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Middle Constructions In Chinese And West Germanic Languages: Toward A Unified Cognitive Account

Posted on:2005-12-25Degree:DoctorType:Dissertation
Country:ChinaCandidate:W Z HeFull Text:PDF
GTID:1115360152456235Subject:Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
This dissertation makes a relatively comprehensive description of the middle constructions in three West-Germanic languages and Chinese, and on the basis of that provides a unified cognitive account of the middle formation, the restrictions middle formation is subject to, and the syntactic and semantic features middles display.The work I did in this thesis is made up of four parts.First, the status of Chinese non-agent subject qilai construction as middle construction Chinese is established.The middle construction has been a hot topic abroad during the past quarter of a century and is studied extensively in a number of European languages. It is claimed that middle semantics is universal. In contrast, the study has just begun in Chinese. The checking of the data of the Chinese qilai constructions with a non-agent subject plus verb in simple active morphology and an adjective against the unanimously agreed criteria for middles in West Germanic languages, English in particular, shows that Chinese qilai constructions realize all facets of middle semantics and exhibit the same semantic properties and similar syntactic representations of the middles in West Germanic languages. The middle status of such qilai constructions is established, which belongs to Type 1 middle construction like those in West Germanic languages. Compared with the middles in West Germanic languages, the middle construction is far more productive in Chinese. Various passive participants of event and even settings can be middlesubject.Second, the implausibility of the prevailing accounts of middles in the generative framework is illustrated.Through a detailed analysis of both typical and atypical middles, it is found that the now prevailing accounts of middles were mostly constructed on the inadequate understanding of middles, therefore are untenable. They did not probe into the cognitive motivation behind middles and did not realize the decisive role of middle semantics on the syntactic structure, but merely focused on the superficial phenomena such as syntactic representations. Consequently, they could not reasonably explain why middles display such unique syntactic and semantic features, let alone the origins of such features and their correlations. The movement approach in the generative syntax framework in particular, could not explain why some verbs are whereas others are not eligible for middle formation. Neither could it account for the restrictions on middle formation. A lot of actually acceptable middles could not be formed in this manner and a lot of data were left unaccounted for. This approach is also in face of lots of other dilemmas. The inadequate understanding of the nature and motivation of middles also led linguists to put various conditions on middle formation to regulate the three visible elements and even the invisible one in middles, which actually overlap to a great extent and often cover only a part of the data. Also the neglecting of semantic and pragmatic factors led them to completely exclude verbs which form unacceptable middles in a certain context. Besides, the obviously closely related constructions were thought to be formed in different manners. Their correlations could not be well explained and the syntactic mechanism became even more complicated.Third, and most important of all, middles were analyzed from cognitive approach and all facets of middles were given a unified account.We argue the motivation of middle construction is to deemphasize the role of the active participant and highlight an active role a passive participant can play in the outcome of virtual events. Therefore, this passive participant is perceptually prominent. It is then selected as the clausal trajector in the middle profile of the event base and at the same time a predicate in active morphology is selected because an active angle can only be construed in active structure. The active participant is not profiled and left unspecified; however, it exists in the base. That is why middles imply an agent though it is syntactically inert. Thus, the p...
Keywords/Search Tags:middle construction, cognition, virtual reality, Chinese, West Germanic languages
PDF Full Text Request
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