| In modern Chinese,the yiV VX structure with its relatively fixed meaning is widely and frequently used in our daily communication.Former scholars have analyzed it from different perspectives,subsuming describing its syntactic,semantic and pragmatic features,but mostly within the discussion of other relevant structures.These studies are with much effort and achievement in describing the components and their relations in the structure.However,scholars have rarely studied yiV VX as a direct research object from a descriptive perspective,let alone an explanatory study on its generative mechanisms and motivations from a cognitive perspective,which leaves room for further research.Based on Construction Grammar,this paper conducts research on this Chinese structure yiV VX systematically,aiming to answer the following three questions:(1)What are the selectional restrictions on the “V” and “X” slots in the yiV VX construction?(2)What are the semantic features and syntactic and pragmatic functions of the yiV VX construction?(3)What are the generative mechanisms and motivations of the yiV VX construction?Construction Grammar upholds a usage-based view of language and considers the basic unit of grammar to be the construction,that is,the form-meaning/function pairing,which is a critique of traditional generative grammar.focusing on the surface generalization of language and emphasizing what-you-see-is-what-you-get,Construction Grammar provides a new research path to address the seemingly irregular linguistic form of yiV VX.To answer the above questions,this thesis collects 4536 cases of the yiV VX constructions in actual use from CCL(Center for Chinese Linguistics PKU)corpus,BCC(Beijing Language and Culture University Corpus Center)corpus and some corpus records of daily communication,and employs qualitative and quantitative,descriptive and explanatory research methods under the framework of Constructive Grammar.Finally,the following conclusions are obtained:First,the yiV VX construction constrains the words that are licensed to the slots“V” and “X”.The slot “V” is chiefly occupied by behavior verbs and phonologically monosyllabic verbs.The slot “X” is mostly a noun or pronoun,or even a structure expressing degree and result,and in some case co-occur with “le”(了,already),“dao”(到,achieve)and “cheng”(成,become).Second,“unpredictability” of sense is a salient semantic feature of the yiV VX construction.The whole construction conveys the subjective emphasis on the unexpected outcome of the event or state delivered by “V”.Syntactically,the yiV VX construction is a relatively complete syntactic structure in itself,it can occur as such components in a sentence as predicate,object or attribute or clause and independent sentence.On the pragmatic level,yiV VX form a “Topic-Comment” and “Given-New”information arrangement,where “yiV” is the topic,the given information and “VX” is the comment,the new information.Finally,construction inheritance plays an important role in the generative mechanism of the yiV VX construction.It’s verified diachronically that the yiV X construction is the inheritance prototype of the yiV VX construction.Semantic coercion is another generative mechanism for the yiV VX construction.In terms of pragmatic and cognitive motivations,the need for new language transmission creates a precondition and then the new form is fixed by high frequency of use.The cognitive and syntactic construe of the yiV VX construction follows quantity iconicity and Figure/Ground principle.Based on the actual language usages,the present thesis takes the yiV VX construction as the direct research object and examines its constructional meaning,form-meaning features and functions,mechanisms and motivations.Its depiction on the concrete features of variable “V” and “X” and the holistic pragmatic and syntactic functions promote the understanding of the yiV VX construction.Theoretically,it can demonstrate the applicability of Construction Grammar in the study of Chinese construction. |
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