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The Core and Specifics of Mandarin Chinese marker le: A unified approach and a Cognitive Grammar representation

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Author

  • Johan Lundvik

Summary, in English

The Mandarin Chinese grammatical marker le has long been a major focus of grammatical research in Chinese linguistics, yet no definition of its semantics has been able to comprehensively account for the marker's full range of functions and uses. Therefore, the aim of the present study is to identify all major meanings expressed by each conventionally accepted le type in a sentence, and investigate if there is a core meaning (underlying schema) expressed in all the marker's occurrences, a meaning that is thus fully applicable to all the marker's uses. To achieve this aim, a mixed-method approach is used, combining a questionnaire survey and an explanatory sequential test, where both methods involve elicitation techniques probing for semantic judgments, measuring metalinguistic knowledge about le. Based on the results of both tests and an extensive review of the linguistic literature, the key finding is the identification of a core le meaning, namely modal certainty (high/highest degree of speaker certitude concerning the truth of a proposition). Through this discovery and the representation of this core meaning and other le meanings within the functional approach to language (Cognitive Grammar), a crucial step is taken towards a greater understanding of the semantics of le, and, at the same time, an important contribution is made to the broader study of the interconnections between tense, aspect, and epistemic modality.

Department/s

Publishing year

2024

Language

English

Document type

Student publication for Master's degree (two years)

Topic

  • Languages and Literatures

Keywords

  • assertive marker
  • Chinese linguistics
  • epistemic judgment
  • mixed-method approach
  • modal certainty
  • semantic elicitation
  • temporal and modal dimensions
  • unqualified/qualified assertion

Supervisor

  • Niclas Burenhult (Ph.D.)
  • Meiyuan Zhang