Contrast Of Tesne And Aspect Expressions In English And Chinese

The topic of tense and aspect has always been the hot research issues as well as difficulties in the field of linguistics. Tense and aspect are mostly analyzed from two perspectives by linguists, that is, meaning and form. Therefore, some scholars assert that there is no concept of tense and aspect in Chinese language from the point of form. But the findings in this study support that Chinese language could express the meaning of tense and aspect through semantics. In this way, each kind of language in world has its unique way to express the meaning of tense and aspect.The –ed form of English verb is regarded as the mark of past tense, an d the –s form is considered as present tense. Verb inflexion(the form of ―be + doing‖ and ―have + done‖) indicating progressive aspect and perfective aspect could also be found in English language. However, there is no verb inflection in Chinese language. That is to say, Chinese language does not have the form of tense and aspect. The meaning of tense and aspect could be expressed through abundant lexical means and aspect markings, such as ―zhe‖, ―le‖, and ―guo‖. Based on previous studies, this paper attempts to analyze the similarities and differences in expressing aspect and tense between Chinese and English in detail from semantic perspective, with the hope to provide some suggestions for teaching tense and aspect in both English and Chinese.In terms of tense expression, English and Chinese both have various ways to express past tense, present tense and future tense. However, there are also some differences, mainly as follows: 1. Tense in English is expressed mainly through verb inflection while in Chinese is expressed through grammatical markings and temporal words. 2. in the perspective of the concept of time(past, present or future), tense in an English sentence must be confirmed while tense in a Chinese sentence could be uncertain. Tense of Chinese sentences could be inferred from the context. 3. In expressing tense, lexical devices are supplementary in English but indispensable in Chinese.The expressions of aspectual meaning are closely related to meaning of verbs in both English and Chinese. Their differences in expressing aspect are as follows: 1. Aspect in English is mainly expressed through verb inflection and Chinese aspect is expressed mainly by grammatical markings ―zhe‖, ―le‖ and ―guo‖ and other adverbs. 2. The form of verb reduplication in Chinese to express transitory aspect is unique.English and Chinese has differences, as well as similarities in expressing tense and aspect. Aspect must be combined with tense in English sentences. That is to say, aspect could not exist alone. So English is prominent in tense expression. On the contrary, lexical devices are mainly used to express tense and aspect in Chinese. Out of tense, aspect could still exist in Chinese. Therefore, Chinese is prominent in aspect expression.