| Discourse markers, as a very common linguistic phenomenon, have been one of the hot topics in the field of linguistic study. There has been a lot of research on discourse markers. However, little has been done on them from the perspective decategorization. This paper integrates the previous findings of the discourse markers explored by the forerunners and finally dig a new way to the interpretation of discourse markers in terms of decategorization。Mostly, decategorization usually happens in the word class of noun and verb. But it also occurs in the decategorization of discourse markers. In the language system, language units go through the change of meanings and functions whose change is gradual and continual continuum. This paper manages to construe the process of bleaching the lexical content meaning and acquiring the functional meaning under the guiding principles of cognitive operations in language and thought. Meanwhile the revelation of cognitive function of the English core discourse marker becomes the focus of my paper.The layout of this paper proceeds in the following chapter. Among them are the five chapters. Chapter one introduces the background of the study, the purpose and significance of the study, the framework of the paper, the research method and the hypothesis of the study. Chapter 2 focuses on the literature review which presents a global picture of the history of discourse markers; Chapter 3 displays the theoretical foundations for the interpretation of the process of the decategorization of discourse markers. The following major elements are investigated in the paper. They are the definition of discourse markers; classification of discourse markers and their characteristics. Chapter 4 is the core part of the paper which is concerned with the generation process of the discourse marker and its cognitive function. This chapter digs deep into the three major types of discourse markers, including the discourse markers of certainty, the discourse marker of response and the discourse markers of cognition. From my research, this paper tentatively comes to a conclusion that evolution of discourse markers mostly goes through three stages. The first stage is characterized by contenfulness of the discourse markers, which indicates that at the very beginning, the meaning of the discourse markers are contentful, which shares the common semantic and grammatical features of all the lexical words. The second stage belongs to bleaching stage which presents the process of changing from the concrete lexical meaning to abstract grammatical functional meaning of the discourse markers. The last one is the precipitation stage where the features of lexical words completely disappear and the functional meanings of these words are profiled. Chapter 5 puts all its strength into the summary and analysis of the process where the discourse markers acquire their status for signaling the developing orientation of semantic connections between language units in discourse from the vantage point of decategorization. This part also points out the problems and goals for further study of discourse markers.Above all, this paper performs a thorough study of the discourse markers in terms of decategorization. This study is a brave attempt to explore English discourse markers with the achievement that discourse markers are used in discourses to realize different cognitive functions. Some discourse markers of high frequency in use have experienced the evolution of semantic bleaching. All the findings prove such a fact that decategorization theory seems to be one of the innovative ways in investigating English discourse markers. |
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