A Contrastive Study On The Semantic Extension Of English And Chinese Visual Verbs Look And Kan

Visual verbs exist both in English and Chinese.English look and Chinese kan are verbs that express visual meanings,emphasizing the action.This study uses the conceptual metaphor and metonymy to analyze the meaning extension mechanism formed when look and kan form phrases to explore their commonalities and differences in terms of meaning extension.The corpus mainly comes from Oxford Advanced English-Chinese Dictionary,Longman Advanced Contemporary English Dictionary,COCA corpus and BCC corpus.English verb look can be used in many phrases and this thesis selects and analyzes most frequently used verb phrases containing visual verb look.The results of research are as follows:The English visual verb look is an intransitive verb,usually combined with a preposition or an adverb to form a phrasal verb.According to the mapping theory of conceptual metaphor,there are three types of meaning extension in phrases combined with look.(1)Mapping from vision domain to mind domain,look is combined with the preposition(at,etc.)followed by an abstract noun to express considering.Look is combined with adverbs(forward,back)to express expecting,thinking about the past.(2)Mapping from vision domain to emotion domain,look is combined with adverbs(up,down,etc.)to express respecting and despising.(3)Mapping from vision domain to warning domain,look is combined with the adverb out to express warning.According to the conceptual metonymy theory,the meaning extension of look can be divided into two categories.(1)Through the Event ICM,look is combined with a preposition(at,after,etc.),then followed by a noun denoting persons or things.It is extended to reading and taking care of.(2)Through the Action ICM,look is combined with a preposition(at,etc.),then followed by a concrete noun.It is extended to enjoying and examining.Kan in Chinese is a transitive verb,which leads to meaning extension when combined with other words to form phrases.According to the mapping theory of conceptual metaphor,there are three ways of meaning extension when kan is used to phrases.(1)Mapping from vision domain to mind domain,kan is followed by abstract nouns to express considering,judging,etc.(2)Mapping from vision domain to emotion domain,kan is followed by nouns denoting people to express treating.(3)Mapping from vision domain to tactile domain,kan is followed by the noun mai to express touching.The meaning extension of kan can also be explained through conceptual metonymy.(1)Through the Event ICM,kan is followed by a noun denoting persons or things.It is extended to express reading,taking care of,etc.(2)Through the Action ICM,kan is followed by concrete nouns to express enjoying and examining.Through the comparison of meaning extension between English look and Chinese kan,the similarities are found as follows.(1)From the perspective of conceptual metaphor,both visual verbs look and kan can be mapped from vision domain to mind domain to express considering.(2)They can be extended to reading,taking care of,enjoying and examining through the conceptual metonymy.There are some differences in meaning extension between look and kan.(1)Through conceptual metaphor,they are extended to different meanings.Look is extended to expecting,thinking about the past,respecting,despising and warning.Kan is extended to judging,depending on,selecting,treating and touching.(2)According to conceptual metonymy,kan has more extended meanings than look.Look is extended to searching for,while kan is extends to treating an illness and visiting.Conceptual metaphors and metonymy are based on human experience.The visual experience is common to English and Chinese people,so there are the same metaphors and metonymies in visual verbs.The differences in meaning extension of visual verbs are mainly related to different thinking and culture.English people pay more attention to the result of visual behavior,while Chinese people pay more attention to the action of visual behavior.Therefore,English and Chinese visual verbs is extended to different meanings.This study has certain reference significance for language learners to learn vocabulary.