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Russian -ost' Nominalization Database
A lexicographic dataset of Russian deadjectival nominalizations in -ost' (/-ость/), classified according to Kurylowicz's distinction between syntactic and lexical derivation. The data are drawn from an exhaustive survey of the Shvedova dictionary (2011) conducted as part of a doctoral dissertation (2024).
Dataset Description
The dataset covers all adjectival entries in the reference dictionary and records whether each adjective yields a deadjectival noun in -ost', and if so, what type of derivation that noun represents. The core theoretical distinction follows Kurylowicz (1936): syntactic derivation preserves the predicative content of the adjectival base and performs a pure category shift (Adj → N), while lexical derivation involves semantic drift to the point where the noun no longer transparently encodes its adjectival source.
A third category, syntactic+lexical (hybrid), captures nominals that retain the syntactic reading as their primary sense (sense 1: см. [adjective]) while simultaneously developing one or more independent lexical senses — referring to concrete entities such as persons, actions, speech acts, spatial locations, or abstract situations. These 175 hybrid nominals are the primary research focus, as they exemplify the transition from propositional transposition to referential reification.
Source
Dictionary: Толковый словарь русского языка с включением сведений о происхождении слов / РАН. Институт русского языка им. В.В. Виноградова. Отв. ред. Н.Ю. Шведова. — М., 2011.
Scope of survey: 6,244 adjectival entries.
Doctoral dissertation: Zhang, Shuchun. Nominalizatsiya ad"yektivov v sovremennom russkom yazyke [Nominalization of Adjectives in Contemporary Russian]. Lomonosov Moscow State University, 2024.
Files
| File | Description |
|---|---|
ost_nominalization.xlsx |
Main dataset (Excel, three sheets) |
Sheets
Master — Full list of all -ost' nominalizations identified in the survey (3,465 entries).
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
ID |
Unique numeric identifier |
Noun (-ost') |
The nominalized form (uppercase) |
Adj base |
The adjectival base as listed in the dictionary (lowercase); empty for purely lexical derivatives where no adjectival entry is cross-referenced |
Derivation type |
Classification: syntactic, lexical, or syntactic+lexical |
Summary — Aggregate statistics: derivation type counts, proportion of nominalizing adjectives, and breakdown of semantic types attested in the hybrid set.
Hybrid_175 — Expanded records for the 175 syntactic+lexical nominals, including the number of extra lexical senses, their semantic classification, and the full dictionary entry.
Derivation Type Counts
| Type | Count | % of total |
|---|---|---|
| Syntactic only | 3,120 | 90.0% |
| Lexical only | 170 | 4.9% |
| Syntactic+lexical (hybrid) | 175 | 5.1% |
| Total | 3,465 |
Of the 6,244 adjectival entries surveyed, 3,390 (54.3%) yield at least one -ost' derivative. Among qualifying adjectives (excluding relative adjectives, which do not typically form abstract nouns), the nominalization rate exceeds 60%. Within this domain, -ost' accounts for 97.05% of syntactic derivatives, confirming its status as the default transposition operator for adjectival properties in contemporary Russian.
Theoretical Background
The classification follows the framework of Kurylowicz (1936), who distinguished derivation from a part of speech (lexical derivation) from derivation from a predicate (syntactic derivation). On this view, syntactic derivatives summarize an underlying proposition by nominalizing its predicate, and abstract nouns in -ost' are the canonical instance of this operation in Russian.
The hybrid category is theoretically significant: it represents cases where a single morphological form supports both a transparent propositional reading and one or more independent referential readings. This polysemy is not accidental but reflects the capacity of -ost' to function simultaneously as a transposition operator (mapping a property onto a nominal correlate of type e) and as a vehicle for referential reification — the process by which a contestable evaluation is packaged as a presupposed ontological entity in discourse.
The semantic types attested in the lexical senses of the hybrid nominals include: actions and behaviours (поступок, поведение), speech acts (выражение, высказывание), persons (человек, лицо), events and occurrences (явление, обстоятельство), spatial locations (место, поверхность), feelings and psychological states (чувство, состояние), concrete objects and substances (предмет, вещество), degrees and measures (степень, наличие), and life stages (возраст, период).
Intended Uses
- Morphological and lexicographic research on Russian nominalization
- Formal-semantic analysis of type-shifting and presupposition in deadjectival nouns
- Corpus-based studies of the syntactic behaviour of -ost' nominals (e.g. distribution of genitive dependents vs. independent referential use)
- Computational probing of semantic drift in derivational morphology
Citation
If you use this dataset, please cite the source dictionary and the doctoral dissertation:
Шведова Н.Ю. (отв. ред.) Толковый словарь русского языка с включением сведений
о происхождении слов. РАН, Институт русского языка им. В.В. Виноградова. М., 2011.
Zhang, Shuchun. Nominalizatsiya ad"yektivov v sovremennom russkom yazyke
[Nominalization of Adjectives in Contemporary Russian]. Lomonosov Moscow State University, 2024.
License
The classification and annotations are original research. The dictionary definitions reproduced in the Hybrid_175 sheet are excerpts from the Shvedova (2011) dictionary for scholarly reference purposes.
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