The Transitivity Analysis Of The Evolution Of "Ji" And "Da" From The Old Chinese To The Middle Chinese

In the era of Middle Chinese,the verb "da" emerged as the replacement of the verb "ji"and "da" actually generated from "ji da",a connotation of "ji".This thesis,based on the theory and methodology of transitivity proposed by Hopper&Thompson(1980),aims to conduct a dynamic analysis of the transitivity features of both "ji",a verb from the Old Chinese and "da",a verb from the Middle Chinese.This thesis studies the usage of "ji" and "da" in five Chinese literatures and Chinese sutras in detail.And all the language data are from either the era of Old Chinese or the era of Middle Chinese.The thesis,first of all,studies the usage of the subjects and the objects of sentences with a "ji" or a "da" and with typical structures,describing the expressing methods of the subjects and objects and individuation.Moreover,the thesis divides those sentences with atypical structures into seven sorts and then analyzes the relevance between the seven sorts of sentences and transitivity.In the end,the thesis studies the sentences with a "ji",studying the transitivity features like aspect,mode,volitionality,affirmation and so on.The results of the study are concluded as follows:1)From the era of Old Chinese to the era of Middle Chinese,except affirmation,all the other nine transitivity features become insignificant in sentences with a "ji".2)For the then-emerging verb "da" in the period of Middle Chinese,high transitivity is presented in features like kinesis,punctuality and affectedness of object,which can be regarded as impetus for its replacement of "ji".And low transitivity is observed with respect to the features like the number of participants,aspect,volitionality,agency,mode and the individuation of object,which guarantees its replacement of the existed verb "ji".3)As for affirmation,that of "ji" becomes more significant from the era of Old Chinese to the era of Middle Chinese,and that of "da" in the Middle Chinese is also quite salient.The above conclusions,however,are contradictory to the test results of other features.4)According to the frequency of usage of "ji" and stylistic features,transitivity of sentences with a "ji" weakens from the era of Old Chinese to the era of Middle Chinese.5)Conducting a dynamic analysis of the replacement and evolvement of the commonly-used verbs of the Middle Chinese based on the transitivity hypothesis and relevant transitivity features is feasible.