SEMANTIC, STRUCTURAL, AND EXPRESSIVE-STYLISTIC APPROACHES TO CLASSIFYING PHRASEOLOGICAL UNITS

INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 39 SEMANTIC, STRUCTURAL, AND EXPRESSIVE-STYLISTIC APPROACHES TO CLASSIFYING PHRASEOLOGICAL UNITS Sh.Sh. Bakhodirova Navoi State University 4th-year bachelor’s student of the Foreign Language and Literature (English) programme Scientific supervisor: Yu. K. Khontorayeva, Assistant Lecturer, Department of English Linguistics, Faculty of Languages, Navoi State University https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17785836 Abstract. This article examines phraseological units from three main perspectives: their semantic features, structural organization, and expressive-stylistic functions. These units arise from various linguistic processes that shape their formation. Phraseological expressions are defined as stable combinations of words whose components retain their direct, literal meanings. Many English proverbs and sayings fall into this category because they are used literally and do not convey figurative or allegorical meanings. The focus of the article is the semantic and structural characteristics of phraseological units that relate to the concept of human intellect. The work also analyzes the notion of a “phraseological unit,” outlines its essential features, and reviews existing approaches to classifying such units. Key words: phraseologisms, archaism, phraseological unity, semantic classification, structural, stylistic, syntactic functions, expressiveness, idiomatic meaning, historicism. Annotatsiya. Ushbu maqolada frazeologik birliklar uch asosiy nuqtai nazardan ko‘rib chiqiladi: ularning semantik xususiyatlari, struktur tuzilishi hamda ifodaviy-stilistik funksiyalari. Bunday birliklar ularning shakllanishini ta’minlovchi turli til hodisalari natijasida yuzaga keladi. Frazeologik ifodalar tarkibiy qismlari o‘z to‘g‘ridan-to‘g‘ri, lug‘aviy ma’nosini saqlab qolgan turg‘un so‘z birikmalari sifatida talqin etiladi. Ko‘plab ingliz maqollari va matallari ham ushbu turkumga kiradi, chunki ular bevosita, ko‘chma yoki majoziy ma’no yuklamagan holda ishlatiladi. Maqolaning asosiy e’tibori inson aqliy salohiyati konsepsiyasi bilan bog‘liq bo‘lgan frazeologik birliklarning semantik va struktur xususiyatlarini yoritishga qaratilgan. Shuningdek, ishda “frazeologik birlik” tushunchasining mazmuni ochib beriladi, uning asosiy belgilari sanab o‘tiladi va frazeologik birliklarni tasniflashga doir mavjud yondashuvlar tahlil qilinadi. Kalit so‘zlar: frazeologizmlar, arxaizm, frazeologik birlik, semantik tasnif, struktur, stilistik, sintaktik funksiyalar, ifodalilik, idiomatik ma’no, tarixiylik. Аннотация. В данной статье фразеологические единицы рассматриваются с трёх основных точек зрения: их семантических особенностей, структурной организации и экспрессивно-стилистических функций. Эти единицы возникают в результате различных языковых процессов, определяющих их формирование. Фразеологические выражения понимаются как устойчивые сочетания слов, компоненты которых сохраняют свои прямые, буквальные значения. Многие английские пословицы и поговорки относятся к этому типу, поскольку употребляются в прямом смысле и не несут переносного или аллегорического значения. Основное внимание в статье уделяется семантическим и структурным характеристикам фразеологических единиц, связанных с концептом человеческого интеллекта. Кроме того, рассматривается само понятие INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 40 «фразеологическая единица», выделяются её основные признаки и анализируются существующие подходы к классификации таких единиц. Ключевые слова: фразеологизмы, архаизм, фразеологическое единство, семантическая классификация, структурные, стилистические, синтаксические функции, экспрессивность, идиоматическое значение, историзм. INTRODUCTION Phraseologisms represent a unique layer of the language that reflects a nation’s cultural identity. They indirectly convey a people’s worldview, social structure, and the ideology of their historical period. The phraseological richness of any language is part of its collective national linguistic consciousness. Most phraseological units cannot be translated literally because each nation embeds in them its own cultural traits and traditional figurative patterns of speech. The use of phraseological units gives language expressiveness and a distinctive national character that differentiates languages with long-standing written traditions as well as newly formed literary languages.The English language is particularly abundant in phraseological units. Its phraseological system reflects the extensive historical experience of its speakers and embodies their social and cultural life. When studying a foreign language, a learner simultaneously enters a new cultural world. MATERIALS AND METHODS Numerous approaches have been proposed for organizing and classifying phraseological units. Linguists have not yet agreed upon a unified classification system. This article reviews several well-known classification models for English phraseological units developed by different scholars. Semantic classification of phraseological units.The most recognized classification is that of Academician V. V. Vinogradov.[12,141] According to his framework, all phraseological units are categorized into three groups based on the degree of semantic cohesion among their components: phraseological fusions, phraseological unities, and phraseological combinations.It is widely accepted that phraseological units originate from free word combinations that gradually acquire figurative meanings. Over time, the original literal meanings become obscured or completely lost, and the expression becomes fixed. Vinogradov classifies phraseological units depending on how much the original lexical meanings have faded and how strongly the figurative meaning has developed. Accordingly, he distinguishes between phraseological fusions, phraseological unities, and phraseological combinations. The following analysis focuses on how these categories function in modern English[12,156]. Phraseological fusions. Phraseological fusions (often referred to as idioms) are completely indivisible, stable expressions whose overall meaning cannot be deduced from the meanings of their individual components. Examples include: kick the bucket – to die; send someone to Coventry – to boycott someone or stop communicating with them; be at someone’s beck and call – to be ready to serve someone at any moment; it’s raining cats and dogs – it is raining very heavily; be all thumbs – to be clumsy; Kilkenny cats – deadly enemies; at bay – in a desperate or trapped position. Phraseological fusions originate from figurative meanings of their components, but in many cases these figurative associations have become unclear to speakers of the modern language. Their imagery can be understood only through historical analysis. For example, the words bay (“a dead end”) and beck (“a gesture of the hand”) are archaisms and are no longer INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 41 used outside the phrase at someone’s beck and call. The idiom be all thumbs derives from the older expression one’s fingers are all thumbs. Similarly, the phrase Kilkenny cats is believed to come from a legend describing a fierce conflict between the towns of Kilkenny and Irishtown in the 17th century, which brought destruction to both. The expression send someone to Coventry originates from Clarendon’s The History of the Great Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, where he describes Coventry as a place used to imprison and socially isolate royalists during the English Revolution.[3,230] As a result, in phraseological adhesions the link between the literal and figurative meanings has disappeared, and the figurative meaning has become dominant. For this reason, phraseological splices are often difficult to render in other languages. These units display several distinctive features: 1.They may contain so-called necroticisms—lexical items that are not used anywhere outside the given expression and are no longer understood in modern language. 2.Their structure frequently includes archaic elements. 3.They function as syntactically indivisible units. 4.In most cases, the order of their components cannot be changed. 5.They are impermeable, meaning they do not allow the insertion of auxiliary words into their structure. When their independent lexical meaning disappears, the words that form a phraseological splice become elements of a single, complex lexical unit that corresponds in meaning to one specific word. Because of this, many phraseological splices function as synonyms for individual words— for example, kick the bucket meaning “to die,” or send someone to Coventry meaning “to ignore.” However, as noted in the section on the equivalence between phraseological units and words, these two—despite being similar in meaning—differ significantly from one another in stylistic terms. Phraseological unity. A phraseological unity is a stable word combination that possesses a single metaphorical meaning while still showing clear signs of semantic separateness among its components. Examples include: to spill the beans (“to reveal a secret”), to burn bridges (“to cut off one’s options”), to have other fish to fry (“to have more important things to attend to”), to throw dust into someone’s eyes (“to mislead”), to burn one’s fingers (“to suffer negative consequences”), to throw mud at someone (“to slander”), to be narrow in the shoulders (“to fail to understand jokes”), to paint the devil blacker than he is (“to exaggerate”), to put a spoke in someone’s wheel (“to hinder”), to hold one’s cards close to one’s chest (“to keep something secret”), to gild refined gold (“to try to improve something already good enough”), and to paint the lily (“to add unnecessary embellishment”). Phraseological unities share some imagery and metaphorical qualities with phraseological mergers, but they differ in a key way: unlike splices, whose figurative meaning is understandable only from a historical perspective, the figurative meaning of phraseological unities remains transparent to modern speakers.According to V. V. Vinogradov, expressiveness is a defining trait of phraseological unities. Their internal connections are logically motivated, and the metaphorical basis is easy to detect. To comprehend a phraseological unity, one must interpret its components figuratively. For instance, the meaning of the expression to make a mountain out of a molehill—that is, “to greatly exaggerate something” (literally, to turn a small molehill into a mountain)—becomes clear only when molehill is interpreted as “something INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 42 trivial” and mountain as “something large or significant.” None of the words within this phraseological unit are obscure to speakers of modern English. Distinctive features of phraseological unities include: 1.Strong expressiveness, which allows them to resemble existing metaphorical expressions (e.g., to throw dust into someone’s eyes, to be narrow in the shoulders, to burn one’s fingers, to burn bridges). 2.Preservation of the lexical meaning of individual components (e.g., to put a spoke in someone’s wheel). 3.Inability to replace their components with other words (e.g., to hold one’s cards close to one’s chest). 4.A pronounced emotional and expressive tone, which plays a crucial role (e.g., to throw dust into someone’s eyes, to paint the devil blacker than he is). 5.The capacity to form synonymic relations with both single words and other phraseological units (e.g., to gild refined gold = to paint the lily). Phraseological combinations. Phraseological combinations are stable expressions that contain words used both freely and with phraseologically bound meanings. Examples include: a bosom friend (“a close friend”), a pitched battle (“a fierce fight”), (to have) a narrow escape (“to escape danger by a small margin”), to frown one’s eyebrows (“to knit one’s brows”), Adam’s apple, a Sisyphus labor (“endless, fruitless work”), to rack one’s brains (“to think hard”), and to pay attention to someone (“to notice or focus on someone”). In contrast to phraseological mergers and phraseological unities, which function as single, indivisible semantic wholes, phraseological combinations display semantic transparency. Because their meaning can be broken down into the meanings of their components, they stand much closer to free word combinations. Characteristic features of phraseological combinations: 1.They allow variation of one component (e.g., a bosom friend ↔ a bosom buddy). 2.The key word in the combination can often be replaced with a synonym (e.g., a pitched battle → a fierce battle). 3.Additional descriptive elements may be inserted (e.g., he frowned his thick eyebrows). 4.The order of components may be changed (e.g., a Sisyphus labor ↔ Sisyphus labor). 5.One component can be freely used independently, while the other remains phraseologically bound (e.g., in a bosom friend, the word friend can be freely combined, but bosom in this sense cannot be applied to “enemy” or other nouns). The recognition of reproducibility as a defining feature of phraseological units enabled Professor N. M. Shansky to further develop academician V. V. Vinogradov’s classification. As a result, Shansky introduced a fourth category of phraseological units—the so-called phraseological expressions. [Shansky 1964: 24] Phraseological expressions Phraseological expressions are stable, ready-made phrases whose components all carry free, nominative meanings and remain semantically transparent. Their distinguishing feature is reproducibility: they function as fixed expressions with a stable lexical structure and straightforward meaning. Unlike other types of phraseological units, phraseological expressions consist of words used literally, without figurative or metaphorical interpretation. INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 43 This category includes many English proverbs and sayings that are applied in their direct, nonfigurative sense, such as: live and learn; better untaught than ill taught (“better to be uninstructed than wrongly instructed”); many men, many minds (“different people think differently”);easier said than done; nothing is impossible to a willing heart (“where there is determination, anything can be achieved”) Key Characteristics of Phraseological Expressions: 1.Literal meanings – no figurative or idiomatic interpretation is required. 2.Stability – the wording is usually fixed and not freely changed. 3.Reproducibility – used as ready-made phrases. 4.Semantic transparency – each component can be understood on its own. 5.Belong to proverbs, sayings, clichés, and set expressions. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Structural classification of phraseological units. N. M. Shansky identifies several typical structural patterns of phraseological units [9, 23]. 1. “Adjective + noun” In this group, the noun and adjective may carry equal semantic weight and jointly contribute to the overall meaning: smart Aleck (“know-it-all”), rara avis (“rare bird,” “white crow”), a clear head (“a bright or intelligent person”). In other cases, the noun functions as the main semantic element, while the adjective serves primarily as an expressive modifier: garden head, pea jester, Babylonian pandemonium, green longing. 2. “Noun + genitive noun” These combinations function like nouns in both meaning and syntax. The components are semantically equivalent: apple of discord, point of view, the palm of supremacy. 3. “Noun + prepositional noun” Phraseological units of this type correlate grammatically with nouns. Their dependent components remain unchanged, and additional elements may take various case forms. The order of components is fixed: struggle for life, running on the spot, it’s in the bag. 4. “Preposition + adjective + noun” These structures are equivalent to adverbs in meaning and syntactic behavior. All components are semantically significant, and their sequence is stable: in seventh heaven (“to be extremely happy”), from time immemorial. 5. “Prepositional case form of a noun + genitive noun” These formations may function adverbially or attributively. The arrangement of elements is strictly fixed: for all time (“throughout twenty-four hours”), to the innermost of one’s heart (“to the core”), in Adam’s birthday suit (“naked”), in the arms of Morpheus (“asleep”), worth one’s weight in gold. Phraseological units of the type “prepositional-case form of a noun + prepositional form of a noun” function as adverbs in terms of their lexical and grammatical meaning. They often repeat nouns tautologically, their components carry equal semantic weight, and the order of elements is INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 44 fixed. Examples include: from morning till night, from cover to cover, year after year, young and old alike. “Verb + noun”. Phraseologisms in this category are primarily verbal in nature and typically serve as predicates in a sentence. The sequence of components and their semantic relationship may vary. Examples: drive home (“to make something clear”), make a fool (“to behave foolishly”), act the fool, play the fool. “Verb + adverb”. These phraseological units also function as predicates. The elements are always semantically equivalent, and their order may be either direct or inverted. Examples include: see through someone (“to understand someone’s true intentions”), put one’s foot into it (“to make a blunder”), go to waste (“to be wasted”). “Verbal participle + noun”. Units of this structure act as adverbials in a sentence. The arrangement of components is fixed. Examples: with folded hands (“sitting idle”), slack one’s work (“neglect one’s duties”). “Constructions with coordinating conjunctions”. In these expressions, the components function as homogeneous parts of the sentence and belong to the same part of speech. Their order is constant. Examples: here and there, pell-mell (“randomly”), sighs and groans. “Constructions with subordinating conjunctions”. Such phraseological units express adverbial meaning and have a fixed word order, always beginning with a conjunction. Examples include: like a bolt from the blue (“suddenly”), as like as two peas in a pot (“exactly alike”), bare as a bone (“completely bare”). Phraseological units built on “constructions with the negation not” function either as verbal or adverbial expressions, depending on their lexical and grammatical roles. In a sentence, they typically serve as predicates or adverbial modifiers. Their components have equal semantic value, and the order of the elements is fixed. Examples include: be (down) in the dumps (“to feel uneasy or depressed”), not of this world (“completely detached from reality”). Expressive–Stylistic Classification of Phraseological UnitsN. M. Shansky also proposes a classification of phraseological units based on their expressive and stylistic characteristics. He distinguishes the following groups [9, 25]: …Interstyle phraseological units …Colloquial phraseological units …Book (literary) phraseological units …Archaisms and historicism. This stylistic categorization takes into account the emotional, evaluative, and expressive nuances that phraseological units acquire through their conventional use in specific communicative spheres. Many of these expressions are stylistically restricted and typically occur only within certain functional styles of the language. For example: to have mercy on someone and to let one’s soul go to repentance belong to colloquial speech; spring torrents (“spring floods”) and to go to one’s eternal rest (“to pass away”) are characteristic of bookish, literary style. Thus, phraseological units not only name events or phenomena of reality but also often convey the speaker’s attitude, such as irony, approval, disapproval, affection, rhetorical emphasis, and so on. Interstyle Phraseological Units.Interstyle (neutral) phraseological units are stable expressions widely used across all functional styles of the language—spoken, written, literary, and official. They carry no specific emotional, stylistic, or evaluative tone. These units are linguistically INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “INTEGRATION OF MODERN LINGUISTICS WITH SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND PRACTICE IN THE PROCESS OF GLOBALIZATION: NEW APPROACHES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND CHALLENGES”, DECEMBER 4, 2025 45 neutral and appropriate in almost any communicative situation. Examples include: from the bottom of one’s heart; to keep one’s word; secret vote / secret ballot;from time to time. Because of their neutrality and universal applicability, interstyle phraseological units constitute the most flexible and widely used group of set expressions. Conversational and Everyday Phraseological Units.Colloquial or everyday phraseological units are stable word combinations that occur mainly—or even exclusively—in spoken language. They are typically figurative and carry strong expressive coloration, which may be affectionate, insulting, ironic, contemptuous, playful, or emotionally charged in other ways. Examples include: to take the edge off one’s hunger – “to eat a little to satisfy hunger,” to freeze the worm, to play a dirty trick on someone – “to treat someone unfairly,” to put a pig on someone. These expressions are strongly tied to informal, everyday communication. Book (Literary) Phraseological Units.Bookish phraseological units are stable combinations used predominantly or solely in written, literary language. They are characterized not only by their domain of use but also by their elevated stylistic tone, which may be solemn, poetic, rhetorical, or formally expressive. Examples include:quirk of fate – “a twist of destiny,” split second – “in the blink of an eye.” [5, 28] These expressions tend to be associated with literature, journalism, official texts, and other forms of polished written communication. Phraseological Archaisms and Historicisms .Phraseological historicisms are expressions that have fallen out of active usage because the real-world phenomena they once referred to have disappeared. Examples: Dutch bargain – a bargain struck while drunk, Dutch courage – boldness induced by alcohol, Dutch treat – a situation in which everyone pays for themselves, in Dutch – to be in trouble, talk like a Dutch uncle – to scold or lecture someone. [8, 116] These units are no longer common because the cultural or historical contexts they describe are no longer relevant. Phraseological Archaisms. Phraseological archaisms are set expressions that have gone out of regular use because they were replaced by newer, more suitable words or phraseological units expressing the same concepts. Examples: at bay – “cornered, in a desperate situation,” be at someone’s beck and call – “to be always ready to serve someone,” run errands (modern equivalent). These expressions have become CONCLUSION In summary, the analysis allows us to draw several key conclusions regarding the interpretation of phraseological units in linguistics. A phraseological unit is understood as a semantically unified combination of words or a fixed expression that is not created spontaneously according to the regular rules of word selection and combination, but rather reproduced as a ready-made structure. Such units possess a stable semantic pattern and a specific lexical-grammatical composition. 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