Oppositional Reduction within the System of English Pronoun

Abstract

The article focuses on the English pronoun and its ability to substitute its counterpart by this or that opposition. In linguistics, this phenomenon is referred to as oppositional reduction or oppositional substitution. Oppositional reduction is well-research in the systems of noun and verb; however, it has but only cursory mentions in regard of the pronoun. It is this circumstance that encouraged the author to focus on the problem. Grounding his speculations by M. J. Blokh’s ideas, the author dwells on several language phenomena that promote reduction in the oppositions within the categories of number, gender, and case, as well as various oppositions of the English pronoun. The research objective was to structure the available information on the problem, as well as to identify varieties of oppositional reduction in the system of the English pronoun. The article contains historical reference, the main provisions of the fundamental theory, and the scientific experience in solving various issues of oppositional reduction. The author dwells on research material and methods, focusing on the contextual analysis. The paper classified oppositional reduction, illustrating each type by examples from written sources of various genres.