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Class 4 words where in Fries’ classification adverbial
function of words and word-groups.
C. Fries tried to avoid even mentioning the usual term of
“parts of speech. This term is also avoided by this grammarian in
his classification of “functional parts of speech”, which are allotted
to 15 different groups and include also some pronouns, adverbs
and verbs.
A typologically more relevant classification has been
suggested for English notionals by C.T. Hocket who distinguishes
in English “parts of speech” and “classes of words”. Among the
notionals three pure “classes of words” (or regular parts of speech)
are distinguished: “Class N words”; “class V words” and “class A
words”. These “classes” are mainly singled out with regard to the
morphological properties of these notionals. They may follow
either the noun or the verb and an adjective pattern. Their true
lexico-grammatical nature, i.e. their proper lexical meaning and
consequently their formal and functional characteristics cannot be
discriminated when taken out of a word-group or sentence, e.g. the
word “export”, may be noun or verb (when indicated by stress
determined by the particle “to”);
“Blue” may be noun (the blue of the sky), adjective (the blue sky)
or verb (to blue something).
In Ukrainian, on the other hand, the lexical meaning and
“formal” (morphological) characteristics of such notional words as
експорт, сине, синій, синіти are always explicitly displayed
already at language level, i.e. when taken separately, out of context
(as in dictionaries). Therefore, many notionals in English, unlike
their lexico-grammatical equivalents in Ukrainian, are variable, i.e.
they may change their nature depending on the contextual
environment.
The variability of some English notionals which can often
shift from one part of speech to another without any morphological
changes in their form/structure is certainly the main allomorphic

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