跨语言论元配置模式下“把”字句的结构属性

Argument Alignment Patterns and the Structural Property of the BA(把)Construction:A Crosslinguistic Perspective

本文以语言类型学中论元配置模式为视角揭示汉语“把”字句的结构属性。研究发现:1)依据Dixon(1994:49-52)、Whaley(1997:157)和Song(2001:142)等类型学者有关小句的基础语序识别论元配置模式的观念,汉语具有句法上的主-宾格和施-通格的混合模式,“把”字句是施-通格模式中的句式;“把”不是通格/施格/宾格/旁格标记,而是充当区分语法角色施事性论元A和受事性论元P的联系项成分;“把”字句的A和P分别是施格论元和通格论元。2)“把”字句和施-通格语言的施-通格句在四个方面具有共同特征:通格论元P的话题性、定.指性、受影响性以及句式的体意义。3)“把”字句中的同一语法角色可由不同语:义角色来承载,但不同语义角色承载同一语法角色的能力不同,可构成一个两极为施格-施事性论元A和通格-受事性论元P的语义角色等级。

This paper investigates the structural property of the BA(把)construction from the perspective of argument alignment patterns in linguistic typology.The structural property of the BA construction and the function of ba have long been controversial.Various proposals have been advanced,among which the following four views on the function of ba in the BA construction have been discussed:i)ba is an object or an accusative marker;i)ba is an absolutive marker,labelling the object of transitive verbs and the subject of intransitive verbs;ii)ba serves as an oblique marker and the BA construction is an antipassive in Mandarin Chinese;iv)ba is an ergative marker and the BA construction is generated via adding an ergative element in absolutive constructions.In fact,the argument alignment pattern of the BA construction depends on the function of ba.The BA construction is a nominative-accusative clause if ba is an object or an accusative marker,and the BA construetion is an ergative-absolutive clause if ba is an absolutive or ergative marker.The findings are as follows:i)following the proposal by Dixon (1994: 49-50), Whaley (1997: 157) and Song(2001: 142) that basic word ordersof clauses can help identify argument alignment patterns, Chinese has the split between anominative-accusative pattern and an ergative-absolutive pattern;the BA construction, asa canonical construction in a basic word order, falls into the ergative-absolutive pattern,where ba is not an absolutive/accusative/ergative/oblique case marker but rather afunctional word serving as a relator to distinguish between the grammatical roles of Agentand Patient, or between an ergative argument and an absolutive argument;ii) the BAconstruction shares four features with the ergative-absolutive constructions in ergativelanguages, i.e., topic status, definiteness, affectedness of the absolutive argument, andthe aspectual meaning of the constructions;ii) the same grammatical role in the BAconstruction can be carried by different semantic roles which show different abilities to servethis function, forming a hierarchy where the ergative A and the absolutive P lie respectivelyatthetwo extremes.