A Contrastive Study On Causative Structure In The Dong Language And English

Causative meaning is a universal concept which is an indispensable element in human languages,and causative structure has been widely investigated by researchers in different fields such as philosophy,psychology and linguistics.Although it makes some achievements,causative structure is still a heated topic.At present,most linguists focus on analyzing causative structure from different perspectives,but there are still lots of gaps to explore.Firstly,most researches lay emphasis on description rather than interpretation of causative structure.Secondly,the relationship between syntax and semantics in causative structure is ignored in many previous studies.Finally,only a few researchers carry on contrastive studies on causative structure among different languages,especially between minority languages and other languages.Causative structure is an ordinary sentence structure in both the Dong language and English,which represents the concept that is to make another person or thing perform some actions or keep some states.Causative structure in both languages not only share the same concept,but also show some similar aspects on the sentence structure reflected by the different components at the level of surface structure and logic relations among the different components and semantic expressions in the deep structure.At present,researches on the causative structure in the Dong language,especially on the contrastive study between it and other languages are seldom considered in domestic academia.Thus,this study takes causative structure in the Dong language and English as a research objective to categorize causative structures in the Dong language and English and to contrastively analyze the similarities and differences in both languages from the perspective of syntax and semantics,with the final goal to reveal the external and internal commonness and differences between both languages.The findings of this paper can not only contribute to the future theoretical research on the Dong language,but also help the Dong people to understand their own mother tongue at a deeper level and assist non-native speakers to have a good knowledge of the Dong language.Though there are differences in various respects,people from distinctive nations can communicate well with each other.It shows that there are intercommunication,exchangeability,and translatability among different languages.Thus,making a contrastive study of sentence structure in the Dong language and English is significant for the development of research on contrastive linguistics and mutual understanding among different people from different areas.