汉语事件结构研究(txt+pdf+epub+mobi电子书下载)

作者：孙肇春

出版社：暨南大学出版社

格式: AZW3, DOCX, EPUB, MOBI, PDF, TXT

汉语事件结构研究试读：

前言

本书的研究对象是汉语单语素动词（Mono-morphemic Verbs）的事件结构（Eventuality）。人们普遍认为动词有四种体（Aspect）：状态体（State），行为体（Activity），完成体（Achievement）和完结体（Accomplishment）。在英语中，上述四种体都是在词库（Lexicon）中表达的。但汉语的情况有所不同。由于汉语中的单语素动词没有结点（Telicity），因此汉语只有状态体和行为体是在词库中表达的。那么，汉语中的完成体和完结体是如何表达的呢？这是本书所关注的主要问题。

本书首先从探讨汉语如何表达状态体和行为体开始。状态体和行为体分别具有[ -stages, -telic]和[ +stages, -telic]的特征。由于汉语中单语素动词也具有[ -telic]的特征，因此这两种体在汉语词库中直接表达。我们在这一部分还探讨了状态体和行为体的事件结构（Event Structure），或称词汇关系结构（Lexical Relational Structures）（Hale and Keyser 1991, 1993）。

本书第二部分探讨了汉语如何表达完成体。本文认为，汉语的完成体是通过句法手段来表达的，即在状态动词和行为动词的基础上加上一个体标记词（了，着，到等），如：红了，见到。体标记词用来表达事件的终点（Endpoint），功能相当于事件谓词BECOME，表示状态变化（Inchoative Change of State）。这一部分还讨论了体标记词的共存现象。体标记词相当于一个标界词（Delimiter），表示事件的终结。因此，每个事件只能允许出现一个体标记词作为标界，我们称其为“一个事件一个标界词原则”（One Delimiter Per-Event Principle）。这可以解释为什么一个事件不允许出现多个体标记词。

本书最后部分探讨了汉语如何表达完结体。汉语有两种方式表达完结体：第一种方式是在行为动词上加一个表达结果的体标记词（了，着，到等），如：抓到，吃了，表示事件的结果。这类行为动词必须是可持续性动词，具有[ +stages]特征。表达完结体的另一种途径是动结结构（Resultative Verbal Constructions）。动结结构是复杂事件结构，其中一个事件表示动作（Activity），另一个事件表示结果（Result）。根据语段理论（Phase Theory）（Chomsky 2000），我们认为动结结构是一个vP-壳（vP-Shell）结构，也就是说，动结结构是由两个vP嵌套在一起的，它们是两个独立的语段，在概念结构上蕴涵着致使关系（Causal Relation）。完结体的事件结构可以表达为[CAUSE（DO）BECOME（BE）]，其中CAUSE和BECOME是两个功能语类，DO和BE是两个实体（Entity）。这两个实体间并没有致使关系。它们之间的致使关系是通过功能语类CAUSE和BECOME表达的。根据完结体的事件结构，我们分析了汉语中不同动结结构的句法生成。本书认为，动结结构的释义和歧义现象是由句法结构的差异造成的。完结体的事件结构可以给汉语中的“得”字结构和英语的动结结构一个统一的解释。本书在结语部分提出两个值得思考的问题：第一个问题是“论元结构（Argument Structure）是什么”；第二个问题是“论元结构在哪里”。对于这两个问题，人们看法不同。站在乔姆斯基生成语法的角度，我们认为论元结构是句法结构（Syntactic Structure）的一部分，论元结构生成于句法结构。

Abstract

This book is dedicated to a research on the eventuality of Mandarin Chinese（MC）. It is acknowledged that state, activity, achievement and accomplishment are the four basic aspectual types of verbs. In some languages like English, the four lexical aspects are denoted in the Lexicon, but in other languages, such as in MC, this is not the case. As we know, the mono-morphemic verbs in MC are void of telicity. And due to this property, we claim that they can only denote the eventuality of state and activity in the Lexicon. Then, how MC denotes the eventuality of achievement and accomplishment arouses our interest.

Our study begins from how state and activity are denoted in the Lexicon in the verbal system of MC. Meanwhile, the event structure of them have been explored. Then, the book proceeds to explore how achievement and accomplishment are denoted in MC. Through our study, we have found that MC has to take advantage of grammatical means to denote the two eventualities: to denote achievement, MC has to add aspect markers to shift the eventuality of state or activity into achievement. Aspect markers function as the eventuality predicate BECOME, which denotes the inchoative change of state; to denote accomplishment, MC has mainly two ways—one is to add aspect markers to activity verbs to denote a result, and the other is to make use of resultative verbal constructions（RVCs）. RVCs are complex events which denote accomplishment, with one subevent denoting a cause event and the other subevent denoting a result event. The formation of RVCs can be accommodated in our accomplishment event structure. In addition to RVCs, we have found that DE constructions and English resultative constructions can also be accommodated in the accomplishment event structure. Our book comes to a conclusion that in MC state and activity are denoted in the Lexicon and achievement and accomplishment are denoted in syntax.

Key words: eventuality; state; activity; achievement; accomplishment;lexical aspect; grammatical aspect

Introduction

This book studies the eventuality{L-End}of Mandarin Chinese（MC）. Specifically, it is dedicated to how MC denotes the four types of eventuality proposed by Vendler（1957, 1967）. According to Vendler（1957, 1967）, English verbs are of four aspectual classes: state, activity, achievement and accomplishment. In contrast, the mono-morphemic verbs in MC can only denote two lexical aspects—state and activity. This contrast motivates us to carry out the present study.

Our study is done within the Principles and Parameters（P&P）framework in the spirit of MP（Minimalist Program）（Chomsky 1995, 2000）. Chomsky（1995）articulates an extremely stringent hypothesis about the architecture of FL（Faculty of Language）: Universal Grammar has only one computational system and any variation between languages reduces to differences in the lexical items that enter the computational system. Our study in this book can be a very good annotation of his hypothesis.

This book, which consists of five parts, is structured as follows：

In

Chapter One

Chapter Two discusses how MC denotes the event types of state and activity. An examination of the properties of the verbs in MC shows that the mono-morphemic verbs in MC are void of telicity, which leads to the fact that there are only two lexical aspects in MC: state and activity. That is to say, mono-morphemic verbs in MC cannot denote the event types of achievement and accomplishment, both of which are telic. Then, we discuss how the event types of state and activity are realized in MC. The eventuality of state is denoted by adjectives and stative verbs, and the eventuality of activity by activity verbs. In addition, we explore the inner structure, i. e. the event structure, of the two eventualities in line with Hale and Keyser' s（1993）Lexical Relational Structures（LRSs）.

Chapter Three is devoted to the study of the achievement eventuality, which cannot be denoted in the Lexicon as mono-morphemic verbs in MC are void of telicity. According to our research, to denote achievement, MC has to make use of syntactic devices by adding to an adjective or an instantaneous activity verb aspect markers like le, dao, zhao, qilai, etc., which shift the eventuality of state or activity into achievement. Our study finds that aspect markers function as delimiters which indicate the telicity of an event. We propose the principle of One Delimiter Per-Event Constraint（ODPEC）which claims that one event only allows one delimiter indicating the endpoint of the event. We also discuss the co-existence of aspect markers in one sentence.

Chapter Four is a study on the eventuality of accomplishment in MC. According to our study, this eventuality can be realized in two ways, which are both syntactic. The first is to add aspect markers, like le, dao, zhao, etc., to activity verbs to shift their eventuality into accomplishment. The other way is to resort to Resultative Verbal Constructions（RVCs）, which are our foci of study in this chapter. RVCs are complex events composed of two subevents, which entail a causal relation: one denotes the cause and the other denotes the result. We propose that the two subevents, each headed by light verb v, form a vP-shell structure, denoting an accomplishment event. We analyze the syntactic structure of four types of RVCs on the basis of the accomplishment event structure. Our study shows that the argument structures of the four RVCs are different, which explains why some RVCs have more than one interpretation. Before ending the chapter, we touch on the event structure of English Resultative Constructions（ERCs）, the aim of which is to find a unified account of the resultative constructions in different languages.

Chapter Five gives the conclusion of the study.Chapter One

Approaches to Eventuality: A Review

Introduction

The study on eventuality dates back to the time of Aristotle, who distinguished kineseis（movement）and energiai（actualities）both in Metaphysics（1048）and in Nicomadean Ethics（1074）. The two categories roughly correspond to“accomplishment”and“activity/state”（Kenny 1963, Dowty 1979）. Since then, eventuality has attracted the attention of many philosophers and linguists. In this chapter, we shall review two mainstreams of approaches to eventuality. One is the“template approach”represented by Vendler（1957, 1967）, and the other is the“decompositional approach”represented by McCawley（1968）, Dowty（1979）, Hale and Keyser（henceforth, H&K 1991, 1993）, Huang（1991, 1997）, and Lin（2001）.

This chapter is structured as follows: in section

1.1

Vendlerian Aspectual Classification of Verbs

In this section, we will introduce Vendler' s aspectual classification of English verbs. This section consists of six subsections: in 1.1.1, we give a general introduction to the four aspectual classes of verbs in English; in the next four subsections, from 1.1.2 to 1.1.5, we examine the properties of state, activity, accomplishment, and achievement respectively; in 1.1.6, we give a summary.

1.1.1 General Introduction to Vendler' s Aspectual Classes of Verbs

The classic twentieth-century philosophical sources for classifying verbs into aspectual classes{L-End}are Ryle（1949）, Vendler（1957, 1967）, and Kenny（1963）. Ryle（1949）crucially distinguishes between the event types of achievement and accomplishment: accomplishment denotes a change of state which has some“task”associated with it, whereas achievement involves a change of state without such an associated task, i. e. the bare change of state itself. Kenny（1963）ignores Ryle' s（1949）distinction and concentrates on the differences between state, activity and performance, where performance indicates an event which has a natural endpoint. Actually, he is concerned mainly about accomplishment, and tacitly he would probably categorize achievement as performance.

Vendler' s（1957, 1967）classification of verbs into state, activity, achievement, and accomplishment{L-End}, encompassing both Ryle' s（1949）and Kenny' s（1963）intuitions, has proved very fruitful, probably the most influential in the relevant linguistic research over the last 40 years, and it provides the basis for Dowty' s（1979）seminal semantic analysis. Dowty（1979）discusses and develops Vendler' s（1957, 1967）classification of verbal predicates into four different classes according to their logical entailments, interactions with temporal modifiers, and interactions with tense, though he retains the same terminology. Our study on eventuality in MC is based mainly on Vendler' s（1957, 1967）and Dowty' s（1979）classification of aspectual classes of verbs. Roughly, in Dowty' s sense, states are non-dynamic situations, such as be ill or feel; activities are open-ended processes, such as cry or run; achievements are near instantaneous events which are over as soon as they have begun, such as see or notice; and accomplishments are processes which have a natural endpoint, such as build a house or read a book. The examples in（1）are given by Dowty（1979:54）.（1）

The four aspectual types above are referred to as“lexical aspect”, which is different from“grammatical aspect”. Lexical aspect, sometimes called situation aspect or“aktionsart”, covers distinctions between properties of event types denoted by verbal expressions, which linguists have tried to capture by classifying verbs into verb classes. Grammatical aspect, sometimes called viewpoint aspect, concerns the distinction in perspective on events, in particular the contrast between perfective and imperfective. The distinction between lexical aspect and grammatical aspect is quite essential since the interaction of them is an important and fascinating question, but it is beyond the scope of this book{L-End}. This book is concerned about lexical aspect and the properties we can ascribe to event types in the denotations of particular lexical items.

The four-way Vendlerian classification of eventuality entails two crucial properties of eventuality, that is, whether an event type has a natural endpoint（whether it is telic）and whether it is progressing or developing（whether it is dynamic, or has stages）. We will discuss the properties themselves before going on to look at the aspectual classes of verbs.

The first property [± telic] targets the Aristotelian distinction kineseis vs. energiai. Eventuality of the first kind is [+telic], and it is a movement towards an endpoint where the properties of the endpoint are determined by the description of the event. Eventuality of the second kind is [-telic]. Once it has started, it can go on indefinitely, since the nature of the eventuality itself does not determine its endpoint（the telic point is often called the“culmination”or“set terminal point”）. The property [± telic] groups the event types of state and activity together on the one hand, and achievement and accomplishment on the other. In other words, achievement and accomplishment are [+telic] and state and activity are [-telic].

Krifka（1986, 1989, 1992, 1998）goes further to give a precise characterization of telicity. He characterizes a predicate as telic if the following holds（1998:207）：（2）If e is in the denotation of X, then all parts of e（subevents of e）which are also in the denotation of X must have the same starting and stopping points.

Krifka（1998）identifies cumulativity and quantization as crucial properties of verbal predicates which lead to atelicity and telicity respectively. Here we do not intend to go to the details of his framework.

The second property, which is important in characterizing the Vendlerian classes of verbs, is[± stages], i. e. whether the verbs can appear in the progressive. States and traditional achievements（Vendler 1957, 1967; Dowty 1979）generally do not appear in the progressive{L-End}, while activities and accomplishments do, as illustrated in（3）：（3）a. ∗John is believing in the afterlife/loving Mary.（state）

b. ∗Mary is recognizing John/losing her pen.（achievement）

c. Mary is running/walking.（activity）

d. John is reading a book.（? ）（Rothstein 2004:11. ex.14）

A sentence with a verb in the progressive asserts that an eventuality of a particular kind is in progress or going on. States do not go on or progress because they are inherently non-dynamic, and achievements do not go on or progress, because they are near instantaneous and are over as soon as they begin. In other words, achievements are too short and therefore they do not extend over time and thus their stages cannot be distinguished. States, on the other hand, are long enough, but they are non-dynamic so that every bit is exactly the same as every other bit and therefore no stages can be distinguished.

Thus we have two crucial aspectual properties which can be used to distinguish the four verb classes, i. e. whether or not they naturally head telic VPs—[ ± telic], and whether or not they naturally occur with the progressive— [ ± stages]. The two properties lead to the classification in（4）{L-End}.（4）States: [ -telic, -stages]

Activities: [ -telic, +stages]

Achievements: [ +telic, -stages]

Accomplishments: [ +telic, +stages]

According to the properties listed in（4）, we can get a clear picture of the event type pattern as shown below.（5）（Rothstein 2004:12. ex.16）

The table in（5）should make predictions about the possibilities of aspectual shift—the shift of one eventuality type to another. For instance, states share one feature with both activities and achievements, but none with accomplishments, and thus we would expect prima facie that it would be easier to coerce or shift a state event into either an activity or an achievement rather than into an accomplishment, and this seems to be the case, since state shares one property with activity and achievement. A second prediction of the two-feature system above concerns how many classes of verbs there are, since n features will generate 2n classes. It gives us a way to address the question why we have the particular lexical classes that we do now.

Having talked about the two basic features of event types, we will now have a closer look at each of the aspectual classes of verbs.

1.1.2 States

States, or stative eventualities, are cumulative and non-dynamic, i. e. [ -telic, -stages]. Both stative verbs and adjectival predicates can denote stative eventuality. States are [ -telic], since we cannot find a natural endpoint once a state starts. States are clearly cumulative; for instance, if John was in the state of loving Mary from 1980 to 1989, he was in the same state during that decade. We cannot identify stages in the development of a state, and thus a state is non-dynamic and [ -stages]. Rothstein（2004: 15）gives the following classic tests for identifying states.

First, stative eventualities do not generally occur in the progressive：（6）a. ∗John is believing in afterlife.

b. John is crying.

Secondly, stative eventualities in simple present tense have a non-frequentive, non-habitual reading, which is impossible for any other verb class：（7）a. John believes in afterlife.

b. John cries.（7a）only denotes the present state of John while（7b）expresses a habitual action. The contrast between them is that believe in（7a）is a verb denoting a state event, but cry in（7b）denotes an activity event.

Thirdly, stative eventualities do not generally occur in the complement of force and persuade：（8）a. ∗John forced Harry to know the truth.

b. John forced Harry to open the door.

Fourthly, stative eventualities do not generally occur as imperatives：（9）a. ∗Know the truth.

b. Open the door.

Fifthly, stative eventualities do not generally occur with the adverbs deliberately, carefully and willingly, or any other adverb indicating agentivity：（10）a. ∗John deliberately believed in afterlife.

b. John deliberately opened the door.

Finally, stative eventualities do not generally occur in pseudo-cleft constructions：（11）a. ∗What John did was know the truth.

b. What John did was open the door.

1.1.3 Activities

Activities have the feature [ -telic, +stages]. The eventuality of activity is atelic since an activity can continue indefinitely without any endpoint. Activities can also occur naturally in the progressive, which indicates that they can be analyzed into stages. Activities are cumulative. For instance, if John ran from 2 p. m. to 3 p. m., and from 3 p. m. to 4 p. m., we can reasonably assert that there was one event of his running from 2 p. m. to 4 p. m. . Of course, we may also distinguish two events of running within that time（perhaps he ran in two different races）, but in any cases, the assertion that John ran from 2 p. m. to 4 p. m. is true. Both states and activities are atelic, but they differ with respect to whether they have stages. Both activities and accomplishments share the same property [ +stages], and therefore they can both occur naturally in the progressive.

1.1.4 Accomplishments

Accomplishments have the feature [ +telic, +stages]. They are telic, and thus they behave differently from both states and activities. On the other hand, they have stages, and so they are like activities. Typical examples of accomplishment eventualities are given in（12）：（12）a. John ate an apple.

b. Mary built the house.

c. Bill painted the picture.

Intuitively, an accomplishment is an activity which moves toward a finishing point or“set terminal point”or“telic point”. An accomplishment event is a noncumulative activity, which has an internally determined point at which it ends. For instance, an accomplishment event of“John eating an apple”entails that the event is over when the apple is eaten up. This property is generalized by Krifka（1986）as [ +quantized].

As has just been discussed, while telicity distinguishes accomplishments from activities and states, accomplishments share

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