Attach Great Importance To The Research Of Disciplinary Categories

Conlrastivc Linguislics is a brunch of linguistics which studies two or more languages synchronically and diachronically, with the aim of describing and explaining their similarities and differences and applying these findings to related areas of study. From the exploration of the history of contrast!ve study at home and abroad, we can sense that: (1) the most fruitful part of contrastive studies is the description of language data and the application of the findings. (2) In China, "contrast" has been regarded as a method to facilitate language research. Owing to the traditional academic view, there is no consciousness of discipline for a long time. (3) Around 1980s, scholars began to realize this problem. But theoretical researches on contraslive linguistics are far from enough. (4) Theoretical researches should be conducted on the definition, classification, key categories, etc. There are few researches on disciplinary categories in this field. So this thesis will present a tentative research of this kind.First of all, the thesis proposes that "similarity" and "difference" are the objects of studies in contrastive linguistics. If "similarity" and "difference" are defined as the objects of this research field, a commander is elicited which will cover all the studies on different language elements or units. The language units are taken as the layers or the levels on which "similarity" and "difference" manifest themselves. In this way, all kinds of contrastive studies can be united under the discipline of contrastive linguistics. Secondly, the thesis expounds the factors which will affect the judgement of "similarity" and "difference" in contraslive studies. They are: (1) objectively, the charatcristics of the entities; (2) socially, the frame of theories and the context; (3) cognitivcly, perspective model , cognitive factors;(4) personally, researcher's interest, ability and knowledge structure, etc. Thirdly, different from Krzeszowski's statement, this thesis proposes that the general process of conlrastive study is a process of assumption-testifying. Fourthly, this thesis adds new items to TC system based on Prof. Xu Yulong's system. They are: rhetoric devices, human cognition, cognitive category, mode of thinking, language mechanism, etc. And finally, this thesis proposes that the manifestation of "similarity" and "difference" can be a matter of degree and there can be conversion between them when the research parameters change.Owing to the lack of research materials, there are several problems unsolved. For example: What is the specific procedure in seeking similarity and difference? What is the standard to ascertain new TC items? What are the specific ways similarity and difference exist on different language levels? And this thesis is far from systematic which requires further studies in future.This thesis is designed to arouse more and more scholars' interest and attention to the researches on disciplinary categories and the construction of theoretical conlrastivc linguistics.