A Study Of "Death" In Modern Chinese

In modern Chinese, it is common to take "si(死)”as complement. Because of the word grammaticalization,"si(死)”can be divided into three types, non-grammaticalization, semi-grammaticalization, and totally grammaticalization. In terms of semantics, some express dead, some only express extreme extent. Thus, it can be divided into two types, one is verb-resulative complement, such as "da si le(beat to death)""shao si le(burnt to death)",and so on. The other one is degree complement, for example "hou hui si le(deeply regret)""nan kan si le(very ugly)", and so on. In this paper, on the basis of detailed analysis of previous research, we take those two kinds of complement for research object, and try to point out the allowable syntactical structure.Firstly, we make a thorough research on the meaning. We find that "si1(死)”means "death","si2(死)’’means "rigid". All of them are belong to verb-resulative complement. But,"si3(死)”neans "in a deeply degree", which is called degree complement. Furthermore, from the perspective of metaphor theory and social average, the paper concludes the source of the changed meaning and the degree meaning when "si(死)”is in complement structure.Then, the paper also explore semantic feature of verb when "si"as verb-resulative complement and degree complement, summarizing the type of predicate word which can access to the structure and the conditions of the admit ion.Lastly, the paper reveals the distinctive grammar feature of "si(死)”,including syntactic rules, negative forms and sentence structures. Besides, at the end, the paper inspects subjective feature of "si(死)”as degree complement, which is set about the aspect of subject perspective and subjective affect.