Main principles and problems of cultur and language in teaching foreign language content: Introduction Chapter I. Principles of classification

8. The category of number of the Engliss noun.

The category of number is proper to count nouns only. Usually words which lack a certain category, have only one form, that of the weak member of the opposition. Non-counts may be singular or plural. So subclasses of non-count nouns constitute a lexico-grammatical opposition “singular only - plural only”: snow, joy, news - contents, tongs, police.
The general meaning revealed through the grammatical opposition a book - books is number, or quantity, or “oneness - more than-oneness”. The general meaning revealed througli the lexico-grammatical opposition is “discreteness - non-discreteness”. The opposition “discreteness - non-discreteness” is semantically broader than the opposition “oneness - more-than-oneness”. It embraces both countable and uncountable nouns. Singular presents the noun-referent as a single indiscrete entity. Plural presents the referent as a multiplicity of discrete entities (separate objects - houses; objects consisting of separate parts - scissors; various types - wines, etc.).

9. The category of case of the English noun.

boy – boy’s boys – boys’
Approaches to the category of case in English:
English has 2 cases (the limited case theory).
The number of cases in English is more than 2 (the theory of positional cases, the theory of prepositional cases).
There are no cases at all with English nouns.
These approaches are possible due to a difference in the interpretation of case as a grammatical category.
It is based on explicit oppositional approach to the recognition of grammatical categories. H.Sweet, O.Jespersen, Prof. Smirnitski, Prof. Ilyish: Case is a category of a noun expressing relations between the thing denoted by the noun and other things and properties, or actions, and manifested by some formal sign in the noun itself (an inflexion or a zero sign). Case can’t be expressed by the phrase preposition+noun or by word order.
Prof.Blokh: Case is an immanent morphological category of the noun manifested in the forms of noun declension and showing the relations of the nounal referent to other objects and phenomena. It is a morphological-declensional form. So, this is the traditional grammar approach.
The theory of positional cases(Nesfield, Deutschbein, Bryant): the unchangeable forms of the noun are differentiated as different cases due to the functional positions occupied by the noun in the sentence.
e.g. Мать(Им.) видит дочь(Вин.). Дочь (Им.) видит мать(Вин.).
e.g. The mother bought her boy a coat: mother – the Nominative case, boy – Dative, coat – Accusative.
e.g. The mother bought a/the coat for her boy: boy – Dative.
Thus, the English noun would distinguish, besides the inflexional Genitive case, also purely positional cases: Nominative, Vocative, Dative and Accusative. The number of cases can be reduced to 3 (M.Bryant): Nominative, Genitive and Objective in accordance with pronouns I – me.
J.Lyons:
1) Nominative - Bill died.
2) Accusative – John killed Bill.
3) Dative – John gave the book to Tom.
4) Genitive – It was Harry’s pencil.
5) Instrumental – John killed Bill with a knife.
6) Agentive – John was killed by Bill with a knife.
7) Comitative – John went to town with Mary.
The weak pointlies in the fact that they substitute the functional characteristics for the morphological features of the word class.
The strong point: it rightly illustrates the fact that the functional meanings can be expressed in language by other grammatical means, in particular, by word-order (rose garden – garden rose).
The theory of prepositional cases (analytical theory or the theory of analytical forms): combinations of nouns with prepositions in certain object and attributive collocations should be understood as morphological case forms. Prepositions - according to Curme – are grammatical elements equivalent to case forms. There can be as many cases as there are prepositions. e.g. of Peter, with Peter, to Peter – of, with, to are lexically empty words like has done.
Weak points:
1. There can be no oppositions, they are synonyms.
2. A paradigm is limited and there are too many prepositions.
3. Prepositions are not empty words; they are relational words (they show relations).
4. Each prepositional phrase would bear then another, additional name of ‘prepositional case’ and the total number will expand greatly.