英汉存在句结构的定量认知对比研究——以BNC和《围城》为语料

Cognitive Perspective:A Contrastive Study on the Structure of Existential Sentence in English and Chinese Based on the Corpus of BNC and Fortress Besieged

以《围城》和BNC为语料,对比研究了英语和汉语存在句的结构普遍性、存在动词和省略存在句三个问题。对每一个问题都进行了详细的定量描述和深入的认知语法解释。汉语存在句的结构更具有人类语言的普遍性,英语存在句使用there作为替代形式不具备普遍性;汉语存在动词丰富是汉语动词概念化时方向不具体化引起的;而英语存在动词少是因为其动词概念化时方向具体化且具有单一性。英汉省略存在结构揭示了"空间域与时间域的不对称"假设,存在句中的空间域和时间域是不对称的,空间域是无标记的,时间域是有标记的,时间域被包含在空间域之中,故时间域往往省略。存在句(陈述句)要有一个存在客体空间域,这是由存在句的语用功能决定的,也是存在的本质需要空间域验证的人类基本认知经验的体现。

The paper has made a contrastive study over three issues of universality of construction, existential verbs and elliptical existential constructions about the existential constructions in English and Chinese based on the corpura of Fortress Besieged and BNC. Each of the three issues has been quantitatively described and explained from prospective of Cognitive Grammar. The authors conclude, after detailed illustrations, that the ES construction in Chinese is universal whereas the ES construction in English is not. Secondly, the diversity of existeutial verbs in Chinese is caused by conceptualization with unspecified direction; while the linguistic fact of less diversified existential verbs in English is the consequence of conceptu- alization with specified direction and unicity. Thirdly, a ＂Space Domain and Time Domain Asymetry＂ hypothesis is put forth as to that space domain is unmarked, but time domain is marked upon observing the common ground of the elliptical existential sentences in both languages. The hypothesis assumes that time domain is embodied in space domain and usually omitted in existential sentences, which is determined by pragmatic function of ES, and an embodiment of the basic cognitive experience that existence of objects needs to be verified by where they actually are.