A Modality-oriented Research On Counterfactuals In Mandarin Chinese

This dissertation is focused on the issues of counterfactual in Mandarin Chinese.Except for the counterfactual category in Mandarin Chinese,more attention is concentrated on the imbalanced performance of the semantic system of modal verbs which has a close relationship with counterfactual semantic in the typical counterfactual sentences.We try to summarize its regularity and use theories on mental space and ICM of cognitive linguistics to probe into the reason behind the phenomena.Generally,the appearance of epistemic modality is more common while the usage of the deontic modality is most limited in counterfactual semantic realm.In addition,different counterfactual markers have effect on the readings of counterfactual semantic and the intensity of counterfactual semantic.Epistemic modality most likely co-occur with counterfactual semantic which could not be easily erased on account of the higher counterfactual semantic intensity while the counterfactual semantic which made of the deontic modality and the dynamic modality has lower intensity so that it might be erased by grammatical devices.Furthermore,the epistemic modality could affect the readings of counterfactual semantic because of their differences on possibilities.The dissertation includes seven chapters.In chapter one,the introduction consists of the research objects,the significance of the research,the background of related theories,the range of argument and the explanation of the corpora's origin.After discussing related research on the counterfactual,establishing the counterfactual category and confirming its typical member,chapter two also illustrate modal verb semantic system in the counterfactual sentences.After retrospecting the issues on counterfactual from the perspectives of logic,philosophy,psychology,this chapter focuses on the study of counterfactual in western linguistics and in Mandarin Chinese and points out the achievements and problems so that to have a basic knowledge of the counterfactual.What is more,the counterfactual semantic system is determined as a category and its status in irrealis.The essay affirms the counterfactual category is subordinate of the irrealis category and all the counterfactual sentences are irrealis-Besides,the counterfactual sentences,which are typical member of irrealis sentences,are located on the irrealis side in realis-irrealis continuum.For the sake of explaining the essence of the counterfactual category clearly,this chapter also discusses a group of concepts,such as "subjunctive","counter-expectation","presupposition" and"negation".The last part of this chapter is about the modality and the modal verb semantic system in the counterfactual category which mainly introduce the achievements of Peng Lizhen(2007).The modal verb category is classified of three parts:epistemic modality,dynamic modality and deontic modality.Chapter three illustrates the typical syntactic forms of counterfactual category in Mandarin Chinese,which are counterfactual conditionals,counterfactual sentences consist of counter-factual verbs and counterfactual sentences made of counter-factive adverbs.After discussing the concepts and classification of counterfactual conditionals,the essay affirms the counterfactual semantic of "Yaobushi".Then we try to distinguish the semantic of non-counterfactual verb " yiwei1" and counter-factual verb " yiwei2 "and discuss the counterfactual semantic of "yiwei2" in the counterfactual sentences consist of counter-factual verbs.In addition,by a diachronic and synchronic research,the counterfactual semantic of "benlai" is identificated.Chapter four,chapter five and chapter six analyze the different modality type readings of modal verbs in counterfactual sentences respectively and mental space buildings is utilized to probe into the reason behind this phenomena.Chapter seven is the conclusion,which summarizes the major points of this thesis,and points out some topics deserved to be discussed further.