| Caused-motion construction is not only an important linguistic concept, but also a basic experience of human beings. Its appearance enriches the expression method of language, and enhances the expressing effect as well. Although abundant studies have been carried out for the caused-motion construction, there is still sufficient space for further investigation. Based on the previous studies, this thesis attempts to investigate caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese as a whole with the guidance of Construction Grammar, and analyze their common characteristics and dissimilarities.This thesis maintains that the fundamental definition of caused-motion construction is stated as that some entity (CAUSER) acts on another entity (CAUSEE) and the effect of the action causes the displacement of the causee along with some certain path appointed by the force. It consists of two events with the causing-effect relationship and the variation of caused-motion construction is limited to the variation of location. The Cognitive Linguistics based on empiricism believes that the formation of language structure experiences the following process: event structure, concept structure, semantic structure and syntactic structure. Caused-motion construction is associated with the basic event structure in which the causee undergoes the variation of displacement caused by the force from the action of the causer in our social life. The caused-motion concept structure is derived from the event structure through human cognition. The need for expression impels the concept structure into the semantic structure with the central meaning of"the force directly causes the causee to move". The expanded meanings of caused-motion construction can be divided into the meanings with the semantic features of [+entail], [+enable], [+prevention] and [+help]. Due to the common cognition of human being, the caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese are similar in the three aspects above. This thesis attempts to further demonstrate the component elements of the caused-motion construction in terms of semantic restrictions, including the causer, the causee, the force and the path. The differences are mainly reflected in syntactic structures of caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese. English is comparatively simple in structure, i.e."[SUBJ [V OBJ OBLPP]]", while in Chinese the syntactic feature is more complex. The most typical structure in Chinese is ba-sentence represented by the formula"[SUBJ [OBJBaNP V OBLDP]]". Another structure of Chinese caused-motion construction is similar to English, i.e. "[SUBJ [V OBJ OBLDP]]". The appropriate expression forms are selected according to the semantic requirements in Chinese. The dissimilarities between caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese also lie in the cognitive decision of causee and the expression of path information. This thesis attempts to investigate the underlying mechanism of the dissimilarities under the framework of Construction Grammar.Therefore, as the basic experience of human being, the caused-motion construction appears in both English and Chinese. Due to the similarities of human cognition, the caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese are similar in event structure, concept structure and semantic structure. However, the dissimilarities still exist because of the formation mechanism of language which is limited by environment and history development. The thesis aims to analyze comprehensively the semantic and syntactic features of the caused-motion constructions in English and Chinese and further investigate the common features and dissimilarities of the two languages. |
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