<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
This paper conducts a comparative study on the resultative verb compounds (RVCs) in Cantonese and Mandarin with an aim to reveal and explain the rules governing the use of RVCs in Cantonese. Mandarin RVCs are classified into six types in terms of the number, the sequence, and the event role of the argument(s). While Mandarin RVCs are found to be rather productive in expressing resultatives, there are syntactic constraints imposed on the use of RVC construction in Cantonese. Given that Mandarin RVCs are often restricted in Cantonese, three substitutive constructions that are used to form resultatives have been introduced, namely V-<italic>dou3</italic> constructions, V-<italic>dou3</italic> in verb-copying construction, and causative construction formed with <italic>gaau2-dou3</italic> ‘cause’. Factors that determine the corresponding structures used in Cantonese have been discussed. Claiming that the expressions of Cantonese resultatives should be highly associated with the event roles the involved NP arguments play, we demonstrate that such a classification of RVCs has contributed to the conclusion proposed in this paper. We also propose a set of linking rules which are designated for resultatives in Cantonese. It is hoped that this study sheds light on the syntax studies of Chinese.
</abstract>

On Resultative Verb Compounds in Cantonese and Mandarin

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>Huang (2015) characterizes “Modern Chinese as a language of high analyticity at multiple levels” and demonstrates “a ranking of relative analyticity among the three dialects: Cantonese &gt; Mandarin &gt; TSM”. This paper argues that Teochew (cháoshànhuà, 潮汕話), another variety of Min, different from TSM, shows more synthetic performances than Mandarin. Chomsky’s “productivity” criterion (1970) helps distinguish lexical operations from syntactic ones. In this spirit, this paper will illustrate its arguments from two perspectives -- lexical and syntactic operations. When it comes to lexical operations, analyses on both the semantic changes within the same categories and the categorial shifts will be made. Besides, syntactic discussions on emphatic inflection, bare classifier phrases, verb-object order and other variants of V-movements in Teochew will also be demonstrated. All analyses will be put under the theoretical framework of generative grammar with the help of a cartography approach. For analyses at the lexical layer, this paper adopts Si’s 司富珍 (2012, 2017a, 2017b, 2018) XW structure, trying to capture the synthesis performances of the Teochew lexicon. As for syntactic operations, the split-CP hypothesis of Rizzi (1997, 2001, 2004) and Rizzi and Bocci (2015), the CL-to-D hypothesis of Simpson (2005), the light verb approach of Chomsky (1995) and the split-light verb hypothesis of Si 司富珍 (2018) will be used as references. Through comparative studies with Mandarin, Cantonese and other languages like English, this paper will conclude that Teochew is a dialect with higher synthesis compared with Mandarin.</abstract>

The Synthetic Performances of Teochew

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>This study returns to the oft-debated question of grammatical number and plurality in Modern Standard Chinese and attempts to shed new light on the constraints operating on the plural marker <italic>men</italic> by analysing its use in a corpus of half a million characters of spoken data. Data from the present research indicate that the plural morpheme <italic>men</italic> is less sensitive than previously assumed to a number of constraints outlined in the standard literature, including structural constraints involving NPs with quantifiers and explicit number expressions. At the same time, it is also more sensitive to a range of other factors that have hitherto been largely overlooked, including parallelism, the length of NP modifiers and lexical diffusion. The findings also suggest that the morpheme <italic>men</italic> is not used only to indicate plurality and collectivity but may have a number of other roles as well, such as functioning like a diminutive suffix and contributing to the organization of discourse and information structure.</abstract>

Constraints on the use of the plural morpheme men in spoken Mandarin

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>Collocation analysis can be used to extract meaningful linguistic information from large-scale corpus data. This paper reviews the methodological issues one may encounter when performing collocation analysis for discourse studies on Chinese. We propose four crucial aspects to consider in such analyses: (i) the definition of collocates according to various parameters; (ii) the choice of analysis and association measures; (iii) the definition of the search span; and (iv) the selection of corpora for analysis. To illustrate how these aspects can be addressed when applying a Chinese collocation analysis, we conducted a case study of two Chinese causal connectives: <italic>yushi</italic> ‘that is why’ and <italic>yin’er</italic> ‘as a result’. The distinctive collocation analysis shows how these two connectives differ in volitionality, an important dimension of discourse relations. The study also demonstrates that collocation analysis, as an explorative approach based on large-scale data, can provide valuable converging evidence for corpus-based studies that have been conducted with laborious manual analysis on limited datasets.</abstract>

Applying Collocation Analysis to Chinese Discourse: A Case Study of Causal Connectives

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>In this paper, the lexical semantics of the pre-modal verb 得 <italic>dé</italic> and its development into a modal auxiliary will be discussed. Two different positions are available for the modal <italic>dé</italic>, the default preverbal position of modal auxiliary verbs and a post-verbal position. The analysis of the event and the argument structure of the lexical verb <italic>dé</italic> reveals that the different modal uses of <italic>dé</italic> originate from its functions as an achievement verb. In this regard, <italic>dé</italic> clearly differs from the other verbs of possibility in Late Archaic Chinese. The particular syntacto-semantic constraints of <italic>dé</italic> can account for its development into both a modal auxiliary verb, and for the particular functions it develops in the Modern Sinitic languages as a postverbal modal marker.</abstract>

A semantic analysis of modal DE 得 in pre-modern Chinese

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>This paper explores the effectiveness of Chinese function words in register studies based on text mining and attempts to determine their register specific functions based on quantitative methods. Following the hypothesis that function words can be used as features to differentiate different registers, our text clustering experiment demonstrates that different registers in Chinese can in fact be classified in terms of distribution of function words. Our correspondence analysis shows that the correlations between function words and different registers vary, hence some function words have register-specific functions. In addition, the correlation coefficients between function words and various registers can determine the register-specific function of function words. Our quantitative model of register specific function of function words makes an important contribution to our understanding of the correlation between function words and registers.</abstract>

Preliminary Studies on Register Function of Chinese Function Words

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
In Chengdu Chinese, degree intensifiers for APs/VPs are attested to pair with three different types of sentence-final particles (SFPs), i.e., the FinP-level, the FocP-level and the ExclP-level SFPs, which function to complete a sentence, encode a focus and express exclamation. In our analysis, a degree intensifier projects a DegP, which pairs with one of the three sentential projections, viz., FinP, FocP and ExclP. This pairing is motivated by feature checking, as intensifiers contain the uninterpretable semantic features of [+Fin], [+Foc] or [+Excl], which need to be checked by sentential projections. Due to the inalienable sentential functions, intensifiers are barred from occurring in any kind of non-finite contexts. Furthermore, FinP and FocP are within the <italic>v</italic>P-domain, whereas ExclP is in the CP domain. Thus, ExclP-type intensifiers, unlike FinP-type and FocP-type intensifiers, defy relativization. This study of associating degree intensification with sentential functions not only explains the syntactic behaviors of Chengdu intensifiers but also sheds new light on the well-known Mandarin <italic>hen</italic> puzzle.
</abstract>

Same Degree of Intensification with Different Degrees of Sentential Projections

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Lingua sinica

 Lingua Sinica is the first international Open Access journal dedicated to the study of languages and linguistics in China, including their various social and regional...

 Lingua Sinica is the first international Open Access journal dedicated to the study of languages and linguistics in China,...