Conflict And Convergence Of Degree Expression And Quality Expression In Chinese Language

The new combination—"degree adverb+stative adjective" is a breakthrough in language development. This thesis inspects the new phenomenon from a diachronic view. The combination has been used widely on the internet; it also appears a lot in news report; it could be found in literary works although the number is limited. This thesis analyzes the special grammatical, semantic and pragmatic functions of the combination. After being modified by degree adverb, qualifying adjective functions more as predicate. In semantics, this combination has a function of restriction in semantics. And it has a pragmatic function of emphasis. This thesis also tries to analyze its generative mechanisms from several points of view. Human knowledge of the world is becoming more precise; qualifying adjective needs to function as predicate; people need new ways to emphasize. These needs in expression are the major drive for involving of this combination. This new combination is deduced by analogy affected by the combination—"degree adverb+qualifying adjective". The phenomenon embodies the mechanism of self-complement of language.