Study On Sentence Patterns In Xunzi(荀子)

In the study of Chinese grammar,the study of sentence patterns has not been given adequate attention,especially if we consider ancient Chinese.To research sentence patterns,this thesis considers the classic writing of the philosopher Xunzi in his self-named book Xunzi. This thesis studies all sentences in their entirety from both a quantitative and qualitative perspective.This study uses the conclusions from these two perspectives along with staffstical analysis to identify sentence pattern$in Xunzi.From this identiffcation.the state of the grlllnlDar is described and classified.Building on the feundations of previous work,this work offerS several new gains and offers several new proposals: (1)Classifications include simple sentences,complex sentences,and groups larger than individual sentences to complete a classification of sentence patterns in XunzL (2)Previous work on equative sentences using"ye zhe"(也者)do not adequately discriminate the semantic and functional roles of"ye"(也) and"zhe"(者)individually.The anaphoric use of"zhe"(者)should be differentiated from the use of"ye"(也).We also discovered that after time expressions and noun phrases"ye"(也)and"zhe"(者)represent a pause and can be used interchangeably.However,after a subject which is a person'S name ,"ye "( 也) and "zhe "( 者) cannot beus d interchangeably.In addition,if the SUbject of the sentence is a noun preceded by a demonstrative pronoun,it must be followed by"ye"(也) and cannot use"zhe"(者). (3)Previous researchers have thought that in structures such as"B zhi wei A"(B 之谓A)that"zhi"(之)iS a conjunction.This thesis argues that when"zhi"(之)precedes"wei"(谓)it iS required that the SUbject be"shi"(是)or that the SUbject be a noun or verb phrase.In this case, "zhi"(之)appears between the subject and the predicate.Items that appear in the snbject before"zhi"(之)are new information.When new info-rmation is at the beginning of a sentence.its function is to emphasize and point out.Therefore,"zhi"(之)is a particle.