英语话语标记语功能的共性和区别——一项基于语法化保持原则的研究

Functional commonality and difference of English discourse markers:A study based on the persistence principle of grammaticalization

已有文献对话语标记语的个案功能研究较多,而对其共性和区别缺乏关注。本文基于语法化保持原则,提出如下假设:当某个表达方式用作标记语时,仍然带有其作为句子副词或评价性短语时的主观意义痕迹。基于上述假设,本文利用语料库,通过观察话语标记语的共时特征,重构其历时演变过程,探讨同一个话语标记语的不同功能的共性,以及具有相同功能的话语标记语的区别。

While previous studies mainly focus on various functions of individual discourse markers,there has not been much scholarly attention to their functional commonality and difference.Based on one of the principles of grammaticalization identified by Hopper(1991),namely,persistence,this study puts forward a hypothesis that the subjective meaning of the adverbial use(sentence adverbial or comment clause)is more or less observable when the items concerned function as discourse markers.Using(a)kind of,the thing is and you know what as examples,this study differentiates their different uses on the basis of the observation of their synchronic characteristics,identifies a number of specific discourse functions,and reconstructs their possible paths of development so as to answer the questions of how different discourse functions of a particular discourse marker are related to each other and how different discourse markers are distinguished from one another when they perform the same function(hesitation filler,for instance).