基于语料库的英汉愿望类违实条件句的认知对比研究

A cognitive-contrastive corpus-based study of English-Chinese counterfactuals expressing wishes

本研究基于自建语料库,运用定性定量相结合的方法,以“if only...”和“要是……就好了”为例,对英汉愿望类违实条件句的句法结构、语义内涵、语用功能等进行对比分析,发现英语愿望类违实条件句的句法位置更灵活、句法形式更多样、语境依赖度较低;汉语愿望类违实条件句的单句化程度高、句法位置较固定、语境依赖度较高。本文从认知角度对这些差异的成因作出了统一解释,认为上述差异体现了两种语言不同程度的主观性,二者的对比特征呈现出两种语言主观化的结果。

Based on a self-established corpus and a combination of qualitative and quantitative analysis, this study conducts a contrastive analysis of the features of English and Chinese counterfactuals expressing wishes, with “if only...” and “yaoshi... jiuhaole” as examples, in terms of their syntactic structures, semantic connotations, and pragmatic functions. The study reveals that English counterfactuals expressing wishes occupy more flexible syntactic positions and have more diverse syntactic forms, and rely less on context. Conversely, the Chinese counterparts tend to be monoclausal and more fixed in syntactic positions, and the interpretations are highly contextual. The study offers a unified interpretation of the causes of these differences from the perspective of cognitive linguistics. All these contrastive differences are essentially reflective of different degrees of subjectivity, and the contrastive features are the demonstration of the subjectification of the two languages.