存现句后续小句回指形式对话题延续性的预测——基于汉语民间故事语料的调查

The Topic Continuity of Anaphora in Clause Clusters of Presentation Construction: A Case Study Based on Chinese Folklore

功能语法认为,不同语言形式一定具有不同的言语功能。汉语新话题的篇章引入通常使用存现句句式,其无定宾语在后续第二小句的回指通常具有三种不同的指称形式,他们应该分别表示不同的话题延续性。基于10万字的汉语民间故事语料,发现这三种回指形式在其他条件相同的情况下,零形回指用于预示所谈论的话题将会延续;名词短语回指预示引入话题的弱延续性,新话题即将入场;代词回指则介于两者之间,且用于较长距离的回指。这种斜坡的存在取决于存现句空间描述和民间故事的事件结构的语篇特征。

In Chinese, presentation constructions are employed to introduce a new topic into the discourse wlth three different forms of anaphor, which are assumed to demonstrate different topic continuity. Based on the Chinese folklore corpus, it is found that the zero anaphor predicted the continuity of the topic, the noun phrase just indicated a weak continuity of the topic with a new one followed soon, while the pronoun form just stood between the former two with a relatively long discourse distance.