Prepositions or Conjunctions: after, before, since, till, until

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Strany: 
51-60
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Kontakt: 
marketa.mala@ff.cuni.cz

Kapitoly v mluvnici:

Abstrakt: 

The topic of the present paper was suggested by an article by S. Greenbaum “Adverbial -ing Participle Constructions in English”, where the author, when describing the structure of adverbial non-finite subordinate clauses in English, mentions, apart from other means of expressing the adverbial function, also those non-finite clauses introduced by after, before, since, till, and until, saying that these conjunctions “...differ from other conjunctions that introduce non- finite clauses, e.g., while, though, when, in that they appear to have a distinct prepositional use ...they can take as object derived nominals (and other phrases with a noun as head) as well as gerundive nominals.. .” According to Greenbaum, ...if a derived nominal is substituted for the nonfinite construction” after these conjunctions, they are “traditionally recategorized as a preposition. {Since his refusal of the offer, John hasn’t been to see us.)”?
It might therefore be interesting to find out what makes after, before, since, till, and until conjunction-like, and which factors support the prepositional function.

Bibliografie: 

Daneš, F. “The Relation of Centre and Periphery as a Language Universal.” Travaux Linguistiques de Prague, 2 (1966), 9-22. s
Dušková, L., et al. Mluvnice současné angličtiny na pozadí češtiny (A Grammar of Contemporary English against the Background of Czech.) Prague: Academia, 1994.
Greenbaum, S. “Adverbial -ing Participle Constructions in English.” Anglia, 91 (1974), 1-10.
Kortmann, B. Free Adjuncts and Absolutes in English. London, 1991.
Quirk, R., et al. A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman, 1985.