A Lexical-Pragmatic Study Of Chinese Verb Duplication Forms In Dialogic Interaction

Verb duplication form is widely used in Chinese dialogic interaction.It is taken as one of the most effective linguistic devices,which are often adopted by interactants for the purpose of maintaining and enhancing the harmonious interpersonal relationship.Previous studies on Chinese verb duplication forms are mostly conducted from the grammatical,semantic and pragmatic perspectives.The present research aims to make a tentative analysis of Chinese verb duplication forms on the basis of lexical pragmatics by adopting the corpus-based method.The corpus used in the present study is the Media Language Corpus(MLC) developed by the Communication University of China,among which the dialogues in television programs are selected as analysis data.This thesis mainly addresses the following three questions:(1)What are the main types of Chinese verb duplication forms and their grammatical and semantic properties in dialogic interaction?(2)How are Chinese verb duplication forms constrained linguistically and contextually in dialogic interaction?(3)What are the pragmatic functions of Chinese verb duplication forms in dialogic interaction?The major findings are drawn as follows:First,three types of Chinese verb duplication forms,AA,ABAB and A—A are found to be the main types used in dialogic interaction.In terms of their grammatical properties,verb duplication forms have the grammatical meanings of adjusting‘quantity’,indicating slightness meaning and conveying relaxation and causality;they serve as the grammatical functions of the subject,the predicate,and the object;they present some different grammatical features from verbs.In terms of their semantic properties,verb duplication forms are continuous,controllable positive action verbs,and their semantic orientations refer to one or more components.Second,the use of Chinese verb duplication forms is constrained linguistically and contextually.Linguistic factors,such as types of speech acts,tense and sentence patterns constrain the use of verb duplication forms in dialogic interaction.Communicative intentions,expectation of the topics involved and the relationship and identity of interlocutors are the contextual constraints.Third,imposition-mitigating and friendliness-strengthening functions are found to be the major pragmatic functions in the present study.On the one hand,Chinese verb duplication forms can function in the mitigation of imposition,such as reducing the negative effects of imposition,shortening the distance between the interlocutors,defending self-image-defense and etc;on the other hand,they can promote interpersonal harmony,for instance,showing hospitality,conveying sincerity and expressing gratitude.The present study is significant to deepen the understanding of Chinese verb duplication forms in dialogic interaction.Theoretically,the lexical-pragmatic perspective leads to a new way of analyzing Chinese verb duplication forms in dialogic interaction.Practically,it sheds light on intercultural communication and second language acquisition.