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Thus, -'s is the only positive case morpheme of English nouns. It would be no exaggeration to say that the whole category' depends on this morpheme.
As already mentioned, with regard to the category of case English nouns fall under two lexico-grammatical subclasses: declinables, having case opposites, and indeclinables, having no case opposites.
The subclass of declinables is comparatively limited, including mostly nouns denoting living beings, also time and distance 0.
Indeclinables like book, iron, care have, as a norm, only the potential (or oblique, or lexico-grammatical) meaning of the common case. But it is sometimes actualized when a case opposite of these words is formed in speech, as in ‘The book's philosophy is old-fashioned’. (The Tribune, Canada).
As usual, variants of one lexeme may belong to different subclasses. Youth meaning 'the state of being young' belongs to the indeclinables. Its variant youth meaning 'a young man' has a case opposite (The youth's candid smile disarmed her. Black and belongs to the declinables.
Since both cases and prepositions show 'relations of substances', some linguists speak of analytical cases in Modern English. To the student is said to be an analytical dative case (equivalent, for instance, to the Russian студенту), of the student is understood as an analytical genitive case (equivalent to студента), by the student as an analytical instrumental case (cf. студентом), etc.
The theory of analytical cases seems to be inconvincing for a number of reasons.
1. In order to treat the combinations of the student, to the student, by the student as analytical words (like shall come or has come) we must regard of, to, with as grammatical word-morphemes 0. But then they are to be devoid of lexical meaning, which they are not. Like most words a preposition is usually polysemantic and each meaning is singled out in speech, in a sentence or a word-combination. Cf. to speak of the student, the speech of the student, news of the student, it was kind of the student, what became of the student, etc.
In each case of shows one of its lexical meanings. Therefore it cannot be regarded as a grammatical word-morpheme and the combination of the student cannot be treated as an analytical word.
2. A grammatical category, as known, is represented in opposemes comprising a definite number of members. Combinations with different prepositions are too numerous to be interpreted as opposemes representing the category of case0.
The number of cases in English becomes practically unlimited .
3. Analytical words usually form opposemes with synthetic ones0 (comes — came — will come). With prepositional constructions it is different. They are often synonymous with synthetic words.
E. g. the son of my friend == my friend's son; the wall of the garden == the. garden wall.
On the other hand, prepositional constructions can be used side by side with synthetic cases, as in that doll of Mary's, a friend of John's. If we accepted the theory of analytical cases, we should see in of John's a double-case word0 , which would be some rarity in English, there being •'no double-tense words nor double-aspect words and the like 0.
4. There is much subjectivity in the choice of prepositions supposed to form analytical cases0 . Grammarians usually point out those prepositions whose meanings approximate to the meanings of some cases in other languages or in Old English. But the analogy with other languages or with an older stage of the same language does not prove the existence of a given category in a modern language.
Therefore we think it unjustified to speak of units like to the student, of the student, etc. as of analytical cases. They are combinations of nouns in the common case with prepositions.
The morpheme -'s, on which the category of case of English nouns depends (§ 83), differs in some respects from other grammatical morphemes of the English language and from the case morphemes of other languages.
As emphasized by B. A. Ilyish 0, -'s is no longer a case inflexion in the classical sense of the word. Unlike such classical inflexions, -'s may be attached
a) to adverbs (of substantival origin), as in yesterday's events,
b) to word-groups, as in Mary and John's apartment, our professor of literature's unexpected departure,
c) even to whole clauses, as in the well-worn example the man I saw yesterday's son.
В. A. Ilyish comes to-the conclusion that the -'s morpheme gradually develops into a "form-word"0, a kind of particle serving to convey the meaning of belonging, possession0.
G. N. Vorontsova does not recognize –‘s as a case morpheme at all0. The reasons she puts forward to substantiate her point of view are as follows:
1) The use of -'s is optional (her brother's, of her brother).
2) It is used with a limited group of nouns outside which it occurs very seldom.
3) -'s is used both in the singular and in the plural (child's, children's), which is not incident- to case morphemes (cf. мальчик-а, мальчик-ов).
4) It occurs in very few plurals, only those with the irregular formation of the plural member (oxen's but cows').
5) -'s does not make an inseparable part of the structure of the word. It may be placed at some distance from the head-noun of an attributive group.
"Been reading that fellow what's his name's attacks in the 'Sunday Times'?" (Bennett).
Proceeding from these facts G. N. Vorontsova treats -'s as a 'postposition', a 'purely syntactical form-word resembling a preposition', used as a sign of syntactical dependence0.
In keeping with this interpretation of the -'s morpheme the author denies the existence of cases in Modern English.
At present, however, this extreme point of view can hardly be accepted 0. The following arguments tend to show that -'s does function as a case morpheme.
1. The -'s morpheme is mostly attached to individual nouns e, not noun groups. According to our statistics this is observed in 96 per cent of examples with this morpheme. Instances like The man I saw yesterday's son are very rare and may be interpreted in more ways than one. As already mentioned, the demarcation line between words and combinations of words is very vague in English. A word-combination can easily be made to function as one word.
Cf. a hats-cleaned-by-electricity-while-you-wait establishment (O. Henry), the eighty-year-olds (D. W.).
In the last example the plural morpheme -s is in fact attached to an adjective word-combination, turning it into a noun. It can be maintained that the same morpheme –‘s likewise substantivizes the group of words to which it is attached, and we get something like the man-1-saw-yesterday's son.
2. Its general meaning — "the relation of a noun to an other word" — is a typical case meaning.
3. The fact that -'s occurs, as a rule, with a more or less limited group of words bears testimony to its not being a "preposition-like form word". The use of the preposition is determined, chiefly, by the meaning of the preposition itself and not by the meaning of the noun it introduces (Cf. оn the table, in the table, under the table, over the table etc.)
4. The fact that the possessive case is expressed in oxen — oxen's by -'s and in cows — cows' by zero cannot serve as an argument against the existence of cases in English nouns because -'s and zero are here forms of the same morpheme
a) Their meanings are identical.
b) Their distribution is complementary.
5. As a minor argument against the view that -'s is "a preposition-like word", it is pointed out0 that -'s differs phonetically from all English prepositions in not having a vowel, a circumstance limiting its independence.
Yet, it cannot be denied that the peculiarities of the -'s morpheme are such as to admit no doubt of its being essentially different from the case morphemes of other languages. It is evident that the case system of Modern English is undergoing serious changes.
2.1.2. The Category of Number of English Nouns.
The category of number of English nouns is the system of opposemes (such as girl — girls, foot — feet, etc.) showing whether the noun stands for one object or more than one, in other words, whether its grammatical meaning is 'oneness' or 'more-than-oneness' of objects.
The connection of the category with the world of material reality, though indirect, is quite transparent. Its meanings reflect the existence of individual objects and groups of objects in the material world.
All number opposemes are identical in content: they contain two particular meanings of 'singular' and 'plural' united by the general meaning of the category, that of 'number'. But there is a considerable variety of form in number opposemes, though it is not so great as in the Russian language.
An English noun lexeme can contain two number opposemes at most (toy — boys, boy's — boys'). Many lexemes have but one opposeme (table — tables) and many others have no opposemes at all (ink, news).
In the opposeme boy — boys 'singularity' is expressed by a zero morpheme and 'plurality' is marked by the positive morpheme /-z/, in spelling -.s. In other words, the 'singular' member of the opposeme is not marked, and the 'plural' member is marked.
In the opposeme boy's — boys' both members have positive morphemes –‘s, -s’, but these morphemes can be distinguished only in writing. In the spoken language their forms do not differ, so with regard to each other they are unmarked. They can be distinguished only by their combinability (cf. a boy's head, boys' heads).
In a few noun lexemes of foreign origin both members of a number opposeme are marked, e.g. symposium — symposia, genus — genera, phenomenon—phenomena, etc. But in the process of assimilation this peculiarity of foreign nouns gets gradually lost, and instead of medium — media a new opposeme develops, medium — mediums; instead of formula — formulae, the usual form now is formula — formulas. In this process, as we see, the foreign grammatical morphemes are neglected as such. The ‘plural’ morpheme is dropped altogether. The 'singular' morpheme becomes part of the stem. Finally, the regular -s ending is added to form the 'plural' opposite. As a result the 'singular' becomes unmarked, as typical of English, and the 'plural' gets its usual mark, the suffix -s.
Since the 'singular' member of a number opposeme is not marked, the form of the opposeme is, as a rule, determined by the form of the 'plural' morpheme, which, in its turn, depends upon the stem of the lexeme.
In the overwhelming majority of cases the form of the 'plural' morpheme is /-s/, /-z/, or /-z/, in spelling -(e)s, e. g, books, boys, matches.
With the stem ox- the form of the 'plural' morpheme is -en /-n/.
In the opposeme man—men the form of the 'plural' morpheme is the vowel change /æ > e/. In woman — women ii is /u > i/, in foot — feet it is /u — i:/, etc.
In child — children the form of the 'plural' morpheme is complicated. It consists of the vowel change /ai > i/ and the suffix -ren.
In sheep — sheep the 'plural' is not marked, thus coinciding in form with the 'singular'. They can be distinguished only by their combinability: ‘one sheep’, ‘five sheep’, ‘a sheep was ...’, ‘sheep were ...’, ‘this sheep’, ‘these sheep’. The 'plural' coincides in form with the 'singular' also in ‘deer, fish, carp, perch, trout, cod, salmon’, etc.0
All the 'plural' forms enumerated here are forms of the same morpheme. This can be proved, as we know , by the identity of the 'plural' meaning, and the complementary distribution of these forms, i.e. the fact that different forms are used with different stems.
As already mentioned 0 , with regard to the category of number English nouns fall into two subclasses: countables and uncountables. The former have number opposites, the latter have not. Uncountable nouns are again subdivided into those having no plural opposites and those having no singular opposites.
Nouns like milk, geometry, self-possession having no plural opposites are usually called by a Latin name — singularia tantum. Nouns like outskirts, clothes, goods having no singular opposites are known as pluralia tantum.
As a matter of fact, those nouns which have no number opposites are outside the grammatical category of number. But on the analogy of the bulk of English nouns they acquire oblique (or lexico-grammatical) meanings of number. Therefore singularia tantum are often treated as singulars and pluralia tantum as plurals.
This is justified both by their forms and by their combinability.
Cf. This (table, book, milk, love) is ...
These (tables, books, clothes, goods) are ...
When combinability and form contradict each other, combinability is decisive, which accounts for the fact that ‘police’ or ‘cattle’ are regarded as plurals, and ‘measles’, ‘mathematics as singulars.
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