WORD与“字”的形态结构对比研究

A Morphological Study of "Word" and "zi" (character) in English and Chinese from a Contrastive Perspective

WORD和字分别是英汉两种语言中的自然单位。汉语中的字等于或小于词,是汉语的构词单位,相当于英语中的词素。在形态结构上,汉语中的字和英语中的词大都可以分析成更小的音义单位。而分出的这些单位都相当于英语中的Morpheme。Morpheme可译成词素或字素,相当于汉语的偏旁部首。英语中的构词和汉语中的构字部件都不变,但洐生能力极强,掌握这些基本的构件,对于提高语言学习的效力是很有意义的。

This article attempts to reexamine the morphological structure and the formation of ＂word＂ and ＂zi＂ （character） in English and Chinese. It begins with the definition of ＂word＂ in English and ＂zi＂ in Chinese, reconsiders their roles in both lan- guages, and clarifies the confusion caused by the Chinese translation of the term ＂morpheme＂. It is suggested that ＂word＂ and ＂zi＂ are the basic units in the two languages, and they share similarities in their morphological analysis and formation of words in both languages. Therefore, a contrastive study of their structure and formation are of significance in the teaching and learning of English and Chinese.