II. Distinguishing between types of word-groups

In dealing with classifications of word-groups, one has to bear in mind constantly, first, that each language has a system of its own, and, second, that — whatever criterion of classification we apply — the number of distinguishable types varies considerably from one language to another. I shall illustrate this by giving what I consider a fairly complete list of the main types existing in Chinese, Latin, and English. [...]

english.

The number of main types is about 14, and some of them can be sub-divided according to part of speech of the members.

a. coordinative group. Men, women, (and) children;...laughed, cried, shouted; red, white, and blue (flowers);...and / or...; before or after (the war).

b. non-coordinative group, non-predicative group.

1) Descriptive groups, so-called modified with modifier.

This category falls into several sub-types, first, according to the part-of speech of the modified, and second, according to the part of speech, or the part of speech and a certain morphological category of the modifier, e. g. the possessive of a noun (John’s house).

The head is

A noun: John the Baptist; red flowers; barking dogs; two flowers; these flowers; a flower; John's house; the above remark; flowers from Paris; the children who were ready; also I; even John

(Most of these groups can be made predicative by putting the adjunct after the noun, and setting it off by breaks: John, the Baptist, died; the dogs; barking furiously, (ran into the garden); the children, who were ready, (left). Such predicative groups are classified below under С. 2) b) ‘head with appositive’.

An adjective: very happy

A numeral: nearly seven

An adverb: very happily

A verb; the adjunct may be an adverb, walk carefully; a prepositional phrase, walk in the garden; a subordinate clause, walk, if you like.

2) Transitive verb with ‘resultative’ adjective (or equiv­alent noun), (he) painted (the door) green; take off (your coat); (they) made (him) president. (This group is usually a ‘split group’, the object being put between verb and adjective.)

3) Intransitive verb with ‘descriptive’ adjective, (he) left — angry; having left — angry, (he became ill); (he) came home — wet.

4) Connective groups

a) Coordinating conjunction with a word of any part of speech, (Mary) and — John; (Mary) or — John; neither — Mary (nor John).

b) Subordinating ‘conjunctive’:

1. Preposition with personal pronoun in the objective case (or equivalent noun, etc.), with him, with John.

2. Subordinating conjunction with clause, if — John went away.

5) Copulative verb (or equivalent) with complement: (He) was — ill; (she) was elected — president.

6) Verb with object (i. e. personal pronoun in the objective case, or equivalent), (I) saw — him.

(The equivalent of the verb may be ‘verb with object’. If so, its object is called ‘indirect object’, (I) gave him the book. Him is object of gave the book, and called ‘indirect’ object.

The equivalent of the object may be a group of a spe­cial type, ‘objective with verbal’, which is classified next, under 7), (I) saw him come down the stairs.)

7) Objective with verbal, (I saw) him — come down the stairs; (I saw) him — coming down the stairs. So-called ‘accusative with infinitive’.

8) Auxiliary verb with verbal (i. e. with infinitive, ed-form, or ing-form), (I) have — seen; (I) am — seeing; (I) shall — see, (I) will — see; (I) do — see, (I) didn’t — see. So-called ‘compound verbs’.

9) Clause with attitudinal adjunct; the adjunct is:

a) An adverb, he will probably come; fortunately, they were away at the time

b) A so-called conjunction, this, however, is a debatable point; the books were, of course, left in the library

c) A ‘final’, he will come, eh? you aren’t ready, are you?

c. predicative groups.

1) Independent, i. e. frequently used as the whole word-content of a sentence. We call it 'the clause'. One member is a personal pronoun in the subjective case (or equivalent: noun, etc.), the other member is a so-called ‘finite verb’, he — left, dogs — bark

2) Dependent, i. e., normally not used as the whole word-content of a sentence:

a) Subjective with verbal, so-called, ‘absolute construction’: he — being a bachelor, (his sister stayed with him); human nature — being what it is, (you couldn’t have expected anything else).

b) Head with appositive. The appositive is set off by breaks. It usually follows the head: the boy, angry, (left); John, the Baptist, (died); the children, who were ready, (left). (Cf. the angry boy; John the Baptist; the children who were ready (left).

The preceding lists were intended to show, first, how, at a first and preliminary stage of investigation and description, distinctions can be made between types of word-group within the same language, and, second, that the result is not the same for different languages. There is a noticeable difference in the types of groups, and in the number of groups. As to the last point, we stated that Chinese has four types, none of which present clearly distinguishable sub-types, whereas Latin has about sixteen, and English about fourteen main groups, some of which fall into a number of clearly distinguishable sub-types.

Consequently, the procedure applied so far was only a matter of preliminary distinction. The next question, i. e. the problem of the criteria applied, and the problem of classification, will be dealt with in the following chapter.