Grammatical Classes of Words. Notional and Functional Words

Grammatical Classes of Words

The words of language are divided into grammatically relevant classes. Traditionally, they are called parts of speech. This term was introduced by ancient Greeks. Nowadays it cannot be taken as in any way defining or explanatory.

In modern linguistics, parts of speech are discriminated on the basis of the three criteria: semantic, formal, and functional.

The semantic criterion presupposes the evaluation of the generalized meaning, which is characteristic of all the subsets of words constituting a given part of speech. This meaning is understood as the categorial meaning of the part of speech.

The formal criterion shows the specific inflexional (form-building) and derivational (word-building) features of all the subsets of words of a given part of speech.

The functional criterion concerns the syntactic role of words in the sentence typical of a given part of speech.

The above-mentioned three factors are referred, to as, respectively, meaning, form, and function.

To illustrate the use of these criteria, let's take the adjective.

The Adjective:

1) the categorial meaning of property; 2) the forms of the degrees of comparison; the specific suffixal forms of derivation (-al, -ive, -ic, -y, -able, -ible, -ing, etc.); 3) adjectival functions in the sentence (attribute to a noun, predicative).

Notional and Functional Words

In accord with the described criteria, words are divided into notional and functional.

To the notional parts of speech belong the noun, the adjective, the verb, the adverb. All of them have the identifying properties which can be described within the triad "meaning - form - function".

The notional parts of speech are words of complete nominative meaning. They are characterized by self-dependent functions in the sentence.

Contrasted against the notional parts of speech are words of incomplete nominative meaning and non-self-dependent functions in the sentence. These are functional parts of speech.

To the basic functional sets of words in English belong the article, the preposition, the conjunction, the particle, the modal word, the interjection.

The article expresses the specific limitation of the substantive functions.

The preposition expresses the dependencies and interdependences of substantive referents.

The conjunction expresses connections of phenomena.

The interjection is a signal of emotions.

The modal word expresses the attitude of the speaker to the situation (fortunately, unfortunately, luckily, probably, perhaps, etc.)

The particle unites the functional words of specifying and limiting meaning (still, just, only, even, quite, etc.).

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