B. As to Their Categories
Date: 2015-10-07; view: 583.
§ 407. The sentences He is a student — Is he a student? form a syntactical opposeme. Their forms differ only in the type of intonation and the relative position of the members of the predication. The only difference in meaning is that between 'declaration' and 'interrogation'. These two meanings can be regarded as the manifestations of the general meaning of a grammatical (syntactical) category which has no name yet. The category shows whether the sentence is presented as a statement or as a question. Let us call it the category of presentation. Like any grammatical category this is a system of opposemes whose members differ in form to express only (and all) the particular manifestations of the general meaning of the category (§ 23).
The meaning of 'declaration' is expressed by a falling tone and by placing the subject before the predicate. The meaning of interrogation is expressed by a rising tone and by placing the structural (part of the) predicate before the subject.
Are you alluding to me? (Shaw). Shall I announce him? (Ib.). Is there no higher power than that? (Ib.). Do you call poverty a crime? (Ib.).
In the last example a special syntactical predicate, the syntactical word-morpheme do is introduced and placed before the subject.
§ 408. With regard to the category of 'presentation' English sentences divide into those that have 'presentation' opposites and those which have not. Imperative and exclamatory sentences mostly belong to the latter subclass. In these sentences the opposeme of 'presentation' is neutralized. The member of neutralization (see § 43) usually resembles that of 'statement' (Go to the blackboard. Let us begin. Look out!) But often it takes the form of the 'interrogation' member (Would you mind holding your tongue? (Hornby). Pass the salt, will you? Isn't she a beauty!) or an 'intermediate' form (How pretty she is!)
§ 409. Not all interrogative sentences are syntactical opposites of declarative sentences.
The meaning of 'interrogation' in 'special questions' (otherwise called Wh-questions) is expressed either lexically 1 (when the subject or its attribute in a statement are replaced by the interrogative pronouns who, what, which or whose) or lexico-syntactically (when some other part of a statement is replaced by some interrogative pronoun). In either case they are not opposites of the corresponding statements because they differ lexically. Compare:
A.
She was thinking about you. (Shaw).
Who was thinking about you?
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Sweetie's thoughts were far from me. (Ib.).
Whose thoughts were far from me?
The horrible thought will break my heart. (Ib.)
What thought will break my heart?
B.
The cat ison the tiles. (Ib.)
Where is the cat?
My son hasbecome a thief. (Ib.)
What hasmy son become?
She returned my love. (Ib.)
What didshe return?
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1 "The expression Who came signals a question, not because of a different arrangement, but solely because the signal of question is in the word who as a word". (Ch. C. Fries, op. cit).
§ 410. The alternative question Are you going out or do you prefer to stay at home? is a compound sentence containing two coordinated interrogative clauses each of which is the syntactical opposite of a declarative clause. Only the intonation of the second clause is not interrogative.
Note. In cases like Are you going out or not? Are you going to Moscow or to Leningrad? the part following the conjunction or may be regarded as representing a clause similar to the preceding one in everything but the appended words and the intonation.
Disjunctive questions are peculiar complex sentences the principal clause being a statement and the subordinate clause the syntactical opposite of its predication with regard to two categories, 'presentation' and 'information.' (See next §.)
You don't smoke, do you? She is beautiful, isn't she?
§ 411. The sentences below form opposemes of some syntactical category.
Open the door. Don't open the door.
It is raining. It is not raining. (It isn'training.)
Do you like it? Don't you like it?
You know. You don't know.
In these opposemes meanings of 'affirmation' and 'negation' are the particular meanings of some syntactical category. It is difficult to find a name for such a general category covering statements, questions and orders. Seeing that in modern science the components of a 'yes-no' system are used as units of information, we shall call the category under discussion the category of information.
The meaning of 'affirmative' information is expressed by a zero form, and the meaning of 'negative' information by means of the predicate negation, the syntactical word-morpheme not (n't) placed after the syntactical (part of the) predicate.
§412. As already noted (§393), the negative word-morpheme not (n't) expresses full negation, as distinct from the partial negation of such negative words as not, no, never, nothing, etc. In most cases full negation excludes the necessity of partial negation in English, and vice versa. Hence the well-known assertion: "In English two negatives in the same construction are not used as in Russian: He does not come so early. or: He never comes so early. Compare with the Russian:
Îí íèêîãäà íå ïðèõîäèò òàê ðàíî."
The difficulty is only in defining what is meant by "the same construction". It is not a sentence, because there can be two (or more) negatives in a composite sentence.
E. g. I ñ a n' t understand why he d i d n' t come yesterday.
It isn't even a simple sentence, for there may be a negative word attached to some verbid in the sentence, besides the negation connected with the predicate verb.
E. g. Would it not be better not to tell your father? (London).
The corresponding rule can, probably, be worded thus: In English two negatives are not used in the same verbal construction. A verbal construction is a verb with all the 'non-verbs' attached.
§ 413. Not every sentence containing a negation is the syntactical opposite of an affirmative sentence. There was nobody in the room is not the opposite of There was somebody in the room. Here the difference is in the lexical meaning of somebody and nobody. Similarly in There is a book on the table, and There is no book on the table the difference is lexical (no versus a). Only a sentence containing the predicate negation, the syntactical word-morpheme not (n't), can be the 'negative' member of an 'information' opposeme, because (like any grammatical word-morpheme) not (n' t) adds no lexical meaning.
§ 414. With regard to the category of information English sentences divide into those that have opposites of the category and those which have not. Since 'negative information' is expressed in English only by means of the predicate negation, all the sentences that have no predicates are outside the category. Rain. No rain. are not members of a syntactical opposeme. They only resemble the corresponding members and may be said to possess lexico-grammatical meanings of 'affirmative' and 'negative' information. In exclamatory sentences the category of information is mostly neutralized. The member of neutralization usually resembles that of 'affirmation'. What a lovely day! But often it takes the form of the member of 'negation'. Isn't it marvellous!
§ 415. Let us compare the following pairs of sentences:
Come Do come
He came He did come
I'll see him I shall see him
It's raining It is raining
The sentences above can be regarded as opposemes of the category of expressiveness. The two particular meanings are those of 'emphatic' and 'non-emphatic' expressiveness.
'Non-emphatic' expressiveness has a zero form, whereas 'emphasis' is expressed by a strong accent on a word-morpheme (morphological or syntactical). In sentences like He did come a special syntactical word-morpheme is placed before the notional verb to receive the stress1.
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1 H. Gleason writes: "The difference between The boy ran away and The boy did run away is not a matter of the presence or the absence of did. Only of the stress position. Did is there only to provide a meaningless carrier for that stress in the required position. If anything else were available did would not occur. Compare The boy will run away. The boy will run away". (Op. cit. p. 174—175).
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