| Based on the previous studies on nominal predication in Mandarin Chinese and the research on non-verbal predication abroad, this MA thesis, taking the nominal predication in Mandarin Chinese as the major object, reclassifies and redefines the nominal predication in Chinese first. According to this study, the nominal predication in Mandarin Chinese is classified as follows: copular sentences (the traditional judgment sentences), empty copular sentences and empty verbal sentences. On the basis of the investigation to the syntactic manifestation of the nominal predication in Mandarin, this thesis summarizes the constraints on it combined with the examination to the adjectival and verbal predication in Mandarin Chinese: The obligatory usage of the copula "是" in copular sentences; And in empty copular sentences and empty verbal sentences, at least one of the following requirements has to be satisfied: the occurrence of the modifiers prior to the predicate nominals; the occurrence of the modal senses in the sentences; the occurrence of the temporal or mood particles in the sentences. With the evidence from old and modern Chinese and that from the other Sino-Tibetan languages, we have proven the constraints from diachronic, synchronic and typological perspectives and discovered that the additional conditions are linguistic universal.According to the Grammar of Predication proposed by Chierchia (1985;1989) and the Syntax of Predication by Bowers (1993), it is possible for the lexical categories which denote properties in the natural languages, including VP, NP, AP and PP, to act as the predications. While the categories denoting properties cannot become the predications naturally, they can become the qualified predications and combine with the subjects to form grammatical sentences only if the properties are transferred into propositional functions first of all via the predication operations. In the framework of their theories, we have explained the nominal predication in Mandarin Chinese semantically and syntactically. We assume that the obligatory occurrence of the constraints on the nominal predication is required by the predication operation. The copula "是" in the copular construction is a predicate operator in essence, which has no semantic content and whose major task is to transfer the property denoted by the noun into a propositional function so as to realize the predication relation. The function of the modifier prior to the predicate nominal issimilar to that of the copula "是" by transferring the property denoted by the noun into a propositional function. The divergence between the two lies in that the modifier not only acts as a predicate operator but also has semantic content whose semantic type is . It combines with a raised noun via predication operation to form a new propositional function and constructs a grammatical sentence with the subject. In the sentences with temporal and mood particles and those containing modal senses, there exist no overt predicate operators as the above two types of sentences. From the semantic perspective, what the three functional categories bind are propositions, and syntactically speaking, their complements are PrPs, which trigger the covert predicate operators and oblige the nouns transferred from properties into propositional functions. The strong features [+PRED] carried by the covert operators cannot trigger the explicit movements, leaving the strong features carried by the nouns to be attracted to Pr to check their features. The sentences converge after the successful feature-checking.From the research on the nominal predication, we find that the predication relation is fundamental in the sentences. A sentence cannot be grammaticalized without the realization of this relation, which explains why the natural predicates VP and PP cannot function as the predication freely. The realization of predication relation is exhibited much more prominently in nominal predication. The other constraints, as those proposed by some scholars that the temporal re...
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