Zero Anaphora And Its Resolution In Chinese Legislative Text:a Study Based On Cognitive Reference Point Model

As a common linguistic phenomenon in modern Chinese,zero anaphora is believed to be the standard paradigm of Chinese anaphora.At present,the study of this linguistic phenomenon has achieved a lot.However,previous studies of zero anaphora for the most part focus on the literary style,such as the narrative discourse of Chinese or English,etc.Up to now,very few of them,if any,have been devoted to the study of zero anaphora in the legal style.In light of this,on the basis of the previous studies,this thesis tries to carry out a tentative study of the representation and the resolution mechanism of zero anaphora in??????????????(the Administrative License Law of the People's Republic of China,hereinafter referred to as the Administrative License Law)from the perspective of Cognitive Reference Point Model by means of an approach combined with quantitative statistics and qualitative analysis.This thesis has the following three major findings:Firstly,zero anaphora in the Administrative License Law can be classified into three categories,namely,Zero Anaphora(topic prominence),Zero Cataphora and Special Zero Anaphora(topic implication),among which Zero Anaphora(topic prominence)takes a larger proportion compared with the other two kinds.Given this,Zero Anaphora(topic prominence)becomes a research focus of this thesis.Secondly,this thesis believes that zero anaphora performs the following three functions in the Administrative License Law:(1)strengthening the coherence of the legislative discourse;(2)highlighting the economical property of the legislative language and(3)stressing the information focus of the legislation.Thirdly,the resolution mechanism of zero anaphora based on Cognitive Reference Point Model is put forward in this thesis and it has an immense explanatory power in construing the anaphor of zero anaphora.In addition,this thesis also probes into the significance of the resolution mechanism to the translation of Chinese legislative texts and the analysis of Chinese legal discourse.This study,on one hand,is an important supplement to and a further development of the traditional study of anaphora,and on the other hand,it offers us certain enlightenment on the translation of Chinese legislative texts.