An Analysis Of Topic Chains In LuXun's Novelistic Texts

Topic chain is so often used in Chinese. However, few researches can be found on the study of topic chains in Chinese, especially in Chinese novels. This dissertation examines the topic chains in Lu Xun's six famous novels. They are《故乡》,《社戏》,《孔乙己》,《祝福》,《药》and《阿Q正传》respectively. The six novels total 45473 Chinese characters. Through the analysis based on empirical study and the concrete statistical data, we aim to: 1) examine and categorize the types of topic chains in Lu Xun's six novels; 2) find out the functions of topic chains.Anaphora and cataphora with zero noun phrases (zero NPs, marked as"?"in the analysis) are the important and indispensable elements to form a topic chain. Zero anaphora has always been the key issue in the field of anaphora as well as in the field of topic chains. A topic chain is a chain of clauses sharing an identical topic that occurs overtly once in one of the clauses. All the other clauses are linked to the chain by zero NPs coreferential anaphorically or cataphorically with the topic. However, there are several types of topic chains according to different criteria. To categorize the different types of topic chains, we have some criteria which are as following: 1) the direction of reference; 2) the number of clauses with zero NPs; 3) the position of zero NP(s); 4) the number of different direction of references; 5) whether the topic chain is interrupted or not by parentheses with new topics.In a broad sense, the topic chain can be categorized into two major types in terms of the directions of reference: 1) topic chain with anaphoric zero NPs; 2) topic chain with cataphoric zero NPs. In terms of the number of clauses with zero NPs in topic chains, topic chain can be divided into two types: 1) topic chain with multiple zero NPs; 2) topic chain with single zero NP. In terms of the position of zero NP(s) in the topic chain, topic chain can be divided into two types: 1) topic chain with zero NPs in the sentence-initial position; 2) topic chain with zero NPs in the chain-initial position. In terms of the number of different directions of references used in the topic chain, topic chain can be divided into mixed-direction topic chain and single-direction topic chain. In terms of whether the topic chain is interrupted or not by parentheses with new topics, topic chain can be divided into continuous topic chain and broken topic chain.This dissertation consists of five chapters in all. Chapter one gives the introduction which presents some basic concepts and the motivation of the study. It also introduces the methods and layout of the study. Moreover, it gives the orientation and the hypothesis of the study. Chapter two provides a literature review which is made on the research of zero anaphora, cataphora and topic chain both in the past and at present. Some important scholars and their researches on this field are reviewed. Chapter three shows some basic information about the database which is employed in the study. It also clarifies the reasons why these six novels of Lu Xun are chosen as the database and gives some information on Lu Xun and his works. Besides, the research framework and the classifying standard are presented as well. Chapter four focuses on the findings of the study. The types of topic chain in terms of different criteria are examined carefully with some typical examples. The key issue in this part consists of two points: 1) to categorize the different types of topic chains; 2) to discover the functions of topic chains. Chapter five is the conclusion which gives us a brief summary, limitation of the study and some questions for further discussion.