The Research On The Metaphor Of Nominal Classifiers In Modern Chine

Chinese is rich in classifiers, which is one of the characteristics of this language. Except the grammatical modifier function, Chinese classifiers can be used to achieve rhetoric effects to make language concrete, vivid and picturesque as well as to express the idea of quantity. As cognitive linguistics explained the metaphor from a revolutionary view, it provides a new way for us to study classifiers. This paper will study the classifiers in the modern Chinese using the theories of cognitive linguistics, especially the theories about the operating mechanism of metaphor.The first chapter introduces the object and scope, the purpose and meaning, the theoretical background, research methods, corpora source of our research.The second chapter introduces the theories about metaphor and metonymy of cognitive linguistics to lay a foundation for making the further research.The third chapter defines the metaphor of nominal classifiers in modern Chinese.We compared the metaphors of nominal classifiers in modern Chinese with the metaphors of nominal classifiers in ancient Chinese to induce its characters. We find that the metaphor of nominal classifiers own "abstract" feature, it is a structural metaphor, relying less on the text. The premise of the metaphor of nominal classifiers is the counter-restriction of classifiers. The cause of the metaphor of nominal classifiers in modern Chinese is that people use the classifiers in a abnormal wayIn the fourth chapter, we classify the metaphors of nominal classifiers according to two standards:the cognitive goal and the feature of the metaphors. As the first standard we classify the metaphors of nominal classifiers into two categories:the cognitive metaphors and the figurative metaphors.according to second standard, we classify the metaphors of nominal classifiers in modern Chinese into four categories depending on their function and their own features:the whole classifiers’ metaphors, the default classifiers’ metaphors, the lacking classifiers’ metaphors, and the container classifiers’ metaphors, and the following text is focus on these four categories. The fifth chapter discusses the characteristics of the whole metaphors of nominal classifiers and the working mechanism of the whole metaphors of nominal classifiers.We find that most whole metaphors of nominal classifiers are found in the temporary noun classifiers. The causes of the whole metaphors of nominal classifiers are the "noun+noun" structure which can express metaphors and sometimes people have no need to express precisely.The sixth chapter discusses the default metaphors of nominal classifiers and the working mechanism of the default metaphors of nominal classifiers. We find that most default metaphors of nominal classifiers are found in the professional noun classifiers, the default source region can be complemented by the classifiers.The seventh chapter explores the lacking metaphors of nominal classifiers, and its ability to abstract noun metaphor. We find that most lacking metaphors of nominal classifiers are found in the two-dimensional noun classifiers, it reflects the cognitive regular pattern of people.The eighth chapter explores the container metaphors of nominal classifiers and its cognitive mechanism. It also reflects the cognitive regular pattern of people.The ninth chapter summaries the whole article.