Дипломная работа: Syntagmatic and paradigmatic peculiarities of adverbs in English

- to carry out the analysis of syntactic functions of the adverb;

- to analyze the main classes of adverbs;

- to compare paradigmatically relevant classifications of the adverb;

- to explore syntactic valency and combinability patterns of adverbs;

- to examine the use of adverbs of degree and to determine their semantic preferences.

According to the spheres of concern the work falls into an Introduction, three chapters, conclusions and the list of references which together with the appendix comprises __ pages. Chapter 1 deals with the analysis of the adverb in accord with the 3-criteria principle of the lexico-grammatical word classification. Chapter 2 is concerned with the paradigmatic relations of adverbs, providing the semantic and lexico-grammatical classifications of the adverb. In Chapter 3 semantic and syntactic valencies of adverbs and their realization in speech are described. Most of the examples presented in this diploma paper are taken form modern English dictionaries.

Chapter 1. The adverb in English theoretical grammar

1.1 Categorial meaning of the adverb

In accord with the 3-criteria principle of the lexico-grammatical word classification (semantic, formal and functional) [35], parts of speech are discriminated on the basis of:

1) common categorial meaning;

2) common paradigm (morphological form and specific forms of derivation);

3) common syntactic function.

The categorical meaning of the adverb is secondary property which implies qualitative, quantitative, or circumstantial characteristics of actions, states, qualities.

The adverb is usually defined as a word expressing either property of an action, or property of another property, or circumstances in which an action occurs [22, 146]. From this definition it is difficult to define adverbs as a class, because they comprise a most heterogeneous group of words, and there is considerable overlap between the class and other word classes. They have many kinds of form, meaning and function.

Alongside such undoubtful adverbs as here, now, often, seldom, always, there are many others which also function as words of other classes. Such words which are different in their lexical meaning and also in their grammatical category (part of speech) but identical in their form are interparadigmatic homonyms (lexical-grammatical) [17, 118]. Thus, adverbs like dead (dead tired), clear (to get clear away), clean (I've clean forgotten), slow, easy (he would say that slow and easy) coincide with corresponding adjectives (a dead body, clear waters, clean hands). Adverbs like past, above, in, up, down, about, since, before, over are homonymous with prepositions. There is also a special group of pronominal adverbs when, where, how, why used either as interrogative words or as connectives to introduce subordinate clauses [3, 87]:

Where would you like to go? (an interrogative pronominal adverb)

We’ll go where you want. (a conjunctive pronominal adverb)

Some adverbs may be used rather like a verb, as in “Up. Jenkins! Down, Peter!”, where the first word is like an imperative [25, 92].

There are three adverbs connected with numerals: once, twice, and thrice (the latter being archaic). They denote measure or frequency:

She went there once a week [41].

I saw him twice last month [41].

Twice is also used in the structure twice as long, etc. [22, 92].

He is twice as tall as his brother [40].

She is twice as clever [40].

Beginning with three the idea of frequency or repetition is expressed by the phrases three times, four times [25, 92]:

He went there four times .

He is four times as bigger.

She is ten times cleverer. [25, 92]

In many cases the border-line between adverbs and words of the other classes is defined syntactically:

I called out to him as he ran past [38]. (adverb)

I called out to him as he ran past the house [38]. (preposition)