A study of infinitive structures in European languages

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Doklady Bashkirskogo Universiteta. 2024. Volume 9. No. 3. pp. 151-159.

Authors

Shafikov S. G.*
Ufa University of Science and Technology
32 Zaki Validi st., 450076 Ufa, Republic of Bashkortostan, Russia

Abstract

The article views a typology of infinitive structures in English, German, Russian, Polish, Spanish and French, which is highly significant for evolving linguistic typology and universals of language. The metalinguistic instrument for contrasting the basic infinitive structures is language etalon. Cross- linguistic coincidence with the structures of language etalon corresponds to one of the four types, such as universals, frequentals, marginals, unequals. The criterion of selecting linguistic representations to match the etalon is the prototype as the most characteristic way of expressing meaning in a concrete language. The hypothesis of the investigation consists of two indissolubly united parts:1) the structural type of language affects its capacity for employing infinitive, 2) employing infinitive results from the tendency to compress text. By way of affinity with the etalon, the contrasted languages may be arranged from left to right in the following order: English → French → Spanish → German → Russian → Polish.

Keywords

  • инфинитив
  • маргиналия
  • функция
  • универсалия
  • уникалия
  • фреквенталия
  • язык сравнения
  • язык-талон
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