汉语系词“是”的形成机制

The Emerging Mechanism of the Copula Shi(是) in Chinese

汉语学界虽然对指示代词"是"发展为表判断的系词"是"基本形成了定论,但对其形成机制尚缺乏有效论证。系词"是"来源于话题化名词短语之后的回指性指示代词"是",它发展为系词的一个关键环节是,这个回指性指示代词"是"所联系的前后两个名词(短语)具有同一性(两个名词或名词短语的所指相同)或者具有类属关系(前一名词或名词短语的所指属于后一名词或名词短语的所指的下位成员),即:[名词性话题][回指性指示代词名词性谓语][主语系词宾语]。系词"是"产生的语体环境可以是叙述语体,也可以是会话语体。

We assume that the copula shi（是） originated from its use of the anaphoric demonstrative which was preceded by a topical NP and followed by a predicative NP, and the crucial semantic conditions were that these two NPs were coreferential or there was class attribute between these two NPs. The copula shi（是） emerged in the context which was the narrative register or the conversational register.