The Grammatical Study Of Reduplicated Words In Shijing

Shijing is a verse collection in early Qin Dynasty. Its language is the spoken language of Western Zhou. So it bears important significance for the study of Chinese in early Qin Dynasty. Since the Duke Mao in Han Dynasty, scholars from generation to generation have carried out research on the notes and commentaries of Shijing. And great achievements have been made in every aspect. Plenty of reduplicated words used in the verse collection are one salient characteristic in Shijing. Many scholars have made some comments. The systematical study merely focusing on the reduplicated words in Shijing has some disadvantages. As an important part in dissyllabic words in early Qin Dynasty, reduplicated words can from a profile reflect the evolution towards Chinese dissyllabic words in early Qin Dynasty. Most lines in Shijing contain four characters. The study of reduplicated words in Shijing can promote the understanding of Shijing. Based on the overview of linguistic research significance of Shijing and the present study situation, the grammatical study of reduplicated words in Shijing conducts research from the judgment of reduplicated word, semantic types, structural types and syntactical function. Reduplicated word is the term in scholium. Some scholars call it reiterative locution as well. There are 356 reduplicated words in Shijing. The reduplicated words are used 655 times. According to the standard of the combination of form and meaning, reduplicated word, first of all, is the reiteration of the same syllable. "Have"phrase which functions as reduplicated word cannot be called reduplicated word. The reiteration of verbs and the phrase of verb+ object are not reduplicated words. The reduplicated words in Shijing mainly consist of the two types: the imitation of form and the imitation of sound. In terms of semantics, reduplicated words have the characteristics of multiple morphemes expressing parasynonym, the same morpheme expressing multiple meanings and one morpheme expressing one meaning. Seen from the existence of structural relation, reduplicated word is divided into reiterative sound and reiteration. The former is single-morpheme word and there doesn't exist structural relation. The latter is compound word and the structural relation is reiteration. Reduplicated words of four letters include the three types: consecutive use of reduplicate word of reiterative sound, consecutive use of reduplicate word of reiterative sound and reduplicated word of reiteration and the consecutive use of reduplicated word of reiteration. 356 reduplications appear in 1. AACD form which appears in front of other words; 2. CDBB form which appears after other words; 3. AABB form which is characteristic of the consecutive use of A and B. Most reduplicated words are adjectives and a few are onomatopoeic, noun and interjections. The reduplicated words in Shijing can act as predicate, attribute, complement, adverbial modifier and subject.