关系语法述评

Relational Grammar: its aims and problems

关系语法以语法关系为理论基础。主要描写语法关系在不同层次中的转换。句子成分的语法关系以层次图形式表示。第一层语法关系和语义相关,最后一层和表层形式相联系。语法通过不同的规则允许语法关系进行转换,另一方面又运用不同的定律制约转换。本文概述了关系语法文献中常见的各种语法规则及定律,并讨论了关系语法对汉语研究的参考价值。

Relational Grammar was developed by David Perlmutter and Paul Postal in the early 1970's.It proposes a universal theory of linguistic structures across languages. A sentence is representedby a stratal diagram, and grammatical relations in an initial stratum are determined by the semanticsof the sentence. The theory provides one set of grammatical rules permitting grammatical relationsto adjust to different strata, with another set of relational laws which constrain these changes.This paper proposes a general survey of the grammatical rules and relational laws frequently metwith in papers on Relational Grammar. The feasibility of applying this theory to the analysis ofMandarin Chinese is also discussed.