The Contrastive Study Of Yes No Questions In Chinese And Vietnamese

Questions have always been the focus of linguistic study. Due to various research perspectives, questions are usually divided into different classes. Yes/No questions in the Chinese and Vietnamese languages are classified by the syntactic features. This kind of question is formed by the use of interrogative words or interrogative intonation. Because of its high frequency of use and its various speech functions, Yes/No question research is worth to gain researchers’ attention. So far, no comparative studies of Chinese and Vietnamese have been conducted. In order to make up the gap, a research on Yes/No questions has been chosen.This study, besides the introduction and acknowledgement, is divided into six chapters. Chapter One introduces the theory of Yes/No questions; chapter Two deals with the syntactic comparison of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese; chapter Three shows semantic contrast of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese; chapter Four compares the speech function; chapter Five analyzes Vietnamese students’ errors in using Chinese Yes/No questions; and chapter Six presents the conclusion of the research.The first chapter mainly introduces the main theoretical basis used to carry out this study. In order to obtain a holistic research result, the three linguistic aspects including syntactics, semantics and function will be carefully discussed. To lay a theoretical foundation for a reliable study, we use the following theories language typology, Fallon and small triangle on three-dimensional language, speech act theory, conversational implicature and conversational relevance Lun, context and presupposition of Chinese yes no question research.The second chapter provides the signs to identify Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese through the analysis of question identification signs. Based on the definition of Yes/No questions, general syntactic patterns are suggested and smaller patterns are introduced as well. Additionally, general syntactic patterns of answers to Yes/No questions are also presented.The third chapter analyzes the focus in Yes/No questions and presupposition first, then makes a semantic comparison between direct and indirect Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese. After that a semantic analysis of answers to Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese is conducted.The fourth chapter uses Searle’s direct and indirect speech act to study Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese. These study results help to build up the regulations to have successful direct and indirect speech act of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese. This chapter focuses mainly on pragmatics of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese, therefore an analysis and a comparison of direct and indirect speech act of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese are paid more attention, In this chapter, a detailed analysis of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese showing imperatives, opinions, feelings and emotions, and dialogues is presented. In addition, a comparative analysis of speech act of answers to Yes/No questions is carried outIn the fifth chapter, based on the results of investigation of syntactics, semantics and pragmatics of Yes/No questions in Chinese and Vietnamese combining with an analysis of Vietnamese students’ errors in using Chinese Yes/No questions, errors are classified and analyzed to find out the reasons and solutionsIn the last chapter, Chapter Six, all the research results of the five previous chapters are summarized; the practical value, the weakness of the thesis and problems to be solved are presented.