 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
112
Thus, the sentence is characterized by its specific category of predication which establishes the relation of
the named phenomena to actual life. The general semantic category of modality is also defined by linguists as
exposing the connection between the named objects and surrounding reality. However, modality, as different
from predication, is not specifically confined to the sentence; this is a broader category revealed both in the
grammatical elements of language and its lexical, purely nominative elements. In this sense, every word
expressing a definite correlation between the named substance and objective reality should be recognized as
modal. Here belong such lexemes of full notional standing as "probability", "desirability", "necessity" and the
like, together with all the deriva-tionally relevant words making up the corresponding series of the lexical
paradigm of nomination; here belong semi-functional words and phrases of probability and existential
evaluation, such as perhaps, may be, by all means, etc.; here belong, further, word-particles of specifying
modal semantics, such as just, even, would-be, etc.; here belong, finally, modal verbs expressing a broad range
of modal meanings which are actually turned into elements of predicative semantics in concrete, contextually-
bound utterances.
As for predication proper, it embodies not any kind of modality, but only syntactic modality as the
fundamental distinguishing feature of the sentence. It is the feature of predication, fully and explicitly expressed
by a contextually relevant grammatical complex, that identifies the sentence as opposed to any other
combination of words having a situational referent.
The centre of predication in a sentence of verbal type (which is the predominant type of sentence-structure
in English) is a finite verb. The finite verb expresses essential predicative meanings by its categorial forms, first
of all, the categories of tense and mood (the category of person, as we have seen before, reflects the correspond-
ing category of the subject). However, proceeding from the principles of sentence analysis worked out in the
Russian school of theoretical syntax, in particular, in the classical treatises of V.V. Vinogradov, we insist that
predication is effected not only by the forms of the finite verb connecting it with the subject, but also by all the
other forms and elements of the sentence establishing the connection between the named objects and reality,
including such means of expression as intonation, word order, different functional words. Besides the purely
verbal categories, in the predicative semantics are included such syntactic sentence meanings as purposes of
communication (declaration - interrogation - inducement), modal probability, affirmation and negation, and
others, which, taken together, provide for the sentence to be identified as a unit forming its own, proposemic
level of lingual hierarchy.
§ 2. From what has been said about the category of predication, we see quite clearly that the general
semantic content of the sentence is not at all reduced to predicative meanings only. Indeed, in order to establish
the connection between some substance and reality, it is first necessary to name the substance ifself. This latter
task is effected in the sentence with the help of its nominative means. Hence, the sentence as a lingual unit
performs not one, but two essential signemic (meaningful) functions: first, substance-naming, or nominative
finction; second, reality-evaluating, or predicative function.
The terminological definition of the sentence as a predicative unit gives prominence to the main feature
distinguishing the sentence from the word among the meaningful lingual units (signemes). However, since
every predication is effected upon a certain nomination as its material semantic base, we gain a more profound
insight into the difference between the sentence and the word by pointing out the two-aspective meaningful
nature of the sentence. The semantics of the sentence presents a unity of its nominative and predicative aspects,
while the semantics of the word, in this sense, is monoaspec-tive.
Some linguists do not accept the definition of the sentence through predication, considering it to contain
tautology, since, allegedly, it equates the sentence with predication ("the sentence is predication, predication is
the sentence"). However, the identification of the two aspects of the sentence pointed out above shows that this
negative attitude cannot be accepted as justified; the real content of the predicative interpretation of the
sentence has nothing to do with definitions of the "vicious circle" type. In point of fact, as follows from the
given exposition of predication, predicative meanings do not exhaust the semantics of the sentence; on the
contrary, they presuppose the presence in the sentence of meanings of quite another nature, which form its
deeper nominative basis. Predicative functions work upon this deep nominative basis, and as a result the actual
utterance-sentence is finally produced.
On the other hand, we must also note a profound difference between the nominative function of the
sentence and the nominative function of the word. The nominative meaning of the syntagmatically complete
average sentence (an ordinary proposemic nomination) reflects a processual situation or event that includes a
certain process (actional or statal) as its dynamic centre, the agent of the process, the objects of the process, and
also the various conditions and circumstances of the realization of the process. This content of the proposemic
event, as is known from school grammar, forms the basis of the traditional syntactic division of the sentence