A Comparative Study Of Grammaticalization Of English Passives And Chinese Passives

Passives play an important role both in English and Chinese languages. They are fully studied by numerous researchers from the perspective of traditional grammar, structural grammar, generative grammar and cognitive grammar, including the analytic investigation or contrastive study on their definition, classification, generation, prototype and so forth. But there are a few studies of comparing the grammaticalization process of English passives and Chinese passives. This thesis has made a comparative study between the grammaticalization of English passives and Chinese passives, including an explanation of their cognitive foundation.This thesis has been engaged in studying dominating marked passives, which are be-passives in English and bei-passives in Chinese. Guided by the theory of grammaticalization, the thesis has discussed the grammaticalization process of English be-passives and that of Chinese bei-passives, and also discussed their cognitive foundation. The result of the investigation reveals the following facts:(1) English be-passives come from the perfective constructions with be＋V-en which express the perfective state of subject. When passive concept generates, people can use the perfective construction be＋V-en to express it, since they share similar function. Given a new function, be＋V-en has to be reanalyzed into a resultative passive that expresses the final state of patient. Once people want to emphasize the dynamic procedure of an event, the resultative passive be＋V-en has to go through another reanalysis, resulting in the verbal passive. During its evolution, the invasion of have-perfect into the perfect domain disconnects the perfective function of be＋V-en, which leads to the reinforcement of passive function of be＋V-en. Since then, be＋V-en has been gradually solidified into a fixed construction expressing the passive relation. Historical changes of be＋V-en, such as the aspectual change, the disappearance of perfective prefix ge-, the appearance of have＋been＋V-en and be＋being＋V-en, can be regarded as signs of its grammaticalization. The grammaticalization of English-passives is motivated by the change of people’s perspective and focus. As a consequence of construing an event from different perspectives or with different focuses, an existing construction would be endowed with new function or a new construction should be adopted to meet people’s needs.(2) The grammaticalization of＋-passives in Chinese is largely influenced by the semantic changes of character bei. Since the predicate head can be freely chosen in Chinese, when the verb νin bei(suffer)＋Vis viewed as the predicate head, the V-O construction should be reanalyzed into the bei(Aux.)＋ν construction. At that time, bei is grammaticalized as an auxiliary marking the passive relation. Analogized from wei+N+V construction, bei+N+V appears when there is a need to introduce agent. This thesis has agreed to the opinion of Wang Li that bei in bei+N+V can still be considered as an auxiliary marking the passive relation between patient and agent. Some bei＋V constructions gain higher frequency and can finally be fossilized into words with fixed meanings, such as被告and被动. With the persistence of meaning suffer,bei-passives are principally used to express negative meaning. However, affected by Western language after the May4th Movement, bei-passives with neutral and positive meaning increase. At present, the bei-passive construction is no longer confined to expressing negative meaning. This grammaticalization process is also motivated by that people might change their perspective and focus when construing an event.Based on the investigation above, this thesis has devoted to finding out the similarities and differences between the grammaticalization process of English be-passives and Chinese bei-passives. They have common cognitive foundation, namely, both of them are motivated by the conversion of people’s perspectives and focuses when construing an event. The grammaticalization process of English be-passives and Chinese bei-passives are also similar in most of characteristics of grammaticalization and reanalysis mechanism, but differ in the analogy mechanism. What’s more, there is a change of semantic preference found in the grammaticalization of Chinese bei-passives, whereas it is not discovered in the evolution of English bei-passives. The grammaticalization of English be-passives is also distinct from that of Chinese bei-passives in the aspect of path, degree and pattern. These differences may be caused by their distinctions in the degree of subjectivization, the frequency, the influence of language contact, and the features of language itself.The study made in this thesis can enrich the comparative study of grammaticalization of structures in different languages and can be of reference value to teachers, students and translators in teaching, learning and translating English be-passives and Chinese bei-passives.