SEMANTIC RELATIONSHIPS OF OPPOSITENESS BETWEEN THE CONSTITUENTS OF ENGLISH ALTERNATIVE INTERROGATIVE STRUCTURES

Abstract

This article presents the qualitative and quantitative results from a corpusbased study of the semantic relationships of oppositeness between the constituents of English alternative interrogative structures (EAISs). The findings reveal that there exist four types of oppositeness – lexical, contextual, morphological, and negative. Statistics show that the largest group includes AISs whose constituents (or some of their components) are contextually contrasted, while the smallest comprises AISs whose constituents display morphological (temporal and voice) contrast.