The Peculiar Measure Structure In Modern Chinese

Content:One of the characteristics in modem Chinese is possessing abundant measure words with flexible usage.The Phrase of "Yi +Measure Word +Noun" is a very common phrase structure,which used to measure amount in Modern Chinese.It provides the information about the object's quantity.But there is the structure of "Yi +X +Noun" in Modern Chinese,that is different from the measure phrase,although they have the same surface forms.We call "X" here as "formal measure word" and call the structure composed of "X" as "measure structure".Based on the previous research,we choose 31 formal measure words as the objects of our research.This paper mainly discusses the characteristics of formal measure words and measure structures guided by the theories of cognitive linguistics and "three planes".The main body of the article is divided into three groups:The First Part mainly introduces the features of "X" in the structure of "Yi+X+ Noun".At first,it concludes that some main forms which can go into the structure of "Yi +Measure Word / X +Noun" as "X" by analyzing the measure words in The Study of the Measure Word of Modern Chinese Dictionary written by Xianzhen Guo. Then the contrastive analysis is made with the characteristics of the measure word and formal measure word "X".The second part emphatically discusses on the features of the measure structure as a whole on the theoretical basis of three planes which is different from the quantitative phrase.It summarizes some common features of measure structure which is mainly discussed from the angle of the semantic plane.The third part analyzes the characteristics of the measure structure from the cognitive perspectives based on series of Image Theory,and Metaphor & Metonym Theory,etc.It discusses on the similarities and differences of the measure phrase and the measure structure.