"..." Sentences, Semantic And Pragmatic Analysis Of The Three Planes

Based on the theory of"the Three Planes of Grammar Study", this thesis discusses the"Shi……de"structure from syntactic, semantic and pragmatic aspects.Chapter One is a brief introduction generalizing the researching object, purpose, method and the corpus's source of the present study. It also explains why the"Three aspects"are employed in the study of this structure. Unlike most of the former researches done from the syntactic aspect, the current paper not only put forward a formal classification of the"Shi……de"structure but also provides more detailed discussion from the perspectives of semantic characteristics and pragmatic conditions.Chapter Two is a general review of former researches done in the past fifty years. Most of the researches are from the syntactic perspective: the classification of"Shi……de", the characteristics of"Shi"and"De", but the former researchers seldom focus their attentions on the semantic and pragmatic aspects.Chapter Three classifies the syntactic patterns of the"Shi……de"structure and distinguishes the"Shi……de"structure from those sentences which have"shi"and"de"but are not used in the way. The this paper gives further description and analysis of two kinds of structures:"(Shi)……(de)"and"(Shi)……de"before discussing the syntactic constraints in using them.Chapter four analyzes the two semantic characteristics of"Shi……de". One is explicit"(Shi)……(de)"structure,and the other is"(Shi)……de"structure with static meaning. The latter"(Shi)……de"has two special patterns:"NP1+(Shi)+(M)+VP+de+NP2"and"NP1+(Shi)+(M)+VP+NP2+de". The object behind"de"is a secondary focus.Chapter five discusses the pragmatic constrains in using the"Shi……de"structure. The paper proposes that this pattern can be used in the following four situations:(1) For pragmatic presupposition(2) When the object is the topic of the sentence, this pattern can be used to maintain the consistent topic to achieve coherence.(3) When zero reference is used, the application of this pattern can be used to maintain coherence.(4) This pattern can also be used to stress certain information.The context and the attitude of the speakers also influence the use of this pattern.Chapter Six is the conclusion part. It also points out the limitations of the present thesis and provides some suggestions for future research.