A Comparative Study Of English And Chinese Cleft Constructions

In traditional linguistics,It is/was...that/who...and shi...de are called cleft sentence or cleft structure,which are the typical focus structures in English and Chinese;and most previous studies have concentrated on the description of its structure and functions in terms of traditional linguistics.Taking Construction Grammar as the theoretical framework,the thesis is conducted from the perspective of syntactic,semantic and pragmatic facets to compare the similarities and differences between the two constructions.And the present study would adopt two cognitive theories,figure/ground theory and iconicity,to represent cognitive explanation.Based on comparative analysis,syntactically,in Chinese cleft only one element can serve as the focus,whereas in English cleft there can be two elements.The formal varieties in English it-cleft construction outnumber that in Chinese cleft construction.In the syntactic limitations to the focus,compatible with discreteness and closeness,the thesis validates different parts of speech and constituents of sentence,and it turns out similarities and differences coexist.Semantically,in Figure/ground theory,the focus corresponds to Figure,and the rest part to Ground in both constructions.In iconicity of proximity,the focus should be placed closer to the conceptual unit.In iconicity of sequence,more important and urgent information tends to be placed first in the string.Pragmatically,this thesis explores pragmatic functions of both constructions in terms of presupposition,implicature,contrast,tone,repairing,and the functions in topic.Both constructions are almost identical in pragmatic functions.Through comparative study,the thesis not only reveals the similarities and differences of constructions in syntax,semantics and pragmatics,but deepens our understanding of English and Chinese.Besides,the thesis aspires to make positive influence on English and Chinese as Foreign Languages Learning,Chinese Teaching as Second Language Learning for English natives and English-Chinese translation.