Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-9prln Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-07T10:06:44.674Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Grammatical Function and Russian Stress

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Dean S. Worth
Dean S. Worth*
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Russian stress alternations are usually considered capricious and unrelated to grammatical meanings, but this paper argues that that is true only on the phonemic level. An analysis of such alternations in terms of underlying morphophonemic entities and ordered rules makes it clear (1) that Russian stress shifts are clearly correlated with the grammatical categories of number and case, and (2) that all stress shifts in the Russian substantive can be described by a single alpha-switching rule with varying environmental conditions. By listing the unmarked singular stem in the lexicon, generating the plural stem therefrom, and then generating the several case forms within each number stem, one obtains a simplification of the stress-shift rules and a generalization of their applicability. It is thus shown that a number of Russian words heretofore considered exceptional can all be covered as members of a single class.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 44 , Issue 4 , December 1968 , pp. 784 - 791
Copyright
Copyright © 1968 by Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

AN SSSR. 1953. Grammatika russkogo jazyka. Vol. 1: Fonetika, morfologija. Moscow. (2d ed., 1960.)Google Scholar
AN SSSR. 1961. Slovar' russkogo jazyka. 4 vols. Moscow.Google Scholar
AN SSSR. 1965. Slovar' sovremennogo russkogo literaturnogo jazyka. 17 vols. Moscow.Google Scholar
D'urovič, L. 1964. Paradigmatika spisovnej ruštiny. Bratislava.Google Scholar
Garde, P. 1965. Pour une théorie de l'accentuation russe. Slavia 34.529–559. Prague.Google Scholar
Isačenko, A. V. 1962. Die russische Sprache der Gegenwart. Teil I: Formenlehre. Halle (Saale).Google Scholar
Jakobson, R. 1936. Beitrag zur allgemeinen Kasuslehre: Gesamtbedeutungen der russischen Kasus. Travaux du Cercle linguistique de Prague 6.240–288.Google Scholar
Jakobson, R. 1958. Morfologičeskie nabljudenija nad slavjanskim skloneniem (sostav russkix padežnyx form). American contributions to the Fourth International Congress of Slavists, 127–156. 's-Gravenhage.Google Scholar
Kuryłowicz, J. 1938. Struktura morfemu. Biuletyn Polskiego Towarzystwa Języko-znawczego 7.10–28.Google Scholar
Kuryłowicz, J. 1946. Sistema russkogo udarenija. Naukovi zapysky L'vivs'koho deržavnoho uni-versytetu 3 (serija filolohična, 2), 75–84. L'viv.Google Scholar
Lunt, Horace G. 1963. On the study of Slavonic accentuation. Word 19.82–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ožegov, S. I. 1949. Slovar' russkogo jazyka. Moscow. (Later editions: 1952, 1953, 1960.)Google Scholar
Ožegov, S. I., and Šapiro, A. B.. 1959. Orfografičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka. 4th ed. Moscow.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1962. Sistema udarenija suffiksal'nyx polnyx prilagatel'nyx v sovre-mennom russkom jazyke. Učenye zapiski Instituta Slavjanovedenija AN SSSR 23.204–211. Moscow.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1963. K udareniju imen prilagatel'nyx s suffiksom -n-. Slavjanskaja Filologija 5.69–84. Moscow.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1964. K akcentologičeskomu zakonu Xartmana. Kratkie soobščenija Instituta Slavjanovedenija 41.55–69. Moscow.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1965. O ponjatii produktivnosti v akcentologii. Russkij Jazyk v Nacional'noj Škole, 1965:2.6–12.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1966. Akcentologija. Osnovy postroenija grammatiki sovremennogo russkogo literaturnogo jazyka, 19–49. Moscow.Google Scholar
Red'kin, V. A. 1967. O variantnosti akcentnyx edinic v formax sklonenija russkogo jazyka. Česko-slovenská Rusistika 12.94–99. Prague.Google Scholar
Shevelov, G. Y. 1963. Speaking of Russian stress. Word 19.67–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stankiewicz, E. 1966. Slavic morphophonemics in its typological and diachronic aspects. Current trends in linguistics, 3: Theoretical foundations, ed. by Sebeok, T. A., 495–520. The Hague.Google Scholar
Trubetzkoy, N. S. 1934. Das morphonologische System der russische Sprache. (Travaux du Cercle linguistique de Prague, 5, part 2.) Prague.Google Scholar
Unbegaun, B. O. 1957. Russian grammar. Oxford.Google Scholar
Ušakov, D. N., et al. 1940. Tolkovyj slovar' russkogo jazyka. 4 vols. Moscow.Google Scholar
Worth, D. S. 1968. Discussion of Stankiewicz 1966. Current Anthropology 9.155–160.Google Scholar
Zaliznjak, A. 1963. Udarenie v sovremennom russkom slovoizmenenii. Russkij Jazyk v Nacional'noj Škole, 1963:2.7–23.Google Scholar
Zaliznjak, A. 1964. ‘Uslovnoe udarenie’ v russkom slovoizmenenii. Voprosy Jazykoznanija, 1964: 1.14–29.Google Scholar