A Comparative Study Of Adverbs In Chinese And English

This dissertation,from a contrastive linguistic perspective,compares the adverb systems between Chinese and English.By describing Chinese and English adverbs on various aspects,this dissertation observes the commonalities and differences between Chinese and English adverbs in terms of syntactic distribution,allocation method,grammatical meaning,semantic orientation,pragmatic function and many other aspects.Based on theories of formal syntax,this dissertation interprets the deep reasons behind the cross-language commonness of Chinese and English adverbs,and explains their differences in syntactic distribution.Firstly,this study views many similarities between Chinese and English adverbs in terms of semantic,distribution and function:(1)Modal adverbs of both Chinese and English are generally subjunctive and speaker-oriented in semantic,and are distributed in the outermost layer of sentences,with important interpersonal,textual and ideational functions such as evaluation,evidential and speech-act etc.(2)Time adverbs of both languages are semantically divided into several subcategories such as time location,aspect,duration,frequency etc.They are generally distributed in the middle part of sentences and have important time-related function.(3)Both Chinese range adverbs and English focus adverbs are closely related to the discrete features of nouns.They both can modify NP and mark the focus of the sentence.(4)Degree adverbs of Chinese and English are both closely related to the degree of the adjective,and both of them mainly modify adjectives and gradable verbs.(5)Manner adverbs of Chinese and English are both positioned in the innermost part of the sentence and have a descriptive function.Also,this dissertation observes significant differences between Chinese and English adverbs:(1)Chinese adverbs are sometimes more abstract in meaning than their English counterparts.English adverbs,however,show significant polysemy compared with Chinese adverbs,for most of English sentence adverbs have manner readings at the final positions.(2)Chinese adverbs of all subcategories must be positioned before the main verbs of the sentences;while English manner adverbs are in general positioned after the main verbs.Moreover,English adverbs are syntactically more flexible and most of them have multiple positions in one sentence.(3)Chinese adverbial modifying adjective can be used as predicates,while English adverbs modify adjectives should be used after the copula verbs.The combination of "focus adverb + noun" in English can be used freely as subject or object,while the combination of Chinese "range adverb + noun" is generally not free for subject and object.Based on the above findings,this dissertation introduces formal syntactic theories to explain the commonness and difference between Chinese and English adverbs.In MP,adverb is considered as the unique identification of the functional projection related to the semantics,and the hierarchical structure of the function projection determines the position of the adverbs.The major findings of this dissertation are as follows:(1)The syntactic performance of an adverb is closely related to its meaning function.(2)The same adverb may contain multiple nuances of semantic characteristics,the specific meaning of an adverb is determined by its syntactic position.One adverb may appear in different locations with different semantic meaning or different pragmatic ones.(3)The order of adverbs reflects its position in the syntactic hierarchy.There is a correspondence between the adverbs of different syntactic levels and the semantics of different categories.(4)English and Chinese share similar syntactic functional hierarchy.The difference of distribution in the surface is due to the different landing sites of main verbs,modal verbs and auxiliaries,combined with movements of subject and other syntactic components.(5)Chinese and English adverbs follow an orderly functional hierarchy in general:ForceP>TopP>MoodPl>FocP>FiniteP>MoodP2>ModP1>ModP1>ModP2>AspP1>AspP2>MannP1>MannP1>MannP2>vP.This study reveals cross-linguistic features of adverbs by linguistic comparison,which is difficult for single language study.Moreover,it deepens the understanding of the essence of adverbs,the typological features of Chinese and English,and the universal hierarchy of functional categories.From a theoretical point of view,this study provides a new theoretical explanation for the differences and commonness between Chinese and English adverbs,providing evidence of linguistic facts for the hierarchy and universality of syntactic functional structure.In terms of practical significance,the research results of this dissertation have important theoretical reference value for the study of adverbs in terms of second language acquisition,teaching method,and translation.