A Study Of The Chinese S+V-R+O Construction

The Chinese Resultative Construction plays a quite important role inthe formation and development of the Chinese grammar; this constructionhas always drawn great attention of many linguists and researchers. Inrecent years, the studies of this construction could be divided into twokinds in terms of the theories employed: formalism and cognitivism;while, the dissertation here thinks there are some deficiencies in theirexplanations. With S+V-R+O Construction (the basic sentence pattern ofResultative Construction) as the research subject, the present paper triesto find out a unified account of this construction under the framework ofConstruction Grammar.According to the definition of constructions, the paper here holds theS+V-R+O Construction, with 'Action-Result (Affect)' as its abstractmeaning, is an argument structure construction that exists independentlyof particular verbs. It has three sub-constructions: Object-orientedS+V-R+O, Subject-oriented S+V-R+O and Verb-oriented S+V-R+O. Inaddition to sharing the basic abstract meaning 'Action-Result (Affect)',they have more specific and concrete meanings and other syntacticfeatures and constraints. To be more specific, the present paper describesthe fusion between the argument roles of the three sub-constructions andthe participant roles of the main verbs which exist in them, tries toconstruct the representations of the three sub-constructions and probesinto the nature of the objects, the problem of the semantic orientation ofthe resultative and other syntactic features and constraints.To be more concrete, the first type, the Object-oriented S+V-R+OConstruction, has comparatively concrete meaning 'An action or eventelicited by the causer causes the existential theme to be affected', withthree argument roles: the causer role, the theme role and the result role. And in addition, the paper here further believes that the objectcontributed by the whole construction has the quality 'AFFECTED', theresultatives semantically refer to the affected theme role and there is anatural semantic compatibility between the resultative and the object. Asfor the second type, the Subject-oriented S+V-R+O Construction, hasmore specific meaning 'An action elicited by an agent causes the agent tobe affected', with three argument roles: the agent role, the patient role,and the result role. Moreover, the result role is contributed by the wholeconstruction; also, the present dissertation probes into the constraints onthe appearance of this construction, for example, the main verb shouldtransitive, and the resultative refers to the affected subject and there mustbe a natural compatibility among the subject, the resultative and theobject. The third type, the Verb-oriented S+V-R+O Construction, hasthree argument roles: the agent role, the patient role and the state role; thestate role is endowed by the whole construction. And besides, the presentthesis also finds out other constraints on the generation of sentences ofthis construction.By applying the Construction Grammar to the study of S+V-R+OConstruction, the advantages are listed as follows: to avoid implausibleverb senses; to clearly explicate the syntactic and semantic relations byutilizing Goldberg's construction representation mechanism; to describeand to explain the three sub-constructions separately and more clearly.The present study has theoretical value and practical significance.By qualitative analysis and based on tremendous actual linguisticexpressions, the present paper could prove the plausibility ofConstruction Grammar; and in addition, the analyses could provide helpfor the Chinese language teaching to foreigners.