The encoding of motion events in Chinese : multi-morpheme motion constructions
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- This dissertation investigates the relative order of verbal morphemes that express motion in Chinese motion constructions consisting of multiple motion morphemes, e.g., the order of pao 'run' and jin 'enter' in the construction pao-jin fangjian run-enter room 'run into the room'. It argues that the order is predictable. Drawing on recent work on "scale structure", it divides Chinese motion morphemes into four types according to the type of scale each lexicalizes. Then it proposes a Motion Morpheme Hierarchy formed of these four types of motion morpheme that can be used to predict the order of motion morphemes. The hierarchy is supported by two extensive studies of multi-morpheme motion constructions using corpora of recent Chinese novels. In addition, the dissertation proposes a More Specific Constraint that explains why the Motion Morpheme Hierarchy emerges. The results of this study provides new insight into the distribution of motion morphemes in Chinese motion constructions and a more fine-grained analysis of the semantic relationships between the morphemes in these constructions; thus, it contributes to an increased understanding of how motion events are expressed in Chinese. The findings of this study may also illuminate the distribution of motion verbs in other languages, as well as constructions in domains other than motion.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2011 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Lin, Jingxia |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. |
| Primary advisor | Levin, Beth |
| Primary advisor | Sun, Chao |
| Thesis advisor | Levin, Beth |
| Thesis advisor | Sun, Chao |
| Thesis advisor | Matsumoto, Yoshiko, 1954- |
| Advisor | Matsumoto, Yoshiko, 1954- |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Jingxia Lin. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. |
| Thesis | Ph.D. Stanford University 2011 |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2011 by Jingxia Lin
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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