Microsoft Word Theoretical Course of English Grammar

Nino Kirvalidze
3
aspect of language implies a human ability to create and understand an infinite set of new 
sentences in the process of human discourse. 
There is a difference between a person’s linguistic competence and his/her linguistic per-
formance. A person’s linguistic competence 
implies the knowledge which is necessary to 
produce sentences of a particular language, while the application of such knowledge in the 
process of human discourse determines his/her
linguistic performance. Speakers’ linguistic 
knowledge permits them to form sentences of any length by joining phrases and words together 
or adding modifiers to a noun or a verb. For the most part, linguistic knowledge is not a 
conscious knowledge. 
The linguistic system – the sounds, structures, meanings, words and rules 
for putting them all together – is learned subconsciously when language is acquired in child-
hood, while in adulthood it is learned with awareness, i.e. with great efforts.
Language is a system of signs. 
It can function as a means of cognition and communication 
due to the unity and interaction of its three constituent parts or subsystems
. These parts are the 
phonological system, the lexical system and the grammatical system. Without any of them 
there is no human language in the above sense. 
The
phonological system
determines the 
material (phonetical) appearance of its significative (i.e. meaningful) units. 
The lexical system
is 
the whole set of naming means of language, that is, the vocabulary of words and stable word-
groups. 
The grammatical system 
is the whole set of regularities, i.e. the set of rules (laws) 
determining the formation of utterances (i.e. actualized in speech sentences) in the process of 
discourse. Each of these three constituent parts of language is studied by a particular linguistic 
discipline. The sound system is studied by phonology, the vocabulary of words is studied by 
lexicology and the regulating rules of word and sentence formations are studied by grammar.
What is grammar? 
The word “grammar” derives from Greek and means “art of letters” 
(gramma = letter). 
The term “grammar” is used in two meanings. 
On the one hand
, in its wide 
sense, the term refers to the explicit theory constructed by the linguist to describe the speaker’s 
linguistic competence. 
On the other hand
, in its narrow sense, the term “grammar” refers to the 
study of morphology (i.e. the rules of word formation, parts of speech and their grammatical 
categories) and syntax (i.e. the rules of sentence formation), often complemented by phonolo-
gy, lexicology, semantics and pragmatics (Fromkin et al. 2003: 14). Our ability to speak and 

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Theoretical Course of English Grammar 
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