对英语会话中认知立场状语Probably和Maybe的语料库对比研究

A Corpus-Based Comparative Study of Epistemic Stance Adverbials Probably and Maybe

研究了英语会话中认知立场状语probably和maybe的使用特点,结果表明:当它们位于句首、句中时,probably主要被用来对谓语所描述的动作或状态作可能性评价,而maybe的评价往往还包括动作的发起者或状态的持有者;当它们位于句末时,probably更多地被用于对话语命题作事后评价,maybe则更多地被用于回应对方话语,评价其命题的可能性;对于中国学生来说,一般是严重超用maybe一词,而对probably使用不足。

This paper studies the use of epistemic stance adverbials probably and maybe in English conversation.Results show that(a) in initial and medial positions,probably is mainly used to express the speaker's judgment about the certainty of the proposition related to the action or state described by the verb,while maybe tends to frame a larger proposition with the subject included.(b) when located in the sentence end,probably is more often placed after a proposition to show the speaker's assessment of its likelihood,while maybe is more frequently placed after a discourse marker to indicate the speaker's judgment on the certainty of the interlocutor's utterance;(c) Chinese learners show strong tendencies to overuse maybe and underuse probably.