Seminar XI. The Secondary Parts of the Sentence. The Attribute. The Adverbial Modifier

I. Theoretical questions for discussion

1. The attribute. Ways of expressing attributes.

2. The position of attributes in a sentence.

3. Detached and non-detached appositions.

4. The adverbial modifier. Ways of expressing adverbial modifiers.

5. Semantic classes of adverbial modifiers.

II. The material to be read for the seminar

The attribute is a secondary part of the sentence which denotes the qualities of a person or thing expressed by a noun (or pronoun) in any of its functions in the sentence. The modified part of a sentence may have several attributes of various kinds. An attribute may be expressed by an adjective, a participle, a pronoun, a numeral, a noun in the possessive case, an adjectivized noun, a noun or a pronoun with a preposition, and infinitive, a gerund, an adverb, a whole syntactical word-combinations.

The appositionis a special kind of attribute expressed by a noun (sometimes a pronoun) which denotes the same person or thing as the head-noun. There are two kinds of appositions: a) a detached (loose) apposition and b) an undetached (close) apposition.

a) A detached apposition follows the head-noun in a rather loose connection and has the force of a descriptive attribute. It may modify a common noun or a proper noun: 1. The river rushed down the valley, a stream of molten bronze. 2. Lena, a very pretty girl, dreams to become an actress.

b) An undetached (close) apposition enters into such close relation with its head-noun that they form a group with one stress. The head-noun is often a proper noun, the name of a person; the apposition denotes rank, profession, relationship etc. The undetached apposition precedes the head-noun, except in some phraseological combinations where the apposition follows the head-noun (Richard the Lion Hearted, William the Conqueror). The stress is on the head-noun: 1. Major Brown looked at his watch impatiently. 2. Captain Smith told us an interesting story. 3. Aunt Becky was pleased to see us.

In geographical names the apposition follows the head-noun. The stress is on the apposition: Lake Baikal. The River Thames. Mount Everest.

The adverbial modifier is a secondary part of the sentence which modifies the verb-predicate, or a verbal in any of its functions, denoting the time, place, manner etc. A verb-predicate may have a number of adverbial modifiers: 1. They walked on silently side by side for ten minutes. 2. He ran along the street at the swiftest pace. An adverbial modifier may be expressed by an adverb, a noun with a preposition, a noun without any preposition expressing extent, distance, definite and indefinite time, price etc., a participle, a gerund with a preposition, an infinitive, a whole syntactical word-combination: 1. He had slept unusually well. 2. The old man spoke with a quiet earnestness. 3. She had been hours in the garden. 4. On entering the room he greeted everyone cheerfully.

According to their meaningadverbial modifiers may be classified as follows:

1. Adverbial modifiers of place: Outside it was getting dark.

2. Adverbial modifiers of time: Yesterday he passed his exam.

3. Adverbial modifiers of manner: The gardeners were busily potting out spring flowers.

4. Adverbial modifiers of degree: He was completely happy.

5. Adverbial modifiers of cause: I was stiff with long sitting on the bench.

6. Adverbial modifiers of purpose: She strained her ears to catch the words.

7. Adverbial modifiers of measure (time, distance, cost, weight): 1) He stood still a long while, surveying the hillside. 2) She moved down the stream a few steps… 3) She was now a hundred yards from the water. 4) It weighs seventy-five pounds.

8. Adverbial modifiers of result: Ben was too busy to listen to him now.

9. Adverbial modifiers of condition: In case of your absence I shall leave you a note.

10. Adverbial modifiers of exclusion or substitution introduced by except, save, but, instead etc.: She made no comment on it, except by a scornful movement of the lips.

Thus, adverbial modifiers in Modern English as well as in Ukrainian may be expressed by adverbs, nouns with prepositions, participles, by the infinitive and by whole clauses. Adverbial modifiers modify a part of a sentence expressed by a verb, adjective or adverb and serve to characterize the action or property as to their quality or intensity, or to indicate the circumstances under which the action takes place or with which the manifestation of quality is connected.