The Study Of The Time Perception Model Of Chinese And Related Factors

Time is an issue which is penetrative in all aspects of our life. There are many ways to express people's perceptions of time for any kind of languages. So we consider the exploration of time perception model to be the basis to explain the time factors in a language. This article concentrates on explaining the time-related factors in Chinese on the basis of exploring the time perception of Chinese model.ChapterⅠ: Introduction.ChapterⅡ: Exploring the time perception model of language. Time is the metaphor of space, people establish a link between spatial displacement and the change of visual image from their childhood, but the changes of the visual image without spatial displacement are time displacement. For example, "cang hai sang tian (time brings a great change to the world) " Displacement is relative between the observer and the observed object. Maybe it is the observer's displacement, or maybe it is the displacement of observed object. In space the observers are the main part, and they are the displacement mostly according to the displacement between the observers and its observed object. We believe that when we consider the perception of time, it is also the observer who has the time displacement, that is to say, the change of the time location of the observer lead to different visual images. A stretch of time is formed because of the constantly change of the observer's time position. Therefore a stretch of time is the course of a life. For individual, the length of his life is what he possesses in a stretch of time. That is his survival time; for human beings, the stretch of time is handed down from one generation to another through the way of illness and death. Time flow is extensive. In order to measure the time stream, .the Gregorian calendar which is the reference of time stream is gradually developed, that is Time axis.When we use the orientation word to express time in Chinese, "before" can express the passed time, and it can also express the future time. The first one happens more frequently, because we choose different postures in the time stream. The discover of metaphor of time by space visualizes the abstract time, but we believe that if we really want to grasp the time perception model , we must pay attention to the difference of time and space, and people's different perception of time and space. People are active in space, and people can choose place A or place B, stillness or movement; a one-way movement or going there or back movement and so on. In terms of time people are passive; people must go on at an average speed following the flow of the time, without stopping or returning, even can not speed up or slow down. People fall into the realistic time stream since they were born, and then they start the course from birth to death following the time stream. For this passive movement, they can choose to face the frontal direction of this movement, or the contrary direction of this movement. Chinese people choose to face ancestors, elders; that is to say, they choose to give their backs to the outstretched direction of the time flow; we only use"qian"to express the outstretched direction of time when we choose to be active, such as "look forward" "go forward" and so on."now"(speaking moment), and "here" is the indication point of the space-time which is brought by the speaker, but the speaking time is not completely same as "here". first of all, the time of speaking is changing all the time, and people speak along the way by which the time flows, the speaking time has more identity with"here"in which the speaker used; Secondly, the speaking time for everyone especially for the two communicating sides, is same, but "here" is a unique perspective of the speaker, even in the face-to-face communication, the speaker is "here", but the listener is "there" ,at least the perspective can be different completely.Chapter III talks about displacement verbs related to time, when the displacement verbs "go" and "come" are used to express the time, "go" means "leave" in the ancient Chinese semantic,"go"doesn't require the end; "to" doesn't require the starting point. "go ","go across the bridge","go across the river","celebrate the New Year","live", we can see the projection obviously from the space displacement to the time displacement, in "go across the bridge" and "go across the river", it was the spatial displacement of the subject who experience the "bridge" and the "river". The situation also happens in "celebrate New Year" and "live a life", the subject experience the"year"and"day"as the time displacement of the time flow. "Live a life"is the Chinese expression of the normal way of life, if there are some problems that can not be solved in life; we will use the sentence"can not go over". But what is commonly used in Chinese is the positive way of expression, such as " No such a Huoyanshan that is impassable (No difficulty is insurmountable)""Lai" can express the displacement of the object. However, it concerns only the end-point but not the starting point; that is to say, it only indicates the process of the objects in front of the observer from the have-nots to the haves, every single day, every event, from nothing to something with time passing by. The "future" is something that has not yet come. "Lai" can also express the observer's, as a person of his own, displacement,"Lai"only can be used to express a distance of displacement when the observer is at the end-point. The"lai"in"guolai(come here)" indicates the displacement of the observer, which forms a symmetry structure with"guoqu(go there)"in semantic."guolairen(an experienced hand)"in Chinese is the most commonly used phrase.The reason why there is no symmetrical expression when expressing time "xiaqu", "xialai ", such as "shangqu", "shanglai, is that we use the stream of the water as a metaphor of the going of time, and the water can only flow from the upper reaches to the lower reaches. "xiaqu", "xialai" can express a certain period of time,"huoxiaqu"is used before the displacement, and"huoxialaile"after.Chapter IV will discuss the words of time. Time words is divided into the words in the time stream, such as: the day before yesterday, yesterday, today and tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, last month, this month, next month and so on; and the word on the timeline, such as: January 8, 2009, the National Day, 3 o'clock and so on. The time word on the Timeline just like the site on a traffic line, when the time stream stretch and arrive, we can say"the 8th ", "the National Day", "3 o'clock" and so on. The time that the time word indicated is unique, known, and strongly topical; at the same time, the time that the time word indicated is also the ordered spots on the time line, and has the function of locating events or something else, it also can be used as an adverbial in a sentence.Chapter V to Chapter VII: the exploration of the time--body.Time—body is the definition of a process state when you observe something in the time stream. In figure 1 the line with the mark of year is the timeline; with the arrow is the time stream. Time stream in reality is unique. In order to be clear, we use one line to each word. Bold line that can be used in part lines by the observation of the location of the word. Each part of the time people experienced is Non-repeatable. We can't use relative words to express the case of attending post-graduate before or after this time. But it can be only used in Assumptions sentences or in subjunctive sentences. "2009 nian le"and "Changchun le" is noun elements which have sequence by adding "le" .what is different is that the use of"2009 nian le"is unconditional; but the precondition of using"Changchun le"is that the speaker must be on the move. It is the speaker's moving that makes the place"Changchun"exist. The use of"2009 nian le"is unconditional because we are passing in time stream as time goes by. The flying time makes the use of "2009" realized. It can be better illustrated by counting down and memorial days. The Beijing Olympic Games in 2008 in the timeline is fixed, and we are approaching the fixed time with the time stream before 2008. There are eight years, seven years ... ... two years, one year to 2008 and after 2008 we are moving away from the fixed point, since 2008 Olympic Games. One year ... two years... "Zai", when representing space, it indicates the ubiety of two spaces, "Zhangsan is in the classroom." expresses the ubiety between the spaces, the space"zhangsan"takes up and the space of the "classroom". The adverb of time "Zai"indicates is the dubiety between the point of time and the period of time, or two periods of time. "Zhangsan is studying." There is no word that can express the time in this sentence, so the time is the speaking time,"study"is a continual verb, and it lasts a period of time. "Zhangsan is studying" indicates the ubiety between the point of time while talking and the period of time that the"study"lasted. If there is a word can express the time in the sentence, for example, "I found Zhangsan was studying after I get there.""Yesterday, Zhangsan has been studying"is to express the ubiety between the time that the word of time indicated and the period of time that the word"study"lasted. The time adverb "Zai" has no durative itself, the durative expressed in the sentence of "The era is developing, and the society is progressing"is caused by the Liquidity while talking, the durative will gone if add a word of time, even"now"to the sentence."The era is developing, and the society is progressing now"Of course, if the word of time in the sentence expresses a period of time, such as "Yesterday, Zhang has been studying", the sentence can also be durative.Chapters VIII to X discussed the time-related adverbs in Chinese. The adverbs of time (the time-related adverbs) are not self-sufficient on expressing concepts, it only can be understand on semantic when combined with other elements of parole. These elements of parole include the time flow, timeline, while talking, the event, as well as the relationship of time flow, while talking and the event, and also the relationship of events, the attitude of the speaker, etc. Based on this, we categorize as follows: Scope concern about the time: at all the times, all along, lately,always,always,forever,all the while, in sports Concern about the events: for ever, for ever, generally, sometimes, often, always The time location of the event: ever, already, just, at, soon, at once, will, be about to, be going to, shall, will, At once, just, Speedily, Hurry, Suddenly, spang; flare up at any moment, on time The number of the events: again, over and over, once, renewedly, repeatedly, temporarily The continuance of the events: also, still, all the same, yet, as of oldThe time relationship between the events: at once, immediately, blink, at once, at first, before, with that, then, promptly, hurry, hasten, in succession, successively, continue, turn and turn about, in succession, in succession, one by one, once more, still, again, as before, as usual, over again,Together, all of a lump, at the same timeThe relationship between the time and the event : frequency, always, always, often, sometimes, often, frequently, every now and then, gradually, little by little, gradually, more and more, increasingly, gradually...