A Cognitive Pragmatic Study Of Chinese Name Idioms Based On ERI Model

Idioms are universal linguistic phenomena of natural languages. And thosecontain names are ubiquitous in Chinese daily conversations, for example Dongshixiao pin. The object of this study is fixed four-character Chinese idioms whichcontain names (Chinese name idioms for short). And the main focus of this paper isto investigate the interpretation mechanism of Chinese name idioms from cognitivepragmatic perspective. We believe that the thinking pattern of Chinese can be partlyrevealed by means of exploring the understanding process of Chinese name idioms.The fixed four-character Chinese idioms are typical among various types, and nameidioms are very special in Chinese idioms. For there are always short stories or fablesbehind those idioms, and most of them are both idioms and allusions. Chinese nameidioms generally originate from historical events and anecdotes, literary works,mythology and fables. In addition, most Chinese name idioms have two layers ofmeanings: literal meaning and implied meaning.In order to fill the gap of previous studies, this paper attempts to reveal theinterpretation mechanism of Chinese name idioms by using an integrated modelcalled Event-domain Relevance Integration Model (ERI for short), which consists ofthree theories: Event-domain Cognitive Model, Relevance Theory and ConceptualIntegration Theory. To support the analysis, a closed data corpus is conducted, inwhich413entries of Chinese name idioms are exhaustively collected from threeauthoritative dictionaries: A Dictionary of Chinese Idioms (Hanyu ChengyuDacidian,2002), The Zhonghua Idiom-ocean Dictionary (Zhonghua Chengyu Cihai,1994) and The Dictionary of Chinese Idiom Origin (Hanyu Chengyu YuanliuDacidian,2009). Based on the data analysis, a qualitative and quantitative research isconducted under the framework of ERI model. And all examples or contexts of thename idioms (except example13) are cited from Xinhua website(www.xinhuanet.com). This paper is organized as follows.Chapter One focuses on a general introduction to this study, including themotivations, the objectives, methodology and layout of the paper.Chapter Two concerns the literature review of previous researches on Chinesename idioms and also the gaps found in the previous researches.Chapter Three presents the main theories, which will be applied in the paper, RT,ECM, CIT, and points out their limitations. In the hope of filling the gaps, anintegrated theoretical framework is proposed: Event-domain Relevance IntegrationModel.Chapter Four concentrates on data analysis and discussion under the ERItheoretical framework. Detailed description of data collection as well as theclassification of Chinese name idioms can be found in this chapter. In the hope ofrevealing the cognitive understanding mechanism, specific case studies are providedto support our argument.Chapter Five summarizes the contributions and limitations. And the mainfindings of the thesis are as follows:Firstly, a closed data corpus of413Chinese name idioms is constructed for thefirst time. By examining the data corpus of Chinese name idioms, we found that mostof the name idioms come from ancient classical written works, such as the Analectsof Confucius, Shih chi and Tso Chuan. Of all name idioms, there are248entries ofChinese name idioms are from ancient classical written works, which takes60%inthe database. In addition,33%(137entries) Chinese name idioms originate fromhistorical events and anecdotes, name idioms come from mythology and legends are18entries (4%) and10entries (3%) Chinese name idioms are from fables.Secondly, based on the limitation of ECM, RT and CIT, a cognitive pragmaticframework—ERI model is proposed to examine the understanding mechanism ofChinese name idioms. And Chinese name idioms are categorized into four type interms of ECM structure. Statistics show there are251entries (61%) Chinese name idioms belong to B-A-B type which account for the largest proportion in the database.This statistics indicate that “EVENT” is the basic unit adopted by human beings toembody and cognize the outside world, whenever there is an action, it is likely totouch upon the receiver and producer of the action.Thirdly, by adopting ERI Model to Chinese name idioms, we find that there aretwo event-domain spaces in the process of name idiom interpretation, namely,specific context event-domain space and name idiom event-domain space. And theinterpretation mechanism is examined with detail description and vivid figures.