A Cognitive Study On Shen Me X Bu X Construction

As a structure full of intense subjectivity,the highly frequent Chinese construction Shen me X bu X is mainly used to indicate negative meaning and the dissatisfaction of the speaker.It is usually seen in informal oral communications.Since the end of the eighties of last century,more and more scholars have explored this construction from different perspectives.These researches are conducive to reinforcing the understanding of the essence of it,which can guide the work of foreign Chinese teaching and improve the teaching efficiency of the teachers.Based on the previous researches,the paper takes Cognitive Construction Grammar as the theoretical foundation and explores Shen me X bu X with detailed description and explanation.Based on the data of Chinese Linguistic Corpus from Peking University,the paper discusses the construction within rich contexts and finds that the negated parts of the construction are different in various contexts.Following this line of thought,the paper aims to discuss different types of negation in this construction through the analysis of corpus data.The thesis demonstrates that Shen me X bu X construction is not a simple syntactic pattern but a conceptual construction.It has various syntactic functions which may result in distinct meanings in different contexts.When the construction serves as an independent clause,it negates the event that the noun triggers.When the construction serves as an object,it can be divided into two types.One is when the verb is the existing verb�?�,it negates the existence of�X�.The other one is the interpretation of negative facts when the verbs are the words other than�?�.The speaker thinks it doesn't matter even the result is not good.It negates the attitude of the speaker towards negative facts.When the construction acts as subject,it conveys the unbiased and neutral attitude towards�X�and�bu X�.And it tends to be objective.When the construction acts as attribute,it shows the current topic is unrelated to "X"in essence.It negates the connection between them.