The category of aspect. The opposition by which the aspective category of development is contrasted. The views on the essence of the perfect forms in modern English.

THEORETICAL GRAMMAR

1. The systemic nature of grammar. The two planes of language: the plane of content and the plane of expression. Two fundamental types of relations of lingual units. Their hierarchical relations.

The means employed for building-up member-forms of categorial oppositions. Synthetical and analytical types. The grammatical categories.

Lexico-grammatical classes of words (parts of speech).The criteria applied in discriminating parts of speech. Possible ways of classifying parts of speech. The problem of notional and formal parts of speech. The syntactico-distributional classification of words.

The category of case. Different approaches to the category of case in English nouns. The range of relational meanings of the English genitive.

The article, its essence. Peculiarities of the article. Semantic observations of the article in English. The meaningful non-uses of the article. The situational assessment of the article uses. The consideration of the English articles in the light of the oppositional theory.

Tense. The general notion of time, the lexical denotation of time, and the grammatical time proper. The two temporal categories in the system of the English verb. The problem of the future tense in English.

The category of aspect. The opposition by which the aspective category of development is contrasted. The views on the essence of the perfect forms in modern English.

The category of mood. The opposition underlying the category. The problem of the imperative mood. The views on the classification of the subjunctive mood in English.

The category of voice, its difference from other verbal categories from the point of its referential qualities. The problem of the reflexive, reciprocal and middle voices.

The sentence as a unit of speech. The difference between the sentence and the word. Essential features of the sentence. The nominative function of the sentence.

The phrase. Two approaches to the definition of the phrase. Types of phrases. Means of expressing syntactical relations within a phrase.

Communicative types of sentence. Speech acts as realization of communicative intentions of the speaker. The three cardinal communicative sentences types. The problem of exclamatory.

Actual division of the sentence, its purpose and main components. The formal means of expressing the distinction between the theme and the rheme.

The composite sentence as a polyprediative construction. The difference between the composite sentence and its contextually coherent de-compositional presentation. The composite sentence of incoherent complexity as a characteristic feature of literary written speech. Hypotaxis (subordination) and parataxis (coordination) as two principle types of construction of composite sentences. The problem of asyndetic composite sentences.

1. The systemic nature of grammar. The two planes of language: the plane of content and the plane of expression. Two fundamental types of relations of lingual units. Their hierarchical relations.

Language is a means of forming and storing ideas as reflections of reality and exchanging them in the process of human intercourse. Language is social by nature; it is inseparably connected with the people who are its creators and users; it grows and develops together with the development of society.

Language incorporates the three constituent parts - the phonological system, the lexical system, the grammatical system. Only the unity of these three elements forms a language; without any one of them there is no human language in the above sense.

The phonological system determines the material (phonetical) appearance of the significative units of language. The lexical system is the whole set of naming means of language, that is, words and stable word-groups. The grammatical system is the whole set of regularities determining the combination of naming means in the formation of utterances as the embodiment of thinking process.

Any linguistic description may have a practical or theoretical purpose. A practical description is aimed at providing the student with a manual of practical mastery of the corresponding part of language.

As for theoretical linguistic descriptions, they pursue analytical aims and therefore present the studied parts of language in relative isolation, so as to gain insights into their inner structure and expose the mechanisms of their functioning. Hence, the aim of theoretical grammar of a language is to present a theoretical description of its grammatical system.

Modern linguistics lays a special stress on the systemic character of language and all its constituent parts. Each system is a structured set of elements related to one another by a common function. The common function of all the lingual signs is to give expression to human thoughts. The systemic nature of grammar is probably more evident than that of any other sphere of language, since grammar is responsible for the very organisation of the informative content of utterances.

The nature of grammar as a constituent part of language is better understood in the light of explicitly discriminating the two planes of language, namely, the plane of content and the plane of expression.

The plane of content comprises the purely semantic elements contained in language, while the plane of expression comprises the material (formal) units of language taken by themselves, apart from the meanings rendered by them. The two planes are inseparably connected, so that no meaning can be realised without some material means of expression. Grammatical elements of language present a unity of content and expression (or, in somewhat more familiar terms, a unity of form and meaning).

Taking into consideration the discrimination between the two planes, we may say that the purpose of grammar as a linguistic discipline is to disclose and formulate the regularities of the correspondence between the plane of content and the plane of expression in the formation of utterances.

Lingual units stand to one another in two fundamental types of relations: syntagmatic and paradigmatic.

Syntagmaticrelations are immediate linear relations between units in a segmental sequence (string). E.g.: The spaceship was launched without the help of a booster rocket.

In this sentence syntagmatically connected are the words and word-groups "the spaceship", " was launched", "the spaceship was launched", "was launched without the help", "the help of a rocket", "a booster rocket ". Morphemes within the words are also connected syntagmatically. E.g.: space/ship; launch/ed; with/out; boost/er.

The other type of relations, opposed to syntagmatic and called "paradigmatic", are such as exist between elements of the system outside the strings where they co-occur. In the domain of grammar series of related forms realise grammatical numbers and cases, persons and tenses, gradations of modalities, sets of sentence-patterns of various functional destination, etc. Paradigmatic relations coexist with syntagmatic relations in such a way that some sort of syntagmatic connection is necessary for the realisation of any paradigmatic series.

The units of language form a hierarchy of levels. This hierarchy is of a kind that units of any higher level are analysable into (i.e. are formed of) units of the immediately lower level. Thus, morphemes are decomposed into phonemes, words are decomposed into morphemes, phrases are decomposed into words, etc. The levels are phonemic, morphemic, phrasemic, proposemic (level of sentences), "supra-proposemic (supra-phrasal units)

The means employed for building-up member-forms of categorial oppositions. Synthetical and analytical types. The grammatical categories.

The means employed for building up member-forms of categorial oppositions are traditionally divided into synthetical and analytical;accordingly, the grammatical forms themselves are classed into synthetical and analytical, too.

Synthetical grammatical forms are realised by the inner morphemic composition of the word, while analytical grammatical forms are built up by a combination of at least two words, one of which is a grammatical auxiliary (word-morpheme), and the other, a word of "substantial" meaning.

Synthetical grammatical forms are based on inner inflexion, outer inflexion, and suppletivity; hence, the forms are referred to as inner-inflexional, outer-inflexional, and suppletive.

Inner inflexion, or phonemic (vowel) interchange, is used in English in irregular verbs for the formation of the past indefinite and past participle; besides, it is used in a few nouns for the formation of the plural (take — took — taken, drive — drove — driven; man — men, brother — brethren).

Suppletivity consists in the grammatical interchange of word roots. Suppletivity is used in the forms of the verbs be and go, in the irregular forms of the degrees of comparison, in some forms of personal pronouns (be — am — are — is — was — were; go — went; good — better; bad — worse; much — more; little — less; I — me; we — us; she — her).

Outer inflexion is a productive means of the English morphology, which amounts to grammatical suffixation.

The traditional view of the analytical morphological form recognises two lexemic parts in it, stating that it presents a combination of an auxiliary word with a basic word. However, there is a tendency with some linguists to recognise as analytical not all such grammatically significant combinations, but only those of them that are " grammatically idiomatic ", i.e. whose relevant grammatical meaning is not immediately dependent on the meanings of their component elements taken apart.

Considered in this light, the form of the verbal perfect where the auxiliary "have" has utterly lost its original meaning of possession, is interpreted as the most standard and indisputable analytical form in English morphology. Its opposite is seen in the analytical degrees of comparison which, according to the cited interpretation, come very near to free combinations of words by their lack of "idiomatism" in the above sense.

Sometimes the synthetical forms of words are used instead of analytical forms for stylistic purposes: He knocked and knocked and knocked without reply.

The grammatical meaning is the most general meaning thanks to which this or that word belongs to the whole class of similar words. The grammatical meaning usually has a number of grammatical forms. Together with abstract grammatical meaning and grammatical forms the grammatical category appears. Grammatical meanings are very abstract, very general. Therefore the grammatical form is not confined to an individual word, but unites a whole class of words, so that each word of the class expresses the corresponding grammatical meaning together with its individual, concrete semantics.

The most general notions reflecting the most general properties of phenomena are referred to in logic as "categorial notions", or "categories". The most general meanings rendered by language and expressed by systemic correlations of word-forms are interpreted in linguistics as categorial grammatical meanings. The forms themselves are identified within definite paradigmatic series.

As for the grammatical category itself, it presents a unity of form and meaning and constitutes a certain signemic system. More specifically, the grammatical category is a system of expressing a generalised grammatical meaning by means of paradigmatic correlation of grammatical forms. The ordered set of grammatical forms expressing a categorial function constitutes a paradigm. The paradigmatic correlations of grammatical forms in a category are exposed by the so-called "grammatical oppositions".

The grammatical categories can either be innate for a given class of words, or only be expressed on the surface of it, serving as a sign of correlation with some other class.

For instance, the category of number is organically connected with the functional nature of the noun; it directly exposes the number of the referent substance, e.g. one ship — several ships. The category of number in the verb, however, by no means gives a natural meaningful characteristic to the denoted process: the process is devoid of numerical features such as are expressed by the grammatical number. Indeed, what is rendered by the verbal number is not a quantitative characterisation of the process, but a numerical featuring of the subject-referent. Cf.: The girl is smiling. — The girls are smiling. The ship is in the harbour. — The ships are in the harbour.

Thus, from the point of view of referent relation, grammatical categories should be divided into "immanent" categories, i.e. categories innate for a given lexemic class, and "reflective" categories, i.e. categories of a secondary, derivative semantic value. The verbal person and number are reflective, while categorial forms of the substantive-pronominal person and number are immanent. Immanent are also such categories and their forms as are closed within a word-class, i.e. do not transgress its borders; to these belong the tense of the verb, the comparison of the adjective and adverb, etc.

The feature of the referent expressed by the category can be either constant (the category of gender divides nouns into non-human names, human male names, human female names, and human common gender names) or variable (number: singular — plural; the degrees of comparison: positive — comparative — superlative).

Grammatical change has been interpreted in traditional terms of declension and conjugation. By declension the nominal change is implied (first of all, the case system), while by conjugation the verbal change is implied (the verbal forms of person, number, tense, etc.). Since the immanent feature is expressed by essentially independent grammatical forms, and the reflective feature, correspondingly, by essentially dependent grammatical forms, all the forms of the first order (immanent) should be classed as "declensional", while all the forms of the second order (reflective) should be classed as "conjugational".

Lexico-grammatical classes of words (parts of speech).The criteria applied in discriminating parts of speech. Possible ways of classifying parts of speech. The problem of notional and formal parts of speech. The syntactico-distributional classification of words.

Modern English has a vocabulary of more than 400 000 words. This number makes it clear that in order to study the forms of words it is necessary to divide words into certain separate classes. That is why the first problem in the study of morphology is the problem of grammatical classification of words. The words of language are divided into classes. These classes are called “parts of speech”. Prof. Smernitsky uses the term “lexico-grammatical categories”. The term POS is purely traditional and conventional.

In modern linguistics POS are discriminated on the basis of the 3 criteria:

1) semantic (meaning)

2) formal (form)

3) functional (function)

The semantic characteristic of a POS is its lexical meaning. It is always more general, more abstract that the meanings of separate words.

The formal or morphological characteristic of a POS is the system of forms this or that POS has (the morphological categories).

The functional or syntactical characteristic of a POS includes not only its function in a sentence, but also its connections with words of other classes.

The main principles of POS classification were elaborated by Prof. Sherba and Academician Vinogradov.

All these 3 points are to be taken into consideration both in English and in Russian. The difference lies in the fact which of the principles is the main one. That depends on the structure of the language. The Russian language is synthetical, it has a developed morphology, so the main principle is morphological (form). The English language is analytical, so the main principle here is functional (syntactical).

Taking into consideration these principles, linguists distinguish in the English language the following notional POS:

Nouns, Adjectives, Pronouns, Numerals, Verbs, Adverbs, Statives.

At the same time some formal POS are distinguished. Words which connect or modify notional words are called formal. They are:

Articles, Particles, Postpositions, Conjunctions, Prepositions.

Modal verbs, interjections and words of affirmation and negation are distinguished as separate classes.

The most exhausted classification of POS in our linguistics is given by Prof. Smirnitsky. He distinguishes the following classes of words:

1) notional words (nouns, pronouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, statives and numerals);

2) modal words;

3) functional or form words;

a) determinative (articles, particles, postpositions)

b) connective (conjunctions and prepositions)

4) the class of interjections;

5) the class of words of affirmation and negation.

Foreign linguists based their classification on the morphological principle. Practically, they distinguish 7 or 8 POS. They forget that modern English is already analytical, but not synthetical.

Prof. Sweet distinguishes declinable POS (nouns, adjectives, verbs) and indeclinable POS (particles, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, interjections).

There are some linguists in foreign linguistics who take into consideration only one principle – synthetic. To such linguists Prof. Fries refers. His viewpoint is shared by Prof. Bloomfield and Prof. Harris. Synthetical distributional classification of words of Ch. Fries is based on the study of words combinability by means of substitution testing. Fries distinguished 4 classes of words:

Class 1 – nouns

Class2 – verbs

Class3 – adjectives

Class4 – adverbs

Prof. Fries also distinguishes 15 frames of function words.

The drawback of this classification is that he doesn’t give the exhausted classification of POS, many words are outside this classification and it is not convenient for practical language teaching.

While speaking about POS classification, we should mention the theory of field structure. It was elaborated by Prof. Shendels, Prof. Bondarko, Prof. Plotkin, etc. In every POS there are units which constitute its nucleus and possess all the characteristics peculiar of this POS. At the same time there are secondary units which do not possess all the characteristics of this or that POS, although they do belong to this POS. So, the field includes main and secondary units, and the task of a linguist is to define the constituents of the field, its main and secondary elements.

The category of case. Different approaches to the category of case in English nouns. The range of relational meanings of the English genitive.

The category of case of the English nouns is expressed by the opposition of the form “a noun with an ‘s” and the form “a noun without ‘s”. The noun with ‘s means possessive or genitive case. The noun without ‘s is common case. The possessive case is the strong member of the categorical opposition and the non-genitive form is the weak member.

The problem of case is a debatable one. Different linguists distinguish different number of cases in ME. Some do not recognize the existence of case in ME nouns at all.

There are several theories concerning the category of case:

1) a limited case theory

2) a positional case theory

3) a prepositional case theory

4) no case theory

The limited case theory is represented by the majority of linguists in ME. They are common and genitive cases.

The positional case theory is expressed mostly by foreign grammarians. They distinguish cases according to the place of a noun in a sentence. If it is in preposition – it is a nominative case, if in interposition – genitive case or other cases. This theory is not convincing, because the place of a noun in a sentence refers to the sphere of syntax, but the category of case is a morphological category and should be expressed morphologically.

The theory of prepositional cases is expressed mostly by foreign linguists. There are many prepositions in ME and there are many cases (with the boy – Dative case). This point can’t be a convincing one as well, because the combination of a noun with preposition refers to the sphere of syntax as well. But case (as a morphological category) should be expressed morphologically. Prepositions are not morphemes, they are spelled separately from nouns. They have their own lexical meaning. So it is a free combination of a noun with preposition, but not the grammatical expression of the category of case.

The theory which doesn’t recognize the category of case in ME is not convincing, because ‘s is a grammatical morpheme, it has no lexical meaning of its own. It is spelled together with the noun. We have never seen ‘s separated from the noun, but Prof. Vorantsova considers that ‘s is a separate words abbreviated from the possessive pronoun, and it has a possessive meaning. All this is not convincing.

In ME only 2 cases are expressed grammatically: common case (the zero morpheme) and possessive case (‘s morpheme).

The meaning of the possessive case is the meaning of possession, but possessive case has some more additional meanings:

1) it expresses the relation of the whole to one (car’s roof)

2) it expresses a period of time (a day’s time)

3) it expresses distance (a 100 yard’s distance)

4) it expresses the meaning of qualification (Dobson’s vanity)

5) it expresses the genitive of agent (the great man’s arrival)

6) it expresses the genitive of patient (the Titanic’s tragedy)

7) it expresses the genitive of dispensed qualification (girl’s voice)

8) it expresses the genitive of adverbial (evening’s newspaper)

Sometimes we have double possession: the boy’s half-hour’s run, my mother’s father’s birthday.

Sometimes we have group genitive: the day-but-obe before yesterday’s paper.

We say that the category of number is the main morphological category in English, because all the countable nouns have it, while the category of case is found only in a part of nouns and not all of them have it.

The article, its essence. Peculiarities of the article. Semantic observations of the article in English. The meaningful non-uses of the article. The situational assessment of the article uses. The consideration of the English articles in the light of the oppositional theory.

Article is a determining unit of specific nature accompanying the noun in communicative collocation. The semantic purpose of the article is to specify the nounal referent.

The traditional grammar doesn’t recognize the category of article determination of English nouns. According to Prof. Blokh, every combination of a noun with an article is considered to be the category of article determination. If we share this point of view, we will consider the article to be a morpheme to express this category. Then articles shouldn’t have lexical meaning and should be spelled together with the noun. But it isn’t so. Articles possess their own lexical meaning and are spelled separately from the noun which they modify. So, the combination of a noun with an article is not a grammar from to express the category of article determination. It is a free combination and we can insert other words between a noun and an article. Article is a separate POS, which expresses definiteness or indefiniteness. It is used in a sentence with a noun or its equivalent and has no independent syntactical function in the sentence. Morphologically it is not changeable.

In English according to the opinion of the majority of linguists there are two articles: DA (which expresses the identification or individualisation of the referent of the noun: the use of this article shows that the object denoted is taken in its concrete, individual quality) and IA (which refers the object denoted by the noun to a certain class of similar objects). Some linguists (Prof. Smernitsky) distinguish one more article – the zero article. It is used before nouns in the plural, before abstract nouns and before nouns expressing different kinds of smth. At the same time we should distinguish the ZA from the cases of omission of the article out of stylistic condiderations in the texts of telegrams, in explanations given in a dictionary, in titles and headlines. When we have the omission of the article, it is possible to insert the omitted article. If we do it, nothing will change but the style. But if we insert any article instead of the ZA, the meaning of the sentence will change. Alongside of free elliptical constructions, there are cases of the semantically unspecified non-use of the article in various combinations of fixed type, such as prepositional phrases (on fire, at hand, in debt, etc.), fixed verbal collocations (take place, make use, cast anchor, etc.), descriptive coordinative groups and repetition groups (man and wife, dog and gun, day by day, etc.), and the like.

Passing to the situational estimation of the article uses, we must point out that the basic principle of their differentiation here is not a direct consideration of their meanings, but disclosing the informational characteristics that the article conveys to its noun in concrete contextual conditions. Examined from this angle, the definite article serves as an indicator of the type of nounal information which is presented as the "facts already known", i.e. as the starting point of the communication. In contrast to this, the indefinite article or the meaningful absence of the article introduces the central communicative nounal part of the sentence, i.e. the part rendering the immediate informative data to be conveyed from the speaker to the listener. The starting point of the communication is called its "theme", while the central informative part is called its "rheme". In accord with the said situational functions, the typical syntactic position of the noun modified by the definite article is the "thematic" subject, while the typical syntactic position of the noun modified by the indefinite article or by the meaningful absence of the article is the "rhematic" predicative. Ex.: The day (subject) was drawing to a close. How to handle the situation was a big question (predicative).

It should be noted that in many other cases of syntactic use, i.e. non-subjective or non-predicative, the articles reflect the same situational functions. This can be probed by reducing the constructions in question on re-arrangement lines to the logically "canonised" link-type constructions. Ex.: If you would care to verify the incident (object), pray do so. → If you would care the incident (subject) to be verified, pray have it verified.

Another essential contextual-situational characteristic of the articles is their immediate connection with the two types of attributes to the noun. The first type is a "limiting" attribute, which requires the definite article before the noun; the second type is a "descriptive" attribute, which requires the indefinite article or the meaningful absence of the article before the noun. Ex.: The events chronicled in this narrative took place some four years ago. (A limiting attribute) She was a person of strong will and iron self-control. (A descriptive attribute)

Oppositionally, the article determination of the noun should be divided into two binary correlations connected with each other hierarchically. The opposition of the higher level contrasts the definite article with the indefinite article and the meaningful absence of the article. In this opposition the definite article should be interpreted as the strong or marked member, while the other forms – as weak or unmarked members. The opposition of the lower level contrasts the two types of generalisation, i.e. the relative generalisation distinguishing its strong member (the indefinite article plus the meaningful absence of the article as its analogue with uncountable nouns and nouns in the plural) and the absolute, or "abstract" generalisation distinguishing the weak member of the opposition (the meaningful absence of the article).

The best way of demonstrating the actual oppositional value of the articles on the immediate textual material is to contrast them in syntactically equivalent conditions in pairs:

Identical nounal positions for the pair "the definite article — the indefinite article": The train hooted (that train). — A train hooted (some train).

Correlative nounal positions for the pair "the definite article — the absence of the article": I'm afraid the oxygen is out (our supply of oxygen). — Oxygen is necessary for life (oxygen in general, life in general).

Correlative nounal positions for the pair "the indefinite article — the absence of the article": Be careful, there is a puddle under your feet (a kind of puddle).— Be careful, there is mud on the ground (as different from clean space).

Finally, correlative nounal positions for the easily neutralised pair "the zero article of relative generalisation — the zero article of absolute generalisation": New information should be gathered on this subject (some information). — Scientific information should be gathered systematically in all fields of human knowledge (information in general).

Tense. The general notion of time, the lexical denotation of time, and the grammatical time proper. The two temporal categories in the system of the English verb. The problem of the future tense in English.

The Category of Tense is the basic verb category. It expresses the correlation between the action and event and objective time. We know that the actions or events can exist and develop only in time. We take some moment of time as a starting point in reference to which all the actions are expressed. If this starting point of time is taken in the plane including the moment of speaking then we deal with the Present tense. Any action which proceeds this starting moment of time is expressed by the Past Tense. And finally, any action which follows this starting point of time is expressed by the Future Tense. So we differentiate 3 principal tense forms in English: Present, Past, Future. In English there exists one more specific tense form which is called the "Future-in-the-Past". This tense form is used when we want to say that the action is treated as Future in reference to some Past moment of time.

When speaking of the expression of time by the verb, it is necessary to strictly distinguish between the general notion of time, the lexical denotation of time, and the grammatical time proper, or grammatical temporality.

The general notion of time exposes it as the universal form of the continual consecutive change of phenomena. Time, as well as space, are the basic forms of the existence of matter, they both are absolutely independent of human perception. On the other hand, time is reflected by man through his perceptions and intellect, and finds its expression in his language.

Lexical denotations of time can be of 2 types: absolutive and non-absolute. Absolutive lexical denotation of time refer an action to the present, past, or future from the point of view of the present moment (now, yesterday, in a couple of days). Non-absolute lexical denotation of time gives no orientation towards the present and can be of 2 types: 1) relative (shows that an event precedes or follows another one, e.g. “after that, before that, some time later, at different times”), 2) factual (directly states the time of an event, e.g. “in 1066, during the time of the First World War”).

Grammatical time proper expresses the most abstract temporal meanings that are conveyed through the category of tense. Traditional grammar speaks of 16 tense forms in English but actually there exist only 4 of them. The matter is that when speaking about an action we express its primary characteristics of tense but then it may be necessary to show the character of the development of the action or to compare the action with some other one and then in such cases the primary tense category is modified by some other verb categories such as aspect (continuous or non-continuous), perfect (perfect or non-perfect). So we get complex analytical forms, which express not one category of tense but a number of them. Ex. If we analyze such forms, as "is reading" we should say that this verb expresses Present Tense and continuous aspect or perfect. Hence the modification of the category of Tense by the category of aspect brings about the appearance of 16 verb forms.

In the system of the English verb there exist two temporal categories: the category of “primary time” and the category of the “prospective time”.

The category of primary time provides for the absolutive expression of the time of the process denoted by the verb. The formal signs of the opposition constituting this category are: with regular verbs – (e)d, and with irregular verbs, phonemic interchanges of more or less individual specification. This category divides all the tense forms of the verb into two temporal planes: the plane of the present and the plane of the past, which also affects also the future forms. E.g.: She returns home at five o’clock. – At five she returned home. – I know that she will return home at five. – I knew that she would return home at five.

The category of prospect is also temporal because it is closely connected with the expression of processual time. In difference from the category of primary time it is purely relative; it means that the future form of the verb only shows the denoted process as an after-action relative to some other action or state or event.

Many linguists don’t include the future in the system of tenses. E.g. Otto Esperson doesn’t include it as he claims that there is no grammatical form of the future, which stands on the same grammatical footing with the forms of the present and the past. The combination shall/will+infinitive cannot be treated as a grammatical (analytical) form of the future since the first elementt in this combination – shall/will – is not devoid of lexical meaning. Shall has traces of the meaning of obligation, will – volition => the combination is a “modal phrase” (Esperson) or a “free word combination”, which cannot be placed on the same footing with grammatical forms of the Present and the Past.

The category of aspect. The opposition by which the aspective category of development is contrasted. The views on the essence of the perfect forms in modern English.

The aspective meaning of the verb reflects the mode of the realization of the process. The opposition of the continuous forms of the verb to the non-continuous represents the aspective category of development. The marked member of the opposition is the continuous. It is built by the auxiliary be plus the Present Participle. The categorial meaning of the Continuous is "action in progress". The unmarked member is the indefinite, which leaves the meaning unspecified. The continuous shows the action in the very process of its realization; the indefinite points it out as a mere fact.

Traditional grammar speaks of 16 tense forms in English but actually there exist only 4 of them. The matter is that when speaking about an action we express its primary characteristics of tense but then it may be necessary to show the character of the development of the action or to compare the action with some other one and then in such cases the primary tense category is modified by some other verb categories such as aspect (continuous or non-continuous), perfect (perfect or non-perfect). So we get complex analytical forms, which express not one category of tense but a number of them. Ex.: If we analyze such forms, as "is reading" we should say that this verb expresses Present Tense and continuous aspect or perfect. Hence the modification of the category of Tense by the category of aspect brings about the appearance of 16 verb forms.

There are verbs in Modern English which are not characterized by the aspective use. They are the so called "never-used - in-the-Continuous" verbs (“to be”, “to have”; verbs of physical perception, of mental perception).

There are numerous meanings of the use of the continuous form of the verb. It can denote an action going on at the moment of speaking, actions states and qualities peculiar to the person at the given moment (You are being rude), habitual recurrent actions, etc.

The Perfect Forms consist in the correlation of the verb “to have” with the Participle 2 of the notional verb. The place of the Perfect in the system of tense forms is a disputable problem. The question is whether we should refer it to the category of tense (Prof. Sweet, Prof. Poutsma) or rather to the category of aspect (Prof. Ilyish, Prof. Vorontsova).

Prof. Smernitsky insists that the Perfect form should by no means be referred to the category of aspect. He conducted a very deep analysis of the Perfect form and suggested to observe it as a category of tense correlation. He underlines that the category of tense correlation is different from the category of tense, because the category of tense concerns a concrete moment of time and the category of tense correlation concerns time as a whole. However, this position is not quite clear, as Prof. Smernitsky in his analysis underlines the meaning of previousness which is typical of the Perfect form, but this meaning is closely connected with the reference to a concrete moment of time.

Prof. Ilyish accepts the theory suggested by Prof. Smernitsky, but he points out that it is very difficult to make out the grammatical meaning of the Perfect form, because it not always expresses previousness and, furthermore, previousness can be expressed not only by the Perfect form. He also adds, that the term “category of time correlation” is not suitable, as it brings the Perfect closer to the category of time (suggests “category of correlation”).

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