4. The Problem of Gender in English.

Gender plays a relatively minor part in the grammar of English by comparison with its role in many other languages. There is no gender concord, and the reference of the pronouns he, she, it is very largely determined by what is sometimes referred to as ‘natural’ gender for English, it depends upon the classification of persons and objects as male, female or inanimate. Thus, the recognition of gender as a grammatical category is logically independent of any particular semantic association.

According to some language analysts (B. Ilyish, F. Palmer, and E. Morokhovskaya), nouns have no category of gender in Modern English. Prof. Ilyish states that not a single word in Modern English shows any peculiarities in its morphology due to its denoting male or female being. Thus, the words husband and wife do not show any difference in their forms due to peculiarities of their lexical meaning. The difference between such nouns as actor and actress is a purely lexical one. In other words, the category of sex should not be confused with the category of sex, because sex is an objective biological category. It correlates with gender only when sex differences of living beings are manifested in the language grammatically (e.g. tiger – tigress). Still, other scholars (M. Blokh, John Lyons) admit the existence of the category of gender. Prof. Blokh states that the existence of the category of gender in Modern English can be proved by the correlation of nouns with personal pronouns of the third person (he, she, it). Accordingly, there are three genders in English: the neuter (non-person) gender, the masculine gender, the feminine gender.

Verb The general characteristics

The general categorial meaning of the verb is process presented dynamically, i.e. developing in time. They also include those that denote states, forms of existence, types of attitude, evaluations, etc, rather than actions.

Its central function is predicate.

From the point of view of their outward structure, verbs are characterized by specific forms of word-building, as well as by the formal features expressing the corresponding grammatical categories.

The word stems may be simple, sound-replacive, stress-replacive, expanded, composite and phrasal.

The original simple verb stems are not numerous: go, take, read, etc.

One of the most productive means of forming verb lexemes is conversion “noun-verb”: to park, to man, to water. The sound-replacive type of derivation and the stress replacive type of derivation are unproductive: food-to feed, blood-to bleed, import-to import, transport, record, insult. The typical suffixes expanding the stem of the verb are: -ate (cultivate), -en (broaden), -ify (clarify), -ize (normalize); the prefixes are: be- (belittle, befriend, bewitch, bewilder), en-/em- (enable, enclose, embody, embed); re (remake), under- (undergo), over- (overestimate), sub- (subdivide), mis- (misunderstand), un- (undo). The composite (compound) verb stems correspond to the composite non-verb stems from which they are derived (whitewash, proofread). The phrasal verb stems occupy an intermediary position between analytical forms of verb and syntactic word combinations. Two types should be mentioned: have, give, take with a noun (to have breakfast, take a breath, take a glance, give a smile) and head verb with a verbal postposition (go on, take off, pick up).

The first category is the category of finitude dividing the verb into finite and non-finite forms, then the categories of person, number, tense, aspect, voice and mood. Among the forms the infinitive occupies the position of the principal representative of the verb lexeme as a whole. Its function is to name the process and to serve as the derivative base for all the other forms of the verb.

The class of verbs falls into a number of subclasses distinguished by different semantic and lexico-grammatical features. On the upper level of division two unequal sets are identified: the set of verbs of full nominative value (notional verbs), and the set of verbs of partial nominative value (semi-notional and functional verbs). The first set is derivationally open, it includes the bulk of the verbal lexicon. The second set is derivationally closed, it includes limited subsets of verbs characterized by individual relational properties. Semi-notional and functional verbs serve as markers of predication and include auxiliary verbs, modal verbs, semi-notional introducer verbs, and link-verbs. Auxiliary verbs serve for building categorial forms of the verbs: be, have, do, shall, will, should, would, may, might. Modal verbs are used to express meanings of attitude: ability, obligation, permission.

On the bases of the subject-process relation, all the notional verbs can be divided into actional and statal. Actional verbs express the action performed by the subject, i.e. they present the subject as an active doer (do, perform, read, learn and the like). Statal verbs denote the state of their subject (live, worry, suffer, see, know). A third set of verbs can be distinguished, which express processes (thaw, ripen). It can be shown by transformational tests: The snow is thawing – the snow is in the state of thawing.

Some subsets of verbs are oppositions of verbs of mental process and sensual process. Within the first group there are verbs of mental perception and mental activity (know-think, admire-assess, notice-note); within the second group there verbs of physical perception and physical perceptional activity (hear-listen, see-look, smell (пахнуть)-smell (нюхать).

Aspective semantics exposes the inner character of the process denoted by the verb. Two aspective subclasses should be recognized: limitive (предельные) unlimitive, durative (непредельные): arrive, come, find, drop/sleep, behave, hope.

Another division is into verbs transitive and intransitive. Transitivity is the ability of the verb to take direct object, i.e. an object which is immediately affected by the process. The direct object is joined to the verb without a preposition.

By morphological criteria verbs are divided into the open group of regular and a closed group of irregular verbs.