об’єднання всіх різнорівневих засобів із погляду мовця. В сучасній лінгвістиці польовий підхід до вивчення мовних явищ набув значного поширення саме завдяки здатності до виявлення системної організації мови.

Отже, ми прийшли до висновку, що функціонально-семантичне поле граматичних категорій числа, відмінка, і роду в сучасній англійській мові займає вагоме місце як у теоретичній, так і в практичній граматиці. Даний підхід дозволяє комплексно досліджувати окремі граматичні категорії з урахуванням окремих контекстних ситуацій та типів тексту.

Практичний аналіз граматичних категорій англійської мови нами був проведений на прикладі матеріалів ділового дискурсу.

Робота складається з двох розділів. У першому розділі розглядаються теоретичні аспекти функціонування граматичних категорій в англійській мові. У другому розділі проводиться аналіз функціонування категорій числа, роду та відмінку на прикладі окремо взятих речень.