GRAMMATICAL VARIABILITY IN PRONOMINAL CONSTRUCTIONS: MNOGO KTO / CHTO VS. MNOGO KOGO / CHEGO

The pronominal constructions mnogo kto (‘many people’) / mnogo chto (‘many things’) / malo kto (‘few people’) / malo chto (‘few things’) are considered. These constructions do not have an unambiguous interpretation in linguistics. The paper discusses the alternation in the positions of subject and direct object: Nominative or Accusative mnogo (malo) kto, mnogo (malo) chto VS. Genitive mnogo (malo) kogo, mnogo (malo) chego: Mnogo chto izmenilos’ VS. Mnogo chego izmenilos’ (‘A lot has changed’). Possible reasons for using the Genitive in place of the Nominative / Accusative are formulated: the infl uence of grammatical rules (cf. infl uence of negation: On chitaet gazety (‘He reads newspapers’) VS. On ne chitaet gazet (‘He does not read newspapers’); the infl uence of the colloquial Genitive: Chego sluchilos’? (‘What happened?’); Chego prines? (‘What did you bring?’); the infl uence of the quantitative construction mnogo lyudej (‘many people’), malo vody (‘little water’), where the quantitative mnogo (malo) controls the Genitive.