A Comparative Study On The N-V Conversion In Chinese And English

Conversion (zero-derivation) is a lexical derivation, in which the shift of word-classis accomplished without changes in form. The linguistic phenomenon has attractedthe attention of linguists since1920s. Conversion embodies the pragmatic principlesof efficiency and clarity. By comparison, the meanings of words after conversion arestill of similarity. With the deepening of human communication, conversion occurs athigh frequency. Especially the conversation between nouns and verbs takes a largepart of it. So the thesis chooses the N-V conversion as the objective.For a long time, the N-V conversion has been studied as a rhetorical phenomenon, orfrom the perspective of lexicology, about the pragmatic and rhetorical functions.Since1980s, with the development of cognitive linguistics, the cognitivecharacteristics of metonymy have been explored and it is the mappings of conceptfrom the source to the target, within the same domain. From the cognitive perspective,the mutual conversion between nouns and verbs is triggered by the metonymy with anaction ICM, which has been classified into seven subcategories under each category.As with the pervasive linguistic phenomenon, the N-V conversion is different invarious languages. This thesis conducts a comparative study on the N-V conversion inChinese and English. It is confirmed that the metonymic mechanism in conversionoperates under the influence of the linguistic, cultural and pragmatic rules of differentlanguages. The findings of this thesis will make enlightenment on the vocabularyteaching and help learners of both languages master conversion and efficient theircommunication.