On distinguishing between the categories of finiteness and predicativity

The article analyzes approaches to defining the categories of finiteness and predicativity as universal categories inherent in all natural languages, regardless of the morphosyntactic parameters of the languages. The following conclusions are drawn: 1) the categories of finiteness and predicativity, while typically expressed through verbs, are not verb-dependent and can be expressed through other linguistic means; 2) to study and define finiteness, a comprehensive approach is necessary - one that should incorporate not only morphological and morphosyntactic criteria inherent in the European tradition, but also account for semantic and syntactic parameters; 3) the category of finiteness should be considered as a continuum (gradation, scale or range), while predicativity is not scalar and is an internal property of all sentence.