Филология

The functional status of a phrasal verb and its constituent component

Annotation. The article is devoted to the problems of determining the functional status of a phrasal verb and its constituent component. The article examines the views of different scientists on the problem.

Key words: phrasal verb, component, interpretation, status, postpositive.

One of the main problems of the English phrasal verbs is the problem of determining the status of their constituent components, as well as establishing the criteria for their selection.

The second component of a phrasal verb, depending on the nature of the verbal interpretation, is called postpositive, postverbal unit, postfix, adverbial postpositive element, relative, a part of the compound word, but the most common name is “particle”.

Different names of the second component are associated with attempts to identify and determine the role of this mobile unit in the phrasal verb. Thus, Yu. A. Zhluktenko gives the functional significance of morpheme to the particle [1, 45]. The history of the phrasal verbs of the English language begins in the XI century, when adverbs in sentences with the direct word order began to be used after the verb. The consolidation of such a position of adverbs was the basis for the formation of a verb with connected units, sometimes with idiomatic meaning. At the end of the XIV century, such idiomatic combinations led to the “homonymy of the semantic structure” [2, 78]. It was during this period that there was a sharp increase in the number of verbal combinations (67 cases in the XII century versus 853 cases in the XIV century) [2, 123]. The lexico-grammatical status of the second element of the combination also changes, thus creating “prerequisites for closer contacts of the adverb with the verb in the derivational aspect” [2, 145]. In the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, the spatial elements associated with a verb finally become postpositives [3, 56]. A distinctive feature of the modern English language is the tendency to the postverbal location of the spatial elements associated with a verb and the priority of borrowing (for example, “to get over” instead of “to recover”) [3, 57].

Postverbal units refer to “a special category of half words, semi-morphs ... that resemble suffixes”, “prepositional adverbs ... that behave like words”, “prefixes”, “postpositive prefixes”, “functional words”, “unconditional adverbs or adverbs coinciding in form and meaning with prepositions”, “functional words of a special kind”, “particles with prepositional or adverbial correlates”, “language elements that are homonymous to prefixes or prepositions” [4, 7; 5, 34].

A.V. Kunin calls combinations of verbs with particles “verbal combinations with postpositives”, and the second element, in his opinion, “occupies an intermediate position between the word and the morpheme ... and in no way enhances or clarifies the meaning of the verb, but turns it into a completely different verb” [6, 34].

The most detailed classification of phrasal verbs belongs to T. A. Bakhanskaya. The classification is based on the degree of conservation or change in the original meaning of the components. The first class of this classification is the verbal-adverbial combinations, which are characterized by the preservation of the original meaning of the verb and the original semantics of the second element. The general meaning of such formations is deduced as the sum of the original meanings of both components that have been fully preserved and have not undergone any semantic changes (to come in, to go out, to walk away, to fly off, etc.).

The second class consists of combinations, whose verbal component is subjected to certain semantic modifications, while the second element retains its content (to breeze in / out, to let in / out, etc.).

The third class consists of verbal-postpositive combinations, in which the adverbial-prepositional component undergoes semantic changes, and the verb retains its original meaning (to go up, to cry out, to walk on, to write out, etc.).

The combinations of the fourth class are characterized by the highest degree of change in the original meaning of the prepositional compound of the verbal form. The content of the second components in such combinations is so unclear that it is impossible to see a clear connection between their function and meaning - original, spatial, figurative, abstract: to drink up, to divide out, to hurry up.

The fifth class of verbal combinations includes those, in which both components have a figurative meaning, as a result of which the meaning of the whole complex changes (to find out = to learn).

The sixth class includes complexes characterized by the maximum degree of idiomatization. At the present stage, the meaning of such complexes turns out to be indeterminate through the meanings of their constituent parts (to look for = to seek).

There are also classifications based on the degree of idiomaticity of phrasal verbs (S. B. Berlizon), the degree of motivation and semantic stability (I. A. Yatskovich), etc.

The diversity and inconsistency of approaches to the problem of describing the language status of phrasal verbs are reflected in the choice of the linguistic material for research. Different scientists included different language units in the number of verbal semantic modifiers.

R. Quirk singles out the following as verbal semantic modifiers in English: abroad, about, above, across, after, against, along, apart, before, behind, below, in, in, in, inside, Near, off, on, opposite, over, past, round, since, to, under, up, within, without [7, 48].

A similar list is proposed by L. Alexander, who cites the following units: about, above, across, after, along, around, before, behind, below, beyond, by, down, in, inside, near, off, on, opposite, outside, over, past, round, under, underneath, up [7, 50].

A. Kennedy narrows the above lists, taking only 15 elements to study: about, across, around, at, by, down, for, in, off, on, out, over, to, up, with [7, 53].

I. E. Anichkov considers postpositives in the order of descending use: up, out, off, down, away, in, on, about, together, over, back, along, forward, round, forth, past, aside, across, by, to, apart, ahead, abroad, behind, under, after [7, 55].

Other linguists, on the contrary, narrow the range of the studied units.

N. N. Skomoroschenko excludes from the list of objects of study verbal complexes with the second element, which coincides with the adverbs “away, back”, according to which postpositive is a linguistic element, homonymous to the prefix or preposition: about, above, across, after, along, around, before, behind, between, by, down, in, off, on, out, over, round, through, under, up [7, 60].

I. V. Arnold distinguishes a number of simple verbs of the German origin, mostly monosyllabic, which can be combined with adverbial components: about, across, along, around, away, back, by, down, forth, in, off, on, out, over, round, past, through, to, under, up [7, 144].

Analysis of the available points of view on the features of the compatibility of verbs with postpositives shows that the main function of the studied elements is the indication of “the direction of movement” and “the location in space”. For a more adequate understanding of the reflection of objective actions and processes in connection with the ideas of motion in the form of verbs with postpositives, it seems necessary to turn to the extralinguistic reality to study and analyze the interpretation of the basic categories included in the notion of the verbal construction in the special literature.

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