Analysis On Pivotal Construction In Mandarin Chinese:Syntax-Semantics Interface

Since the Western grammar theory was introduced in Ma Shi Wen Tong in 1898,the mandarin Chinese research has developed from primary school research to Chinese and foreign fields.With the introduction and promotion of generative grammar over the last century,Chinese sentence structures have been constantly incorporated into the field of syntactic research,however linguists are continuously interested and argue about this phenomenon that breaks through the Western syntactic framework.The sentences,like “bei” sentences,“ba” sentences,non-subject sentences,topic sentences,etc,had been difficult to interpret in Western syntax until the end of the last century when cognitive grammar rose and combined syntax and semantics to create a new era of syntactic research,mandarin Chinese syntax got more and more attention and discussion.Pivotal Construction drew the attention in the academic fields at this stage.It is different from the English verb infinitive structure “NP1+VP+NP2+TO+VP2+NP3”,where the verb infinitive structure is the absolute structure,but the NP2 of Chinese Pivotal Construction has two identities.For example,in the sentence “Zhang San asks Li Si to go home”,“Li Si” is the object of “ask”,and also the “subject” of “go home”.Its semantic and syntactic status is subject to the syntactic function and semantic framework of other parts in the sentences.So,Pivotal Construction is complex because of not only the double identity,but also the syntactic and semantic relations between the syntactic elements in this pattern.Pivotal Construction in Mandarin Chinese research in the academic filed dates back to the 1930 s,experiencing from the surface form research as Ding Shusheng and Lu Shuxiang's “V-V-Construction”,“Recursive predicate”,etc,represent in the 1950 s and 1960 s,Zhang Jing and Song Yuzhu's “caused Construction” and “Pivotal Construction” functional research in the 1970 s and 1980 s,and to You Rujie and Yang Daran's deep syntactic semantic research in the 1990 s and early this century.Pivotal Construction research develops from the Surface form function research to the deep syntactic semantic research.These studies undoubtedly promote the scholars' understanding of Pivotal Construction,but the study does not stop,and with the imperfections of syntactic and traditional semantics themselves,more and more problems present to the scholars.Based on this,this paper tries to analyze the Chinese Pivotal Construction thoroughly to the new depth and from the new dimension.It mainly focuses on how every element in the Pivotal Construction functions in the syntactic structure and semantic relations.The specific questions are as follows:1)What are the element identifiers in the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction?2)What are the syntactic status of NP2 in the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction?3)What are the Syntactic control relations among NP1?VP1?NP2?VP2 in the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction?4)How are the semantic characteristics of the different syntactic components highlighted in the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction?5)How does every element relate to each other to contribute to the Pivotal Construction in this Construction?To solve the problems above,this paper tries to analyze them using PRO empty category,control theory,theta theory,control theory,and cognitive grammar's Dependent link analysis and semantic salience with Chomsky's theory of universal grammar and cognitive grammar.This paper redistricts the types of Pivotal Construction,converses the syntactic structures from D-structure to the S-structure,and discusses the Pivotal Construction under syntax and semantic with semantics.This paper is divided into six chapters.The first chapter is the introduction,mainly concluding the study object,the basis,research methods,utterance materials and structure arrangement.The second chapter mainly introduces the research situation,summarizes predecessor's research results,analyzes the shortfalls and puts forward the main problems this study needs to solve.The third chapter is mainly about the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction's definition and classification,determines the scope and standards from four dimensions,dividing it into prototype Pivotal Construction,sub-prototype Pivotal Construction and borderline Pivotal Construction.In the fourth chapter,based on the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction's definition and classification,the syntax and semantic are analyzed,and the syntactic relations of each element are discussed in the deep syntax.In the fifth chapter,the modern Chinese Pivotal Construction's meaning constructions are revealed by combining the syntax and semantics.In the end,it is the conclusion.The direction of future's study is put forward.