名词谓语句的认知语用动因:类型学证据

The Cognitive-pragmatic Motivation of Nominal Sentences: Evidence from Linguistic Typology

以往研究名词谓语句的主导思路是对谓语NP进行语义分析,以此发现其成立条件。但是,这些研究都是从汉语内部视角进行的考察,对该结构的形成理据探索还不够深入。本文基于类型学证据提出,名词谓语句的形成是认知和语用推理作用的结果。这一构式的语义结构类型出现频率最高的是类属关系和数量关系,其次是同一关系和空间关系。一种语言是否允准名词谓语句以及允准哪些类型既取决于文化制约下的语用策略,又取决于该语言内部其他构式的影响。

Previous studies of nominal sentences in Chinese have been dominated by the analysis of nominal predicates,with a view to discovering conditions affecting their acceptability.However,these studies have been conducted mostly from the internal perspective of Chinese,failing to explore the motivation of nominal sentences.Based on evidence obtained from typological research,this article argues that nominal sentences originate as a result of cognition and pragmatic inferencing.In terms of semantic structure,nominal sentences encode relations of categorization and quantification most frequently,followed by those of identity and space.Whether a language licenses nominal sentences and which types it may license depend on culturally constrained pragmatic strategies,and also on other constructions in that language.