A Study Of Certain Chinese Loanwords In Mongolian

This thesis, under the guidance of comparative linguistic theory, has undertaken an analysis of a number of Chinese loanwords in Mongolian founded on the basic evolutionary principles of Chinese loanwords into Mongolian through the comparison of Chinese and Mongolian phonology, syntax, lexicon, and semantics.The author utilized and read through literary works relating to Mongolian history,and from these sources, selected over 50 words which were very likely to be Chinese loanwords into Mongolian. These words were then analyzed theoretically and practically to determine if they were indeed Chinese loanwords in Mongolian. In the end, the author confirmed that 27 of these proposed words are indeed Chinese loanwords into Mongolian. These 27 words were taken as the subject of this thesis.This thesis consists of an introduction, body, conclusion, references and appendices.Introduction and Chapter OneI state the study objectives and meanings of this treatise, study methods, study states of the subject and brief descriptions of the main source of linguistic data.The body includes three chapters:Chapter Two analyzes the phonological changes of some Chinese loanwords in Mongolian. This chapter first provides a brief account of the phonological systems of Chinese and Mongolian, indicating their distinguishing features, similarities,and differences. Following this, the linguistic data utilized in this thesis (i.e., a number of Chinese loanwords into Mongolian) is analyzed in terms of the main phonological changes which took place, from the point of view of vowel changes, consonant changes,and situations resulting from the omission of tones.Chapter Three analyzes the syntax of certain Chinese loanwords in Mongolian. This chapter presents an analysis of the object of study in terms of both syntax and semantics.Chapter Four presents lexical and semantic analyses of certain Chinese loanwords in Mongolian. This chapter primarily examines the words in terms of their original meanings, changes in meaning (including assimilation, transformation, semantic shift in word meaning, broadening, and narrowing), their Mongolian synonyms, antonyms,homonyms, and then further expounds on the causes and circumstances for the Chinese words entering Mongolian.Lastly,the thesis summarizes the findings and includes appendices.