The semantic constraints on the verb + zhe nouns in Mandarin Chinese
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I-Hsuan Chen
Abstract
The suffix -zhe in Mandarin Chinese can attach to a verb stem to form a verb +zhe ‘one who is/does X’ noun. Zhe is compatible with different aktionsarts, but there is a distinct difference in productivity. The verb +zhe nouns adhere to three constraints. First, the semantic completion is obligatory when the verb stems are transitive. Second, the referents of verb +zhe nouns must be human. Third, the verb +zhe nouns are episodically linked to their verb stems. This study aims to capture the interaction of morphological rules and the semantics encoded in the verb +zhe nouns. The distribution of the -zhe nouns in the corpus shows that Activities, Statives, and Achievements are the most productive in the -zhe nouns.
Abstract
The suffix -zhe in Mandarin Chinese can attach to a verb stem to form a verb +zhe ‘one who is/does X’ noun. Zhe is compatible with different aktionsarts, but there is a distinct difference in productivity. The verb +zhe nouns adhere to three constraints. First, the semantic completion is obligatory when the verb stems are transitive. Second, the referents of verb +zhe nouns must be human. Third, the verb +zhe nouns are episodically linked to their verb stems. This study aims to capture the interaction of morphological rules and the semantics encoded in the verb +zhe nouns. The distribution of the -zhe nouns in the corpus shows that Activities, Statives, and Achievements are the most productive in the -zhe nouns.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Contributors vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- Introduction 1
- Subjecthood in Chinese 23
- Characteristic syntactic patterns of Mandarin Chinese 49
- The origins of Sinitic 73
- Classifier choices in discourse across the seven main Chinese dialects 101
- The painted word 127
- Tone realization in younger versus older speakers of Nanjing dialect 147
- Evaluating the emergence of [ʋ] in modern spoken Mandarin 171
- The semantic constraints on the verb + zhe nouns in Mandarin Chinese 189
- The semantic type system of event nouns 205
- Semantic reanalysis in grammaticalization in Chinese 223
- How linear distance and structural distance affect the processing of gap-filler dependencies in head-final relative clauses 247
- Variation in Mandarin Tone 3 Sandhi 271
- The role of instruction in developing pragmatic competence in L2 Chinese 293
- Author index 309
- Subject index 311
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Contributors vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- Introduction 1
- Subjecthood in Chinese 23
- Characteristic syntactic patterns of Mandarin Chinese 49
- The origins of Sinitic 73
- Classifier choices in discourse across the seven main Chinese dialects 101
- The painted word 127
- Tone realization in younger versus older speakers of Nanjing dialect 147
- Evaluating the emergence of [ʋ] in modern spoken Mandarin 171
- The semantic constraints on the verb + zhe nouns in Mandarin Chinese 189
- The semantic type system of event nouns 205
- Semantic reanalysis in grammaticalization in Chinese 223
- How linear distance and structural distance affect the processing of gap-filler dependencies in head-final relative clauses 247
- Variation in Mandarin Tone 3 Sandhi 271
- The role of instruction in developing pragmatic competence in L2 Chinese 293
- Author index 309
- Subject index 311
