An Analysis Of Chinese Temporal Reference Frame From The Perspective Of Lexical Concept And Cognitive Model Theory (LCCM)

Describing temporal relations between events is a very basic and vital function of human language.Lakoff and Johnson believe that human's understanding of abstract time relations is based on the understanding of specific spatial relations.It is precisely because of this mapping that the phenomenon of reflecting time relations in terms of spatial relations appears in language.However,time and space are essentially different,and a large number of empirical studies have found that humans can independently perceive the relationship between time and space without being affected by mapping.Zinken proposed the method of spatial reference,using three logical elements in the coordinate system to study time reference.Evans introduced Galton's concept of transience into the study of time-reference frame and extended it into three major parts,namely,duration,succession and anisotropicity.Evans argues that they underpin the human experience of time and are the basis of human ability to distinguish temporal relations.Based on the theory of Lexical Concepts and Cognitive Models(LCCM)proposed by Evan,this study explores the time-reference framework of Chinese and the temporal relationships that it expresses.It is found that,based on the three types of instantaneity,Chinese has three kinds of time relations: indicative time reference frame,serial time reference frame and external time reference frame,so there are three kinds of time relations: past/future,early/late and time matrix.At the same time,this study uses the principle recognition process of LCCM theory to identify some lexical concepts in the three time-reference frames.By exploring the temporal frame of reference and its lexical concepts in Chinese,this study analyzes how Chinese users employ language to express the temporal relations between events,and further verifies the cognitive principle of the temporal frame of reference.