A Study On Chinese Modal Verb Neng From The Perspective Of Grounding Theory

Modal verb in modern Chinese has long been a heated topic in the study of Chinese language.As a typical member of Chinese modal verbs,neng has always been the focus of attention in the research on Chinese modal verbs.A lot of research has been conducted to clarify its meanings,grammatical category,and the structural nature of the composite structure ‘neng V'.Little attention has been paid to the grounding function of it.What kind of process does neng profile in different types of modality? How does it direct the profiled process in the certain directions in the speaker's conception of reality? There are no clear and unified explanations to these issues.By taking neng as a grounding element,the present study aims to elaborate the grounding function of neng in different types of modality.Except a few self-made examples,the examples adopted in the analysis of neng in the thesis are mainly collected from cncorpus.Before probing into the grounding function of neng,the author offers a semantic reclassification of neng with reference to the modality types proposed by Palmer(1986,2001)and provides the semantic interpretations of ‘neng V' structures in different types of modality.In the present study,Chinese modal verb neng can be classified as dynamic neng,deontic neng and epistemic neng.On the basis of the semantic reclassification,the semantic interpretations of ‘neng V' can be concluded as follows:(1)Imposed with a modal force from the clausal subject,the dynamic ‘neng V' expresses a meaning of ‘NP has(have)the ability to do something'.(2)Imposed with a modal force of permission from the authority,the deontic ‘neng V' conveys a meaning of ‘A(not)permits B to do something'.(3)Imposed with a modal force from the speaker,the epistemic ‘neng V' expresses a meaning of ‘the speaker assumes that something is probably(not)true'.Niu(2017)pointed out that the grounding function of a modal verb in theclausal grounding can be divided as the epistemic function and the temporal function.As a result,the discussion of the grounding function of neng in the present study is divided into two parts.According to Langacker(2008),the modal forces of modal verbs in dynamic and deontic modal sense are aimed at the execution of the action while the modal force in epistemic sense is aimed at the epistemic control that reflects the speaker's effort in assessing the likelihood of the occurrence of the process.As a result,to clarify the epistemic function of neng,what kind of process does neng profile in different types of modality needs to be explored.Besides,Langacker(2008)also pointed out that modal verbs can direct the profiled process in certain directions in the speaker's conception of reality.Hence,the analysis of the temporal function of neng should clarify how neng directs the profiled process in certain directions in the speaker's conception of reality.With reference to the syntactic environments and the semantic features of V of ‘neng V' structures in different types of modality,the epistemic function of neng can be concluded as follows: the dynamic and deontic neng tend to profile the dynamic and autonomous process while the epistemic neng tends to profile the process of a high possibility or a low possibility.Beside,with reference to the dynamic and evolutionary model,the temporal function of neng can be summarized as follows:(1)Both the dynamic neng and epistemic neng can serve as a time reference to speech time and direct the profiled process in the certain directions to the potential reality;(2)The deontic neng can also serve as a time reference to speech time and direct the profiled process in the direction to the future reality.