Substantivization as a Manifestation of the Prototypical Nature of the Part-of-Speech System

Abstract

One of the most important achievements of cognitive grammar is the prototypical method. It can be effectively used in describing the English system of parts of speech which contains a lot of words combining characteristic traits of two or even more parts of speech and thus making intermediary zones. An example of the kind is presented by substantivized adjectives displaying some features of nouns which are revealed in their meaning, combinability and syntactic functions. At the same time they preserve some features of the adjective. Due to their dual nature substantivized adjectives are to be found in the intermediary zone between nouns and adjectives. Other parts of speech can also be substantivized acquiring some typical properties of the noun