Special Sentence Constructions: An Ergative Perspective

This study attempts to provide a unified explanation for six special sentence constructions in Chinese (SSCs for short) from an ergative perspective: ba, bei, inverse, semi-inverse, SSC-related topic and verb-copy constructions (they will be defined in Chapter 2). The six SSCs constitute a set of"deviational1"syntactic structures in Chinese. What stands behind them are ergativity and ergativization as will be uncovered as this study progresses.The research consists of four parts.First, the author provides workable definitions for the above-mentioned six SSCs and gives the reason why they can be researched together. The previous SSC-related studies follow a tradition: Each SSC is discussed alone, with uncovering its syntactic behaviors, semantic properties and pragmatic functions as the aim. Insightful and thought-provoking though these studies are, the interrelatedness among them are regrettably left uninvestigated. This dissertation attempts to reconsider them from an ergative perspective.Second, with the previous studies on SSCs and the studies on ergativity and ergativization reviewed, the present author proposes an explanatory model to explicate the commonness of SSCs. Figure 1 represents this model: Monosyllabic verbs to complicated verb forms↓Complements typified with four grammatical categories: resultatives, tense-aspect markers, verbal-quantifiers and directionals2↓Leftward repositioning of patient-objects and the formation of SSCs ↓Diachronic ergativization in SSCs Figure 1 Diachronic ergativization in SSCs3Figure 1 can be decoded as: along with the overwhelming tendentious di-syllablism from mono-syllablism in Chinese, the verbs of Chinese become complicated in form and more capable of sophisticated linguistic purposes in function. Under the influence of di-syllabism, there have evolved in Chinese various complements, with four grammatical categories as their representatives: resultative, tense-aspect markers, verbal-quantifiers and directionals. They are so"tightly attached"to verbs that objects are squeezed away from the original post-verbal positions. Consequently, an"intimate relation"between verb-predicates and complements has developed. This relation brings about a syntactic effect: the original post-verbal objects can be readily leftward repositioned to replace the original subjects as new subjects.The leftward repositioning of post-verbal objects pushes forward the formation of SSCs. In this"pushing-forward"process, diachronic ergativization emerges, which, on the contrary, is centrally demonstrated in SSCs.Third, in order to lay the explanatory model of figure 1 on a firm ground, the author briefly traces the origin of the complements and the syntactic effect they produce. When complements emerge in factual sentences, the sentences usually take on past tense or perfect aspect. They strengthen the psycholinguistic tendency of action-process stress in Chinese. Typologically speaking, the maturity of aspect markers (zhe, le and guo) makes Chinese an aspect-prominent language (see 3.4). These characteristics (i.e., objects leaving post-verbal position and aspect-prominence, etc.) are characteristics generally found in an ergative language (see 2.2.2). Thus, the author concludes that complements, esp., the four categories, pave the way for the emergence of diachronic ergativization in SSCs.When the four categories emerge in"normal"active sentences, the sentences take on accusative form, i.e., the objects are post-verbal and the word order is SVO. But when they appear in SSCs (except a verb-copy construction), the original post-verbal positions of patient-objects can no longer be maintained. The objects leave the"normal"post-verbal position and are gradually repositioned leftward. The special function markers ba and bei, unique to Chinese, together with the four categories, assist in the"leftward repositioning"of patient-objects. And the gradualness of leftward repositioning (i.e., the patient-objects in some SSCs are more leftward than those in others) gives rise to a hierarchy of ergativity in SSCs.Fourth, as is noted above, both ergativization and ergativity are not equally exhibited in different SSCs. The author works with four criteria to work out this unequal exhibition of ergativity in SSCs. The criteria are:(a) Embeddability of an SSC with a subordinate clausal slot(b) Detransitivization status of the main verb-predicate in an SSC(c) Affectedness status of the patient-object in an SSC(d) Leftward repositioning status of patient-objects and the positional change of agent-subjectsThe order of SSCs exhibiting the hierarchy of ergativity is:SSC-related topic constructions > inverse constructions > semi-inverse constructions > bei and ba constructions > verb-copy constructionsThat is, an SSC-related topic construction is wholly ergativized, semi-inverse and inverse constructions partially ergativized, ba and bei constructions conditionally ergativized, and a verb-copy construction minimally ergativized.Ergative voice is one of the three voices in Halliday (2007) (the other two are active and passive). Though it is not our aim to establish ergative as a voice in Chinese, our research, we are confident, can shed light on and provide a new angle to the syntactic study in Chinese. What merits mentioning is that we have explored SSCs diachronically, synchronically and slightly psycholinguistically. In so doing, we hope our study is more solidly grounded in an explanatory adequacy, and wish it is insightful for researchers interested in ergative phenomena in Chinese.