Inheritance Of Chinese Grammar Monographs Written By Westerners In The 17^th-19^th Centuries

The study focuses on Chinese grammar monographs(mandarin-centred)written by westerners in the 17fth-19th centuries,taking cases about writing and publishing,main contents,examples and reference books as study objects.The study collects a great number of academic research results from various fields such as history of Chinese grammatics,history of western sinology,history of culture exchange and history of Christianity spreading eastward,using research theories and methodologies from them.The problems in nowadays research are the starting point of this paper.Many researchers put too much emphasis on each monograph,ignoring inheritance and improvements of these works.Besides,their studies are lack of investigation of the editions status and cause confusions of evaluation system.Therefore,I selected five Chinese monographs which are of great representative.The study introduces these five authors' brief lives and their experiences of learning Chinese in detail,based on collecting historical data in any resource and analyzing the text deeply.Furthermore,the study sorts out these monographs about their starting and finishing points of writing and publishing,exploring the reference books from China and foreign countries used in the works.In order to avoid becoming "Brief Introductions" to these works,the study applies the way combining points,lines to overall.I want to establish a multidimensional system from the point of monograph research,the line of country research to the overall of the correlation and heritage of Chinese Grammar monographs.The paper contains four parts:preface,five case studies of Chinese grammar monographs,conclusion and appendix.Each part is interrelated,so the whole paper can be relatively independent in contents and relevant in logic.The preface disserts the historical background of Chinese grammar monographs written by westerners in 17-19th century which came out in quantities then,main tasks of this study,academic research and its reflection in some related fields.Specifically,there are five sections in the preface.The first section explains some basic concepts of the study,defining the scope clearly;the second refines research contents and methods on the first;the third lists innovations and difficulties of this study;the fourth surveys theses existing Chinese grammar monographs and revises some errors of the previous research;and the last section looks back into academic research results made by many predecessors.Five case studies of Chinese grammar monographs,from Chapter I to Chapter V,which are the main body of the paper,discuss representative Chinese grammar monographs written by westerners in 17-19th century.The author selects Martinus Martini's Grammatica Sinica,Joseph Henry-Marie de Premare's Notitia Linguae Sinicae,Robert Morrison's A Grammar of the Chinese Language,Thomas Francis Wade's Yu-yen Tzu-erh Chi:A Progressive Course Designed to Assist the Student of Colloquial Chinese and Georg von der Gabelentz's Chinesische Grammatik:Mit Ausschluss des niederen Stiles und der Hentigen Umgangssprache,making a case-by-case analysis.Each chapter indicates every author's life and experiences of learning Chinese and sorts out these monographs about their starting and finishing points of writing and publishing,exploring the reference books from China and foreign countries used in the works.Also,we choose some valuable aspects to special studies.In addition,the spreading and influence of these monographs are also key points of our argument.In order to reflect the developing trajectory of Chinese grammatics in different western countries more accurately,the paper introduces the history of Chinese grammatics in America and European countries as required.Based on the arguments above,the conclusion makes some comparisons among these monographs in depth and summarizes characteristics of their inheritance,discussing several concepts of Chinese grammar with examples.Moreover,the conclusion tries to comment the historical status and role of these monographs in Chinese grammar development.Finally,the conclusion clarifies the relation between these monographs and the rise of Chinese scholars studying Chinese grammar from 1898 to 1919.The conclusion aims to achieve the association of case studies and the overall research as firm as possible.As a helpful supplement to the main content,the three appendixes collect and present the catalogue of Chinese grammar monographs(mandarin-centred)written by westerners in 17-19th century,the dendrogram of main works in these monographs and images of some monographic covers.