The Semantic Cognition Study On Hand Verb Na

Verbs, which determine the basic structures of sentences, are treated as one of the core topics in the grammar study. But there is still no existing systematic and comprehensive verb research model. Basing on the universal hypothesis of human languages, this study analyzes the modern Chinese hand verb na's semantic extension routes and the cognitive extension mechanisms as well as its syntactic and semantic performance by describing and explaining its syntactic patterns and semantic structures.Following the "Laboratory Research" method, the syntactic patterns of na are described as sufficiently and accurately as we can. Secondly, basing on the descriptions of na's syntactic patterns and the paraphrasing contents given by dictionaries, its meaning extension routes and the cognitive extension mechanisms are analyzed following the "Lexical Concepts and Cognitive Models" theory with an aim to construct a figure for its semantic cognition process. Thirdly, basing on na's syntactic and semantic performance, the cognitive pragmatic motivations are tentatively investigated.The results of this study shows that the subjects in the syntactic patterns of na should be the animate nouns which involve personal pronouns and some nouns referring to animals; the objects can be animate, inanimate, and abstract nouns (but all of them have their own semantic constraints); the syntactic and semantic compatibility of the objects can be explained by the cognitive metaphor, metonymy or the continuum of them. Secondly, the hand verb na has something to do with a series of the semantic categories, such as participants, manners, achievements, directions, or strength, etc. na and its syntactic and semantic performance all have their cognitive motivations. That is to say, every syntactic pattern can be explained by certain semantic cognition relations.This study not only provides some references for the study of other verbs at the theoretical and methodological levels, but also promotes the studies on lexical semantics and the researches of the interface of syntax and semantics. It further develops and improves the cognitive metaphor and metonymy theories as well as the "Lexical Concepts and Cognitive Models" theory. It also investigates the shortcomings of the "Laboratory Research" method with some necessary revising suggestions are given. In addition, the results of this study also have certain reference and practical value for the studies of the Chinese natural language information processing, thesaurus construction, dictionary compilation and language teaching, etc.