A Typological Study On English And Chinese Cause-effect Complex Sentences

Cause-effect complex sentences refer to two or more sub-clauses that have the relationship between cause and effect. The cause-effect relationship means the inherent connection between events that connect and restrict each other. Although cause-effect complex sentences have different forms in different languages, this kind of sentences exist widely in human languages, and studies on them have never ceased. Many scholars have studied cause-effect sentences from the perspectives of traditional grammar or cognitive grammar. But there are few studies on implicational universals and priority sequences of English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences based on linguistic typology.The paper tries to have a further typological analysis on English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences and find out their typological properties. A table is set up for the study and it includes40languages of SVO-type, SOV-type and VSO-type, in which in the English materials consists of8394sentences including3425cause-effect complex sentences, and the Chinese materials consists of6000sentences including2847cause-effect complex sentences. These languages mainly are English, Chinese, Japanese, etc., and some minority dialects.The study on English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences mainly focuses on three aspects. First is the study of implicational universals in English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences. There are two aspects:From the view of semantics, descriptive cause-effect complex sentences imply deductive cause-effect complex sentences; from the view of positions, languages of SVO-type imply the pre-modifier of connective words while languages of SOV-type imply the post-modifier of connective words. Second is the study of the priority sequences. It mainly includes three parts:1) the priority sequences in the perspective of logical semantics:in English, complementary effect-cause complex sentences> descriptive cause-effect complex sentences> deductive cause-effect complex sentences> judgmental effect-cause complex sentences, while in Chinese, descriptive cause-effect complex sentences> judgmental effect-cause complex sentences, complementary effect-cause complex sentences> deductive cause-effect complex sentences;2) the priority sequences in the perspective of connective words:in English, the priority sequence in descriptive cause-effect complex sentences is: inasmuch as1> since> because1> as; the priority sequence in deductive cause-effect complex sentences is:now that> seeing that; the priority sequence in complementary cause-effect complex sentences is: on the ground that>because2> for fear that> inasmuch as2>for the reason that>by reason that; There is no priority sequence in judgmental cause-effect complex sentences because it just has one connective word: the reason why...is that (because); in Chinese, the priority sequence in descriptive cause-effect complex sentences is:"之所以...是因为...">"既然>"由于>"因为2"(complementary)>"毕竟">"因为1"(descriptive);3) the priority sequence of pre-modifier or post-modifier of connective words:pre-modifier of connective words> post-modifier of connective words both in English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences. Third is the cognitive explanation of typological properties of English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences. Language is an expression of human cognition, so human cognitive thinking is used to explain many linguistic phenomena. On the basis of Sequencing-Iconicity Principle (SIP) and Prototype Theory, the thesis explains the typological properties of English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences.Through this study, language learners and users will have a better understanding about the typological properties of English and Chinese cause-effect complex sentences. Of course, the study will also help learners to master the differences of semantics of cause-effect complex sentences in English and Chinese, so as to distinguish these differences better in practical situations.