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- Volume 5, Issue, 2014
Chinese Language and Discourse - Volume 5, Issue 2, 2014
Volume 5, Issue 2, 2014
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Clause structure and grounding in Chinese written narrative discourse
Author(s): Wendan Lipp.: 99–145 (47)More LessThis study examines the grounding functions of eight basic clause types in Chinese written narrative. It demonstrates that variations in constituent order and clause structure are a major means to designate events versus states at the clause level and ultimately a device to encode foregrounding versus backgrounding distinction. While perfective clauses in the canonical SV(O) word order typically designate major events and are signposts of foregrounding, deviations from this prototype tend to be interpreted as stative predications in the background. Variations in constituent order and clause structure even override the verb form in indicating situation types and grounding functions.
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A corpus-based functional study of shi…de constructions
Author(s): Yi Xupp.: 146–184 (39)More LessExisting research on shi…de constructions has often referred to its purported “emphasis” or “focus” functions. This paper reexamines shi…de by analyzing 787 examples of shi…de extracted from a spoken corpus. Positive evidence was found for several earlier proposals that rely on intuitively-generated data. Meanwhile, additional features of the construction can be observed. Results indicate that the preferred form of shi…de takes stative predicates, and some examples occur in such high frequencies that they form formulaic expressions. The construction always achieves stative predication, is often associated with subjectivity, and expresses the speaker’s certainty in stancetaking. To explain all the data, a unified “emphasis” function is proposed to integrate the traditional analyses of “constructive focus” and “affirmation.” Also, the overlap between the copula and the emphasis/focus function of shi in shi…de suggests that the construction is a form grammaticalized from shi + nominalization. This paper thus shows that corpus data can enable us to tackle an old issue with new evidence by making all subtypes of the construction available for quantitative and qualitative analysis, which in turn helps us redefine and reconceptualize otherwise ambiguous notions.
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A corpus-based study on Chinese sentiment parameters of Chinese sentiment discourse
Author(s): Xiao-Ling Cui and Janet S. Shibamoto-Smithpp.: 185–210 (26)More LessMost previous work on sentiment identification and annotation has focused on the identification and annotation of attitudes and targets, while less work has been done on other sentiment parameters. In this paper, we aim to discover different lexical, syntactic and semantic features of Chinese sentiment parameters based on Appraisal Theory. The data are from an annotated corpus of Chinese commentaries, analyzed using both qualitative and quantitative methods. We find that sentence-level sentiment production is the collaborative work of the core sentiment parameter (attitude) with other peripheral sentiment parameters (topic, source, field, process and degree of attitude). The distribution of sentiment parameters is also restricted by word classes, syntactic and semantic features and functions. This work not only offers a new analytic framework for Chinese sentiment analysis, but will improve the precision of sentence-level machine extraction of sentiment expressions in Chinese, with implications for possible extension to other languages.
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Language attitudes toward Northeastern Mandarin and Putonghua (PTH) by young professionals
Author(s): Chunsheng Yangpp.: 211–230 (20)More LessThis study examines the language attitudes of young professionals in three cities in China towards Northeastern Mandarin (NEM) and Putonghua (PTH) (i.e., the standard language in China). It confirms that NEM has lower status as compared to PTH. However, the young professionals in Northeast China rated the NEM speaker higher than the PTH speaker in most qualities, attesting to the empathy and solidarity of native speakers toward their own variety of language. The northeastern professionals also rated the NEM speaker lower in some personal qualities, implying that the northeastern professionals’ awareness of the stereotypes associated with NEM and the prestige associated with PTH. The findings show that language attitude is directly linked to socio-economic status and that speakers of the low variety of a language may develop complicated language attitudes when negotiating their language use and identity in social interaction.
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Chinese disyllabic words in conversation
Author(s): Shu-Chuan Tsengpp.: 231–251 (21)More LessThis paper presents a study of segment duration in Chinese disyllabic words. The study accounts for boundary-related factors at levels of syllable, word, prosodic unit, and discourse unit. Face-to-face conversational speech data annotated with signal-aligned, multi-layer linguistic information was used for the analysis. A series of quantitative results show that Chinese disyllabic words have a long first syllable onset and a long second syllable rhyme, suggesting an edge effect of disyllabic words. This is in line with disyllabic merger in Chinese that preserves the onset of the first syllable and the rhyme of the second syllable. A shortening effect at prosodic and discourse unit initiation locations is due to a duration reduction of the second syllable onset, whereas the common phenomenon of pre-boundary lengthening is mainly a result of the second syllable rhyme prolongation including the glide, nucleus, and coda. Morphologically inseparable disyllabic words in principle follow the “long first onset and long second rhyme” duration pattern. But diverse duration patterns were found in words with a head-complement and a stem-suffix construction, suggesting that word morphology may also play a role in determining the duration pattern of Chinese disyllabic words in conversational speech.
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The inter-sentential function of Mandarin bei passives
Author(s): Saina Wuyun and Haihua Panpp.: 252–280 (29)More LessAlthough the intra-sentential functions of the Mandarin bei passive construction have been well studied, its inter-sentential function has not been well understood yet. In this paper, from a Centering Theory perspective, we demonstrate that the bei passive also bears inter-sentential weights. Specifically, the function of the pre-bei semantic entity is to preserve the Cb from its preceding utterance; whereas that of the bei-object is either to introduce a new Cb or to retain the original Cb so as to step aside for a new one at the pre-bei position. This study also compares the Centering Theory approach with the Givón tradition in discourse analysis and claims that Centering Theory is a more suitable analytical tool of calculating the degree of discourse coherence and portraying the fluency of information flow, whereas the Givón tradition is better treated as a measurement for discourse relatedness.
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Understanding memes on Chinese social media
Author(s): Lu Ying and Jan Blommaert
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