GRADUAL MEANINGS EXPRESSED BY PRONOUNS IN THE BASHKIR LANGUAGE

Abstract

The article examines pronouns of the Bashkir language from the point of view of their expression of gradual meanings. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that for the first time in Bashkir linguistics pronouns are analyzed from the point of view of functional grammar, namely from the point of view of the category of graduality. It is stated that the role of pronouns in the expression of gradual meanings is quite large. As the analysis of linguistic facts gleaned from works of fiction and genres of journalism presented on the pages of the republican mass media has shown, the nature of the manifestation of the defined signs is more or less predominantly characteristic of interrogative, indicative, indefinite, determinative and negative pronouns. The strengthening of the expressed feature, for example, is mainly facilitated by the interrogative pronouns nindai, ҡaihlai ‘what’, nisek, ҡaihlai ‘how’, shundai ‘such’ and shulai ‘so, so.’ Gradation scales can also be represented by pronouns of various categories. This is most noticeable in the field of negative, indefinite and determinative pronouns, as well as within the category of demonstrative pronouns.