1. Subject of theoretical grammar. Analytic and synthetic word forms

14. The characteristic features of the verb.
16. The properties of the finites in general.
The verb as a notional part of speech has the categorial meaning of dynamic process, or process developing in time, including not only actions as such (to work, to build), but also states, forms of existence (to be, to become, to lie), various types of attitude, feelings (to love, to appreciate), etc.
Formally, the verb is characterized by a set of specific word-building affixes, e.g.: to activate, to widen, to classify, to synchronize, to overestimate, to reread, etc.; there are some other means of building verbs, among them sound-replacive and stress-shifting models, e.g.: blood – to bleed, import – to import. There is a peculiar means of rendering the meaning of the process, which occupies an intermediary position between the word and the word-combination: the so-called “phrasal verbs”, consisting of a verb and a postpositional element. Some phrasal verbs are closer to the word, because their meaning cannot be deduced from the meaning of the verb or the meaning of the postposition separately, e.g.: to give up, to give in, etc.; others are semantically closer to the word-combination, e.g.: to stand up, to sit down, etc. A separate group of phrasal verbs is made by combinations of broad meaning verbs to have, to give, to take and nouns, e.g.: to give a look, to have rest, to have a bite, etc. The processual semantics of the verb determines its combinability with nouns denoting either the subject or the object of the action, and its combinability with adverbs denoting the quality of the process. In certain contexts, some verbs can be combined with adjectives (in compound nominal predicates) and other verbs.
The verb is usually characterized as the most complex part of speech, because it has more word-changing categories than any other notional part of speech. It is changed according to the categories of person and number, tense, aspect, voice and mood. Besides, each verb has a specific set of non-finite forms (the infinitive, the gerund, participles I and II), otherwise called “verbals”, or “verbids”, opposed to the finite forms of the verb, otherwise called “finites”; their opposition is treated as “the category of finitude”.
Such a wide range of forms is mainly due to the importance of the function that the verb performs in the sentence: its primary function (and the only function of its finite forms) is the function of a predicate – the central, organizing member of the sentence, expressing its crucial predicative meanings, or the relations of the event denoted by the sentence to actual reality. The non-finite forms of the verbs, verbids, perform functions characteristic of other notional parts of speech – nouns, adjectives, or adverbs, but still, they can express partial predication and share a number of other important verbal features with the finites (see Unit 11).
The complexity of the verb is also manifested in the intricate system of its grammatically relevant subclasses.
On the upper level, all the verbs according to their semantic (nominative) value fall into two big sub-classes: the sub-class of notional verbs and the sub-class of functional and semi-functional verbs. Notional verbs have full nominative value and are independent in the expression of the process, e.g.: to work, to build, to lie, to love, etc.; these verbs comprise the bulk of the class and constitute an open group of words. Functional and semi-functional (or, semi-notional) verbs make a closed group of verbs of partial nominative value. They are dependent on other words in the denotation of the process, but through their forms the predicative semantics of the sentence is expressed (they function as predicators).
Functional and semi-functional verbs are further subdivided into a number of groups. Auxiliary functional verbs are used to build the analytical grammatical forms of notional verbs, e.g.: have done, was lost, etc. Link verbs connect the nominative part of the predicate (the predicative) with the subject. They can be of two types: pure and specifying link verbs. Pure link verbs perform a purely predicative-linking function in the sentence; in English there is only one pure link verb to be; specifying link verbs specify the connections between the subject and its property, cf.: He was pale. – He grew pale. The specification of the connections may be either “perceptional”, e.g.: to seem, to look, to feel, etc., or “factual”, e.g.: to grow, to become, to get, etc. The semi-functional link verbs should be distinguished from homonymous notional verbs, e.g.: to grow can be a notional verb or a specifying link verb, cf.: The child grew quickly. – He grew pale. Modal verbs are predicators denoting various subject attitudes to the action, for example, obligation, ability, permission, advisability, etc.: can, must, may, etc. A group of semi-notional verbs function as verbid introducers, i.e., they introduce non-finite forms of verbs into the structure of the sentence: they are grammatically inseparable from the verbids and these two lexemes jointly make the predicate of the sentence, e.g.: He happened to know all about it. Verbid introducers render the following meanings: modal identity, when the speaker evaluates the action denoted by the following verbid as seeming, accidental, or unexpected, e.g.: to seem, to prove, to appear, to happen, etc.; subject-action relations (conation), e.g.: to try, to fail, to manage, etc.; phasal semantics, e.g.: to begin, to start, to continue, to finish, etc. These semi-notional verbs should also be distinguished from homonymous notional verbs, cf.: It happened ten years ago (happen is a notional verb). – He happened to be there at the same time with her (happen is a semi-notional verbid introducer of modal identity – the process denoted by the infinitive is presented as unexpected).
The subdivision of verbs into notional and (semi-)functional is grammatically relevant since the verbs of the two subclasses perform different syntactic functions in the sentence: notional verbs function as predicates, semi-functional and functional verbs as parts of predicates (predicators).
Notional verbs are subdivided into several groups as follows.
On the basis of subject-process relations the verbs are subdivided into actional and statal verbs. The terms are self-explanatory: actional verbs denote the actions performed by the subject as an active doer, e.g.: to go, to make, to build, to look, etc.; statal verbs denote various states of the subject or present the subject as the recipient of an outward activity, e.g.: to love, to be, to worry, to enjoy, to see, etc. Mental and sensual processes can be presented as actional or statal; they can be denoted either by correlated pairs of different verbs, or by the same verbal lexeme, e.g.: to know (mental perception) – to think (mental activity), to see, to hear (physical perception as such) - to look, to listen (physical perceptional activity); The cake tastes nice (taste denotes physical perception, it is used as a statal verb). – I always taste food before adding salt (taste denotes perceptional activity, it is used as an actional verb). The difference between actional and statal verbs is grammatically manifested in the category of aspect forms: actional verbs take the form of the continuous aspect freely, and statal verbs are normally used in indefinite forms in the same contexts, cf.: What are you looking at? Do you hear me? The use of the continuous aspect forms of the statal verbs finds its explanation in terms of the oppositional theory as a specific case of transposition and involves certain transformations in the meaning of the verb, e.g.: The doctor is seeing a patient right now; I’m not seeing much of her lately (seeing acquires the meaning of activity close to “meeting”); You are being naughty (= “behaving”) .
Another subdivision of notional verbs is based on their aspective meaning, which exposes the inner character of the process denoted, or, its mode of realization. According to the mode of realization, the process may be instantaneous (momentary), durative (continual), repeated, starting, completed, uncompleted, etc. For example: instantaneous actions are denoted by the verbs to drop, to click, to jump, etc.; starting, durative, terminated, or repeated actions are denoted by the combinations of verbids with semi-notional verbid-introducers, such as to begin, to continue, to finish, used to, etc.; prefixes are used to denote the aspectual meanings of overcompletion, undercompletion or repetition, e.g.: to overestimate, to underestimate, to reread, etc. All these minor subdivisions are generalized in the grammatically relevant subdivision of all the verbs into two big groups: the so-called limitive verbs and unlimitive verbs. Limitive verbs present a process as potentially limited, directed towards reaching a certain border point, beyond which the process denoted by the verb is stopped or ceases to exist, e.g.: to come, to sit down, to bring, to drop, etc. Unlimitive verbs present the process as potentially not limited by any border point, e.g.: to go, to sit, to carry, to exist, etc. Some limitive and unlimitive verbs form semantically opposed pairs, denoting roughly the same actual process presented as either potentially limited or unlimited, cf.: to come – to go, to sit down – to sit, to bring – to carry; other verbs have no aspective counterparts, e.g.: to be, to exist (unlimitive), to drop (limitive). But the bulk of English verbs can present the action as either limitive or unlimitive in different contexts, e.g.: to build, to walk, to turn, to laugh, etc. Traditionally such verbs are treated as verbs of double, or mixed aspective nature. In terms of the theory of oppositions one can say that the lexical opposition between limitive and unlimitive verbs is easily neutralized; this makes the borderline between the two aspective groups of verbs rather loose, e.g.: Don’t laugh – this is a serious matter (unlimitive use, basic function of the verb laugh); He laughed and left the room (limitive use, neutralization). The aspective subdivision of the verbs is closely connected with the previously described subdivision of the verbs into actional and statal (limitive verbs can be only actional, while unlimitive verbs can denote both actions and states) and it is also grammatically relevant for the expression of the grammatical category of aspect .
English limitive and unlimitive verbs do not coincide with the Russian perfective and imperfective aspective verbal subclasses, which denote the actual conclusion or non-conclusion of the process and may correspond (in due contextual circumstances) with either limitive or unlimitive verbs in English, cf.: He came early yesterday (Он пришел рано вчера). – He came to us every day (Он приходил к нам каждый день).
The next subdivision of the notional verbs is based on their combinability features, or their valency[1]. In traditional grammar studies, on the basis of combinability, verbs are divided into transitive and intransitive: transitive verbs denote an action directed toward a certain object; in a sentence they are obligatorily used with a direct object. Constructions with transitive verbs are easily transformed from active into passive, e.g.: He wrote a letter. – The letter was written by him. This subdivision is grammatically relevant for such languages as Russian, because in Russian only transitive verbs can be used in the passive. In English the use of passive forms is much wider; almost every verb can be passivized, e.g.: to walk is an intransitive verb, but it is possible to say She was walked out of the room. In English, transitive or intransitive uses of verbs are distinguished rather than separate groups of transitive and intransitive verbs.
The notion of ‘valency’ allows the analysis of verbal combinability potential in greater detail. It involves the whole range of subordinate syntactic elements (valency partners, valents, or adjuncts) either required or specifically permitted by a verb. For example, the valency of the verb to eat includes a subject and an object, as in I am eating cheese. The valency of the word can be either obligatory (required), or optional (permitted). The obligatory adjuncts (the valents required by the verb) are called “complements” and the verb itself is called “complementive”; without a complement a syntactic construction with a complementive verb is grammatically incomplete and semantically deficient, cf.: He is a writer. - *He is…. The optional valents are called “supplements” and the verb is called “uncomplementive” (or, “supplementive”); the supplemenive verb can be used with or without a supplement in a syntactic construction, cf.: They are singing a song. - They are singing.
Uncomplementive verbs are further subdivided into two groups of verbs: personal and impersonal verbs. Personal verbs imply the subject of the action denoted (animate or inanimate, human or non-human), e.g.: to work, to laugh, to grow, to start, etc., as in I’m working; The concert started. Impersonal verbs usually denote natural phenomena, e.g.: to rain, to snow, to drizzle, etc.; the number of impersonal verbs is limited; in English they are combined with a formal subject, e.g.: It’s raining (in Russian impersonal uncomplementive verbs can be used without any subject at all, cf.: Моросит; Смеркается).
Complementive verbs are further subdivided according to the members of the sentence which they must be obligatorily used with. Predicative complementive verbs are link verbs obligatorily combined in a sentence with their predicatives, e.g.: He is a writer. Adverbial complementive verbs are verbs which are obligatorily combined with adverbial modifiers of time, or space, or manner, e.g.: He lives in Paris; He lived in the eighteenth century; The married and lived happily ever since. Objective complementive verbs require either one object-complement (monocomplementive verbs) or two compliments (bicomplementive verbs). The following verbs are monocomplementive: to have – the possession objective verb, non-passivized; to take, to grasp, to enjoy, etc. – direct objective verbs, e.g.: Take the book; to look at, to point to, to send for, etc. – prepositional objective verbs; in spite of their prepositional use they are easily passivized in English, e.g.: Everyone looked at her; She was looked at.; to cost, to weigh, to fail, to become, etc. – direct objective verbs, non-passivized; to belong to, to abound in, to merge with, etc. – prepositional objective verbs, non-passivized. The following verbs are bicomlementive: to give, to bring, to pay, to show, etc. – direct objective and addressee objective verbs, e.g.: Give the book to your neighbor; Give the neighbor your book; to teach, to forgive, to ask, to excuse, etc. – double direct objective verbs, e.g.: My mother taught me this song; to argue, to agree, to cooperate, etc. – double prepositional objective verbs, e.g.: I agree with you about his latest book; to remind of, to apologize for, to pay for, etc. – addressee objective verbs, e.g.: Don’t remind me of that awful day; to put, to send, to bring, etc. – adverbial objective verbs which are obligatorily used with a direct object and an adverbial modifier, e.g.: Put the book on the table.
This description of verbal valency subclasses is not exhaustive; there may be further subdivisions and generalizations. For example, the term “pseudo-transitive verbs” is sometimes employed to distinguish prepositional objective verbs which can be passivized (to look at, to give to, etc.) and, vice versa, direct objective verbs which cannot be passivized (to have, to cost, etc.).
In conclusion, it should be stressed once again that many verbs in English in different contexts migrate easily from one group to another, and the boundaries between the subclasses are less rigid than in Russian. For example: to work is an uncomplementive verb, but in modern English, especially in its American variant, one can use it with a direct object too, e.g.: She worked her team hard; She worked the phones. Such cases, as well as all other notional “sub-class migration” cases, are treated as syntactic variants (‘uses’) of the same verbal lexemes. But lexemes which coincide as notional and functional or semi-functional verbs should be treated as homonymous verbs, because different grammatical functions underlie these subdivisions.