Images and expressions: resultative verb-complement constructions in Chinese

Abstract

This dissertation presents the results of an extensive and in-depth investigation of Mandarin Resultative Verbal Compounds (RVCs) carried out to uncover the semantic complexity hidden under their syntactic simplicity. A fresh perspective is adopted to achieve a new and more reasonable account of RVCs, especially with respect to their event aspects and thematic roles. The implications of these theoretic findings for teaching and learning RVCs are also discussed. In Chapter 1 it is argued that a cognitive approach can shed much fresh light on the study of RVCs. Although several previous works have studied RVCs from both formal and functional perspectives, they tend to be flawed by excessive formalism or functionalism. This study examines RVCs by using Compositional Cognitive Grammar (CCG) to achieve a desired balance between rigid formalism and loose functionalism. Chapter 2 gives a comprehensive picture of CCG with particular detail given to the level of Semantic Structure representations, which mediates the cognitive content and abstract form of a sentence. Based on this framework, the following two chapters study RVCs from two perspectives: RVCs as the composition of simple events, and RVCs as hosting the thematic roles for all event participants. Chapter 3 explores Mandarin aspectual types, focusing on those in an RVC. An RVC is analyzed as a composition of two general-verbs (g-verbs), representing two causally and temporally connected events. I categorize six event types and further classify 1505 Chinese g-verbs based on these six types. By employing Aspectual Composition, which captures the lively moment of interaction between two event aspects, an explicit computational method is formulated which rigorously derives the aspect of a complex event from the aspects of its composing simple events. No ad hoc adjustment rules intervene in obtaining the predicted correct results. Chapter 4 applies similar rigorous and precise computational rules to the thematic roles in the composing simple events to obtain the thematic roles in the complex event in an RVCs. The final chapter, chapter 5, discusses the pedagogical implications of these theoretic findings concerning RVCs.