To Explore The Semantic Evolution Of "Shang/Xia" From Cognitive Angle

"Shang/Xia" are basic words in contemporary Chinese. They have a lot of meanings and complex usages. In contemporary Chinese, "shang/xia" can be used not only as nouns but also as verbs. And "xia" even can be used as quantifier. When "shang/xia" are used as verbs, they can be regarded as either predicates or complements. For those studying Chinese as a foreign language, the meanings and the usages of "shang/xia" are difficult. From the cognitive angle, this paper mainly cleans up the meanings and the usages of "shang/xia" according to grammaticalization laws, just in order to help people who study Chinese as their second language to have a systemic uderstanding on them and learn a flexible usage of them. All kinds of other meanings and usages of "shang/xia" are come from the meanings of "shang/xia" as orientation noun. Not only language laws but also the particular cognitive fashion of the Han nationality affect the development of meanings of "shang/xia". So the development of their meanings embodies the Chinese cognitive feature. This paper demonstrates the Han nationality's cognitive characteristic through the systemic research on their meanings in order to train those who make Chinese as their second language to have a Chinese verbal thinking.