Determiners and their general features as a part of speech

MINISTRY OF HIGHER AND SECONDARY
SPECIALIZED EDUCATION BUKHARA STATE UNIVERSITY
FOREIGN LANGUAGES FACULTY
ENGLISH LINGUISTICS DEPARTMENT


COURSE PAPER
Of the student of the group 11-8chi-20
To`xtayeva Aziza
On the topic
" DETERMINERS AND THEIR GENERAL FEATURES AS A PART OF SPEECH "


5111400-Foreign language and literature (English)


Scientific supervisor: M.M.Tursunov.

Bukhara-2023

CONTENT

1. 
   CHARACTERISTICS OF DETERMINERS…..……………........……3
   
2. 
   TYPES OF DETERMINERS…………………………………..……....6
   
3. 
   DETERMINERS IN PARTS OF SPEECH ………………………......11
   
4. 
   GENERAL AND SPECIFIC DETERMINERS…………..........…......14
   
5. 
   DETERMINERS OF DIFFERENCE.........................................….......17
   

6. ON MULTI-FUNCTIONALITY OF DETERMINERS IN GRAMMAR AND DISCOURSE…………………………………………………….……....20
CONCLUSION…..………….…………………………………..…….....28
LIST OF USED LITERATURE……………..…..............................…....29
LIST OF USED WEBSITES……………………………………………32

1. CHARACTERISTICS OF DETERMINERS

The grammar of the English language comprises a lot of phenomena which need to be discussed. One of them are determiners since they are phenomena that do not occur in all languages. The Czech language, which is my mother tongue, does not have the word class of determiners. This is the reason why Czech learners have problems with their proper use and why they are explored in this bachelor work. Therefore the aim of this bachelor thesis is to find out how particular a thesis intends to prepare an overall view on the topic. This is realised by analysing particular sources that are available. These sources are namely grammar books, course books and online sources. It is hoped that the thesis will contribute to the simplification of the learning and teaching process of determiners. There are two possible viewpoints from which determiners can be looked at. These are possible classifications of determiners and particular rules of the use of determiners. These two fields lead together to the proper use of determiners. Particular authors discuss different aspects of the topic. Although individual classifications may differ, the rules are the same. Nevertheless, not all of them occur in the particular sources analysed in this bachelor work. As for the content, the analysis is divided into three main groups of sources. The first part, the most extensive one, is the notion of determiners in grammar books. This part is further divided into two subgroups. The first subgroup discusses grammar books referring to determiners as one topic. Each of the analyses of a particular author is supplemented by a figure illustrating the author’s classification of determiners. The second subgroup discusses grammar books referring to determiners in separate particular parts where they discuss rather the individual rules of the use of determiners than their classification. After these two parts, there is a summary which highlights the main differences and similarities between the authors. The second part of the analysis discusses the notion of determiners in course books. Determiners occur in course books at more levels of language proficiency beginning from the elementary level, at which they should be discussed for the first time. Thus according to the level of English, particular sources will be grouped and described. These levels are elementary, pre-intermediate, intermediate, upper-intermediate, advanced and proficiency. Therefore it can be seen how important the topic chosen for the study is, since it is taught from the lower levels of proficiency. At the end of this chapter, there is a comparison of particular course books discussed.¹
The third part is devoted to the notion of determiners in online sources. Determiners do not occur in many online sources as might be expected. However, some of them are discussed in this bachelor thesis. It is so mostly in terms of the classification of determiners. Similarly to the two previous chapters, there is a comparison of differences and similarities between particular web pages at the end of the chapter. The very last chapter concludes the treatment of determiners in the particular sources analysed. The term determiner is used in two slightly different ways. In formal grammatical studies determiner is use broadly to include the entire class of adjective noun modifier (including the articles the and a/an). In English language textbooks, determiner is usually used more narrowly to refer to all determiners except for the articles the and a/an (and sometimes some). There is no real conflict between these definitions: articles are, in fact, a subclass of determiners. Textbooks (quite reasonably) separate out articles from the other determiners for practical pedagogical reason: articles require much more extensive treatment than the other determiners. Let us begin by defining what determiners are (defining determiner here in the broader sense that includes articles). Determiners are a special group of pre-adjective noun modifiers. Determiners are adjectives only in the widest sense that determiners, like adjectives, also modify nouns. Determiners differ from what we will now call “true adjectives” both semantically and grammatically. Semantically, there is a basic difference in meaning between determiners and true adjectives. True adjectives describe some characteristic or property of the particular nouns they modify, but determiners do not. All determiners have the function of helping the audience (the listener or reader) determine which noun the speaker is referring to. In fact, this is where the meaning of the grammatical term determiner comes from: determiners help “determine” which particular noun a speaker or author means. Compare the true adjective large and the determiner these in the following sentence: We need to move these large boxes into the hall. In this sentence, the true adjective large is used to describe a property or characteristic of the noun boxes—their physical size. However, the determiner these does not describe any property physically inherent in these boxes. There is no property of “these-ness” that these boxes themselves possess. The function of the determiner these is to help the listener identify which particular set of boxes the speaker is talking about. These identifies the boxes as being the ones nearer the speaker (as opposed to those boxes—the ones farther away from the speaker). Note: the determiner these locates the boxes in space at this particular moment in time. It really has nothing to do with the intrinsic nature of the boxes at all, only where they happen to be at the moment in reference to the speaker and audience. For example: We finally found a good dentist. The adjective good describes a property or quality the speaker attributes to the speaker ’s dentist, the quality of being good.
The determiner a does not attribute any comparable property to the dentist. It does, however, give us a very different kind of information: it tells us that the speaker of the sentence does not expect us, the audience, to already know the particular dentist the speaker is talking or writing
about. This information (unlike the information contained in the adjective good) has absolutely nothing to do with any characteristic or property inherent in the
speaker ’s dentist. The use of a has everything to do with the relationship and state of knowledge between the speaker and the audience and very little to do with the
inherent nature of dentists. As we have seen from these two examples, determiners are a kind of contextual aid that speakers or writers use to help their audience tell which particular noun or nouns they are referring to at the moment. True adjectives, on the other hand, are like descriptive tags that speakers or writers attach to particular nouns and which last for the duration of that particular language event. A determiner is a member of a class of words used to modify nouns or noun equivalents. Determiners help clarify what a noun is referring to and are typically placed before descriptive adjectives. For example, in the sentence Would you like to buy this new book?, the word this is a determiner. It tells us more about the book we are talking about: this book. It’s also placed before the descriptive adjective new. Simply put, in English, a determiner is a word that introduces a noun or provides information about the quantity of a noun. It always comes before a noun, not after, and it also comes before any other adjectives used to describe the noun. Determiners are required before a singular noun but are optional when it comes to introducing plural nouns. A determiner is a word placed in front of a noun to specify quantity (e.g., "one dog," "many dogs") or to clarify what the noun refers to (e.g., "my dog," "that dog," "the dog"). All determiners can be classified as one of the following:

• 
  An article (a/an, the)
  
• 
  A demonstrative (this, that, these, those)
  
• 
  A possessive (my, your, his, her, its, our, their)
  
• 
  A quantifier (common examples include many, much, more, most, some)