THE SEMANTIC ASPECT OF SUBSTANTIVE-INFINITIVE PHRASES

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the syntax of the infinitive, a word form that, due to its origin, acquires ambiguous syntactic properties in a sentence. The author proves that in substantive-infinitive phrases, the infinitive fills in the necessary semantics of the main word, realizing the determinative meaning of the verb, as well as the object meaning of the dependent word. The infinitive can increase and enhance the attributive function due to the presence of other definitions in the noun and qualitative determinants in the infinitive. Phrases like C + inf. in some constructions may show similarities with syntactically non-free phrases. Attention is focused on the fact that there are certain analogies between the syntactic relations of components in a phrase and the syntactic functions of these components in a sentence. The internal possibilities of the phrase C + inf. are realized in context. In an utterance, the phrase C + inf. may exhibit a condensed predicativity in it – the result of its syntactic derivation.