The Lexicalization、Grammaticalization And Formation Of "I See"

The Lexicalization、Grammaticalization and Formation of "I See"Since1970s, the grammatical academy has begun interested in the research of discourse markers making of "Personal Pronouns+Sensory Verbs" such as "I/you say","I/you see","I think", etc. the lexicalization and grammaticalization of phrases such as "I see" has attracted many scholars. The academy has almost acknowledged the phrases such as "I see" being lexicalized as discourse markers. The process of grammaticalization is from notional to delexical, the same process as semantic bleach of the verb "see". However, the conclusion of my research is on the other side of the coin. The bleach of the subject-predicate phrases "I see" is different from that of notional verb. The most obvious difference is that the notional verb bleaches in syntax and grammar but the phrase bleaches in pragmatic. Even if the two processes look the same, their characteristics should be taken as the focus of research.The development of pragmatics, cognitive linguistics, functional linguistics, and the numerous internet resources of corpus and video data, provides us with a lot of means for the research of discourse function, evolvement process, and interactive subjectivity in communication of "I see". The theoretic basis of the thesis is the five-plane theory, three-area theory in cognitive linguistics, empathy theory, subjectivity and interactive subjectivity theory. The methods include the integration of diachronic analysis and synchronic analysis, semantic element analysis and frequency statistics. The aim is to explain the lexicalization and grammaticalization of "I see".The thesis is divided into three parts:The first part is the introduction, which aims at clarifying the object of the research, synthesizing previous research results, finding out the deficiency of previous researches. The thesis find out that the academy has ignored the empathic function of the strong subjective first person pronoun "I" in the "I see" structure, and wrongly identified it as the bleach of phrase. The reason is probably that the one-way principle of grammaticalization has affected the analysis.The second part is the analysis of the problem. This part includes two chapters explaining the lexicalization, grammaticalization and formation of "I see" structure.On the lexicalization, this part stands on the previous three-plane theory, emphasizing on the additional sound-plane and the text plane, so as to thoroughly analyze the lexicalization and discourse function of "I see" structure, and develop the mechanism of the process of lexicalization.On the grammaticalization, the problems reside in three aspects. The first is the evolution of the "I see" structure; the second is the reason of the evolution; and the third is the mechanism of the evolution. Firstly, we describe the evolution of "I see" structure from ancient to modern Chinese, and analyze its reason. We find out that "I" and "see" have influenced the evolution of the structure. So the text below discusses the grammaticalization of "see" and the role of "I" respectively. After that, we discuss the subjective empathetic function of "I" in the "I see" structure, an simulate the process by image. Finally, we analyze the mechanism of the grammaticalization of "I see" structure making use of "one-verb-centric theory", subjectivity and interactive subjectivity theory" and "usage frequency".On the formation, we use graphs to display its process.The third part is conclusion. This part presents the result of the research by the analysis of lexicalization, grammaticalization and formation."I see" has developed into discourse marker with the function to starting a topic, expressing the speaker’s attitude and cognition. The process of the grammaticalization of "I see" is the process of the amplification of its subjectivity."I" and "see" have both influenced the evolution of the structure."See" has evolved semantically from action verb representing vision to auxiliary verb representing attempt. The amplification of its subjectivity relies on the subjectivity of "I". The "anxiety" of the cognitive entity "I" transfers the vision in the objective world into the subjective world, even into the communication scene, which leads to the subjectivity and interactive subjectivity of the "I see" structure. The author tries to describe the empathetic process of "I" and the formation of "I see" by graphs."See" evolves semantically objectively and "I" evolves semantically subjectively. The two words have experienced a double process of grammaticalization and lexicalization.