A Syntactic Study Of The Cleft Construction In English And Chinese Under The Phase Theory

Both English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft are a kind of construction which can be used to stress some particular element of a sentence.Many linguists at home and abroad have made in-depth researches on these two constructions for several decades and have achieved fruitful results.Nevertheless,it is found that these related researches are usually made under relatively outdated Transformational-Generative Theory or Government and Binding Theory.With the development of Minimalist Program and Phase Theory,Chomsky suggests that syntactic structures are built up by phase,which can efficiently erase the burden of syntactic computation.Therefore,this thesis adopts Phase Theory to delve into the syntactic mechanism of English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft and then make a contrast between them.While since linguists have been all long holding different opinions to the delimitation of Chinese cleft construction,it should be pointed out that shi…de cleft in question is defined and abstracted as?NP₁?+shi+clefted XP+V+?NP₂?+de.And it-cleft in question is sketched as It+is+clefted XP+cleft clause.The research questions of this thesis include:?1?What is the syntactic status of main components in English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft??2?How to derive English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft under the Phase Theory??3?What differences and similarities exist between the syntactic mechanism of English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft?Firstly,in English it-cleft,it is analyzed as an expletive subject;is is considered as a copular verb;the clefted XP is deemed to be the focus and projects a Focus Phrase?FP?;and the cleft clause is treated as a Complementizer Phrase?CP?.In Chinese shi…de cleft,shi is also accounted as a copular verb but is non-inflectional;the clefted XP enjoys the focus status as well and de is an affirmative modal particle attached to the end of the whole sentence.Secondly,based on the syntactic analysis presented in question?1?,this thesis derives the commonly-seen subject-focus,object-focus and adjunct-focus it-cleft and shi…de cleft under the Phase Theory.This thesis tends to view the non-cleft canonical counterpart of English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft as their deep structure.The non-cleft counterpart constitutes the first CP,then,with the clefted XP being moved?in a cyclic raising fashion?out to Spec-FP,and the participation of it is or shi and de,the second CP is formed.Until then,the whole derivation is completed.Thirdly,this thesis concludes some differences and similarities in terms of four perspectives.From the aspect of syntactic structure,both it-cleft and shi…de cleft are analyzed as the complex sentence with two CP layers.However,their specific inner structure differs.From the aspect of adjacency restriction,it is found that the clefted XP should be both adjacent to the copula is or shi.Nevertheless,the degree of the restriction is different for Chinese is often affected by prosody.From the aspect of generation of the clefted XP,it seems that the subject,object and adjunct clefted XP in English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft are generated in almost the same way?raising in a cyclic fashion and finally arriving at Spec-FP?.The only difference lies in that the generation of object focus in Chinese shi…de cleft will result the subject of vP remain at Spec-vP and need not move to Spec-TP for the indispensable insertion of bei.From the aspect of tense expression,it is found that it-cleft can express various kinds of tense and its tense expression relies more on the inflection of the copular verb be,while Chinese shi…de cleft is past-oriented and if it wants to express the future tense,it usually need the help of the future-oriented temporal adverb and future modal element.This thesis investigates English it-cleft and Chinese shi…de cleft under the Phase Theory,which can not only deepen our understanding to these two constructions but also broaden the use of Phase Theory.