A Generative Grammar Approach To Object-Oriented Adverbial Constructions In Chinese

This thesis concentrates on the object-oriented adverbial constructions（OOACs）in Chinese under the theoretical framework of Generative Grammar.Chinese object-oriented adverbial constructions refer to a type of Chinese construction that contains a modifier that is placed at the preverbal position,a position typically modifies the way of the action denoted by the verb,yet has semantic connections with the object.Under the name of object-oriented adverbials,this kind of modifier has attracted the attention of many researchers.Meanwhile,its crosslinguistic connections with languages like English have also been observed in the literature.Attempts have been made mainly to explore the properties and generative mechanisms of Chinese object-oriented adverbials,though rare consensus has been reached.On the one hand,the properties of object-oriented adverbial constructions in Chinese have been examined in three aspects:form,structure and meaning.In terms of form,Chinese object-oriented adverbials are reduplicated state adjectives/adverbs.In terms of structure,the formal structure of object-oriented adverbial constructions is"NP1+Adv+VP+NP2"（Zhang,1990）and the argument structure of verbs is（Lu,2003）.The meaning of object-oriented adverbials,especially the sense of subjectivity encoded within,is realized through the formal and structural relation with other constituents in the construction（Wang＆Gu,2000）.On the other hand,studies on the generative mechanism of object-oriented adverbial constructions in Chinese have gone through two stages:traditional grammar stage and generative grammar stage.In traditional grammar,the focus has been placed on the relation between structure and meaning and on how they contribute to the mystery of object-oriented adverbials.The major issue is:Are object-oriented adverbials in Chinese derived by attributive-to-adverbial movement?On the one side,Lu（1982）and Shao（1986）held that object-oriented adverbials are not generated by attributive-to-adverbial movement because the object-oriented adverbial sentences are different from the attributive counterparts.On the other side,Lü（1986）defended the attributive-to-adverbial movement theory and argued that the similarities between object-oriented adverbials and corresponding attributives are too obvious to be called a coincidence.In generative grammar,the focus has been switched to the derivative process.The major concerns become the base-generated position of Chinese objectoriented adverbials as well as their possible landing sites.Four analyses have been proposed:functional category analysis,null predicate analysis,base-generated analysis,and feature-checking analysis.The previous analyses have advantages yet overgeneration remains a problem to be solved.Efforts can still be made in exploring the meaning representation of Chinese OOACs as well as the relevant crosslinguistic similarities and differences.Under the theoretical framework of Generative Grammar,this thesis aims to answer two sets of questions:（1）What is the connection between English secondary predicates,English object-oriented adverbs and Chinese object-oriented adverbials?What are their similarities and differences?（2）How are Chinese object-oriented adverbials generated?What are the restrictions on the derivation of OOACs?The first set of questions aim to make a comparative and contrastive study between Chinese object-oriented adverbials,English object-oriented adverbs and English secondary predicates.Through this,the properties of object-oriented adverbial constructions in Chinese will be examined in a more comprehensive way.Based on previous discussions,they are re-divided into resultatives and depictives.The second set of questions concentrate on the generative mechanism of Chinese object-oriented adverbials.Adopting feature-checking theory,functional projection theory and Single Category Claim,this thesis proposes a possible explanation for the complex reading of Chinese object-oriented adverbials,namely the availability of object-oriented meaning and manner reading.For the first set of questions,it is found that there are both differences and similarities between Chinese object-oriented adverbials and English secondary predicates.Both English resultative secondary predicates and Chinese resultative object-oriented adverbials describe the change of states in the objects,and both have causative relations between the actions and the states.Also,both lose resultative readings after being transformed into attributive sentences.English depictive secondary predicates and Chinese depictive object-oriented adverbials both describe the stable states of the objects.Since no resultative meaning is available,the attributive transformation seems to cause less loss of meaning than resultatives.Contrary to resultatives,depictives in two languages highlight the overlap of time between the main predicates and secondary-predicates/object-oriented adverbials rather than causative relations.There are also crosslinguistic differences.In addition to the difference in the form of adverbials/adjectives,Chinese object-oriented adverbials also seem to be more obvious in describing the manner of action than English secondary predicates.Also,depictive OOAC is available in Chinese but not in English.In summary,object-oriented adverbial constructions in Chinese and English secondary predicates are similar in meaning but different in formal and structural realization.The former is more overt in describing the manner of actions denoted by the verbs.In this aspect,Chinese object-oriented adverbial constructions share more with English object-oriented adverbial constructions.For the second set of questions,the thesis proposes that object-oriented adverbials are base generated as the modifier of object DP and then attracted by the strong feature[Manner]of Voice head to move upward to the specifier of VoiceP to check it.In addition,the resultative OOACs gain resultative meanings from[Result]feature checking with the functional head Aspresultative,which happens before[Manner]feature checking.For the constraints on derivation,the OOACs are highly restricted in terms of adverbs（reduplicated state adjectives/adverbs that have[Manner]feature）,verbs（projecting VoiceP containing[Manner]feature;semantically compatible with the adjective/adverb）and objects（either unmodified by adjectives or modified by adj ectives that are semantically uncontradictory with the object-oriented adverbials）.