A Study Of The Semantic Structure And Its Formation Mechanism Of Chinese “VO+VO” Four-character Idioms

Idiom is an important part of the Chinese language,most of which consists of four characters."VO+VO" is a typical structure of Chinese idioms.There have been a number of studies of the semantic structure of Chinese idioms.However,these studies cover only a part of the important aspects of Chinese idioms and some other issues are still worth investigating.This study attempts to combine independent/dependent relationship with frame theory to propose frame-semantic analytical model of autonomy/dependence.It mainly investigates and explains the various semantic relations between the constitutive elements of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms and how they are connected to form the semantic structure of idioms.It then analyzes and compares the formation mechanism of the semantic structures of the "VO+VO" four-character idioms with different degrees of compositionality.On this basis,the characteristics of the semantic structure of the "VO+VO"four-character idioms are elaborated.This thesis focuses on three issues:(1)the relations in semantic structures of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms;(2)the formation mechanisms of the semantic structures of different patterns of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms;(3)the characteristics of the semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms.The main findings are summarized as follows:First,the Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idiom is composed symmetrically in the word class,semantic role and semantic relation.In order to realize the symmetry of the word class of corresponding components,flexible use of parts of speech is prevalent,and the conversion of the parts of speech is mainly based on the conceptual metonymy as cognitive mechanism through the replacement between frame elements or frame elements and related frames.It is also found that,in most cases,whether the two predicate verbs evoke the same semantic frame or not,the semantic roles of the objects are of the same type.The semantic structure of an idiom is the upper frame,which is made up of the semantic frames of VO1 and VO2 and these two lower frames are related by coordination or inclusion.The relationship between the semantic frames and frame elements determines the specific semantic relation between VO1 and VO2.In addition,through the various associations between the frame and its elements,there is an autonomous/dependent relationship between the predicate verb and the object,VO1 and VO2,and between the constituent elements and the idioms.Therefore,the formation condition of the semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms is not only the autonomous/dependent relationship between the etymology and the constituent elements,but also the relevance of the semantic frames related to the constituent elements formed in an autonomous/dependent manner.Second,the semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms may undergo three phases: the formation of literal meaning,the formation of figurative meaning and the formation of conventional meaning.The main cognitive mechanisms are conceptual metaphor,conceptual metonymy,common culture,and cognitive entrenchment.There are two steps in the formation of literal meaning: First,four words are generated directly or indirectly from the etymology as constituents of the idiom;second,the four constituent elements are bound to form the whole meaning by the autonomous/dependent relationship between the semantic frame and its frame elements.There is an autonomous/dependent relationship between the semantic frames of the literal meaning and the etymology,which can be regarded as the relationship between the whole and the part in the metonymic thinking mode.Regardless of the different ways of generation,the literal meaning is deduced from the etymology,and the V-O relation is inherited from the main logical relationship in the etymology.The semantic structure ofthe idiom with different degrees of compositionality undergoes various forming process.There are three formation types of the figurative meaning of comprehensive Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms:(1)figurative meaning is produced by partof frame elements in the semantic frameand their conceptual relations through metaphorical mapping;(2)the semantic frame of literal meaning and its frame elements are linked by substitutionthrough the metonymy PART FOR WHOLE.That is,the elaboration of a frame element in the semantic frame of literal meaning is the figurative meaning;(3)more than one figurative meaning is generated from the literal meaning of one idiom.The figurative meaning of integrative idiom is formed byconceptual metonymy,including the PART FOR PART pattern andthe SPECIFIC FOR GENERAL pattern.For the PART FOR WHOLE pattern,the figurative meaning and literal meaning generated from the etymology are usually the elaborationitems of two frame elements in the semantic frame of the etymology,and the twoelements are substitution for each other.The SPECIFIC FOR GENERAL pattern counts for the formation of the figurative meaning of some integrative idioms that are generated fromfables or historical stories.In other words,the reasoning based on specific events in the etymology frame is mapped to the target domain as a general reasoning.In addition toconceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy,common culture is also indispensable to a certain extent in the formation of the figurative meaning of idioms.There arefive main types of common culture: etymology,pre-scientific concept,cultural symbols,material culture and social culture.Theyare often overlapped and interrelated in the process of forming the semantic structure of idioms.The final identification of the semantic structure of an idiom needs to go through the process of cognitive entrenchment.Thirdly,the semantic structure ofChinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms is characterized by compositionality,motivation,hierarchy and dynamism.The different degrees of compositionality of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms is mainly determined by the correspondence and correlation between the semantic frames of etymology,literal meaning and figurative meaning,andbetween the frame elements in each frame.The conventional meaning of the idioms with high compositionality is directly composedof the four constituentsby autonomous/dependent alignment.The semantic frame of literal meaning is consistent with the frame of the conventional meaning,and the frame elements in each frame basicallycorrespond with each other in most cases.The conventional meaning of the idioms with medium compositionality cannot be formed directly from the combination of the literal meaning of the constituents.Instead,they need to be constructed by means of conceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy in an autonomous /dependent way.Frame elements of the relevant frames of literal meaning and conventional meaning are not conceptually related in an direct way,but through an indirect link of conceptual metaphor and metonymy.The literal meaning and conventional meaning of the idioms with low degree of compositionality are linked through cognitive mechanisms such as conceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy,with etymology as the intermediary.The semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms are motivated,which can be divided into two categories: constitutional motivation and etymological motivation.The idioms with medium-degree of compositionality are mostly of constitutional motivation,since its figurative meaning is derived from theliteral meaning of four constituents.The difference is that some figurative meaning is the extension of one frame element in the literal semantic frame,and the others can be derived from more than one frame elements and their relationships in the frame of literal meaning.The idiom with high or low compositionality is etymologically motivated.The idioms with high compositionality are of etymology motivation.The etymology and conventional meaning are related by autonomous/dependent alignment.The conventional meaning as the dependent component is derived from the autonomous etymology.For low compositionality idioms,the frame of literal meaning is not directly related to the frame of figurative meaning,but the figurative meaning is generated from the frame of etymology.The standard of the composition of the idiomatic expression is that the literal meaning and etymology can be linked by the metonymy PART FOR WHOLE.The hierarchical feature of the semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idiomsis the result of autonomous /dependent relationship between the frame of etymology and the frame of literal meaning,and between the frame of the literal meaning and the frame of figurative meaning.The formation of literal meaning is based on the independent etymology.The frame of literal meaning and the frame of figurative meaning are in the source and target domain respectively.The semantic frame profiled in the source domain is mapped to the target domain,as well as the frame elements and the relations between them.The semantic structure of Chinese "VO+VO" four-character idioms is not completely fixed,but dynamic in nature.In the process of development,idiomswith high,medium and low compositionality form a complex semantic structure system from a lowerlevel to a higher one.However they have difference in the formation of literal meaning,figurative meaning and conventional meaning.On the premise of stability,the semantic structure system of idioms may still undergo changes: the old and the new semantic structures coexist both as prominent parts by the generation of the new low-level semantic structure,or the new semantic structure replaces the old oneas the prominent part.To sum up,thisthesisuses the frame-semantic analytical model of autonomy/dependence to study the semantic structure and its formation mechanism of Chinese"VO+VO" four-character idioms,which is a supplement to the previous study ofthe meaning of idioms.It is also a help for the learners to better understand the connection between thinking and language,and enhance understanding and application of idioms.This analytical model may be applied to other linguistic phenomena from a new perspective.