Karen Steffen Chung | National Taiwan University (original) (raw)

Papers by Karen Steffen Chung

Language, 2005

This book is designed as a university-level textbook for German-speaking students of phonetics wh... more This book is designed as a university-level textbook for German-speaking students of phonetics who come from liberal arts backgrounds and are relatively weak in math and physics. While somewhat similar in coverage and tone to Peter Ladefoged's Elements of acoustic phonetics (2nd edn., Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), it includes materials not in Elements or most other books of this type, such as detailed information on the hearing mechanism. Reetz manages to make difficult material extremely accessible, ...

CHAPTER IV: EMBEDDED COMPOUND VERBS 4.1 TYPES OF COMPOUND VERBS WITH EMBEDDING 4.2 LEXICAL ASPECT... more CHAPTER IV: EMBEDDED COMPOUND VERBS 4.1 TYPES OF COMPOUND VERBS WITH EMBEDDING 4.2 LEXICAL ASPECT 4.2.1 Defining and exemplifying lexical aspect 4.2.2. Inceptive action: The aspect markers: 起 qi 3 'to rise', 啟 qi 3 'to open', 興 xing 1 'to activate', 創 chuang 4 'to create' 4.2.3 From concrete to aspectual verb: 開 kai 1 'to open' and 發 fa 1 'to emit' 4.2.4 Inceptive aspect compounds with miscellaneous verbs: TABLE OF CONTENTS vi 就 jiu 4 'to realize', 承 cheng 2 ' to assume', 獲 huo and 得 de 2 'to obtain, get', 行 xing 2 'carry out', 作 zuo 4 'to do' 4.2.5 Embedded compounds formed with the light verb 打 da 3 'to strike' 4.2.6 Terminative aspect: 停 ting 2 'to stop', 止 zhi 3 'to stop', 休 xiu 1 'to stop, suspend, rest', 斷 duan 4 'to break off, sever', 拒 ju 4 'to resist, refuse', 防 fang 2 'to prevent'; 失 shi 1 'to lose, fail to' 162 4.2.7 Continuative or resumptive action: 續 xu 4 and 繼 ji 4 'to continue, renew' 4.2.8 Additive and supplemental aspect: 加 jia 1 and 增 zeng 1 'to add on to, do additionally, do anew'; 補 bu 3 'to compensate for, supplement' 4.2.9 Commutative action: 改 gai 3 'to change', 換 huan 4 'to change, to trade one thing in for another', 轉 zhuan 3 'to transfer to' 4.3 LEXICAL PASSIVE COMPOUNDS 4.4 LEXICAL CAUSATIVE AND PASSIVE-CAUSATIVE COMPOUNDS 4.4.1 Lexical causatives 4.4.2 Passive-causatives: Emissive compound verbs 4.4.3 'Available for'

Booij says these are "pieces of morphological structure, just like the constituents of compounds.... more Booij says these are "pieces of morphological structure, just like the constituents of compounds." These are usually less controversial, but it is sometimes hard to draw clear morphemic boundaries, e.g. what about-ca-in intensification?

Asian English Language Classrooms

Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique

Language, 2002

Collocational and idiomatic aspects of composite predicates in the history of English. Ed. by LAU... more Collocational and idiomatic aspects of composite predicates in the history of English. Ed. by LAUREL J. BRINTON and MINOJI AKIMOTO. (Studies in language companion series.) Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1999. Pp. xii, 283. This book, a follow-up volume to Brinton's 1998 The development of English aspectual systems: Aspectualizers and post-verbal particles (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), introduces a fresh historical angle to the growing literature on English compound verbs. The seven papers plus introduction by Japanese and Western scholars cover the development of complex verbs from Old to Late Modern English. The main collocation types examined in this volume are light verb + deverbal noun, such as do a report, make a call, give an answer; and verb + postverbal particle, e.g. write down, dust off, think over, which often express Aktionsart, or lexical rather than syntactic aspect. The first paper, which is by the editors, presents interesting representative examples of Old English collocations with verbs such as (ge)macian 'make', sellan, giefan 'give', habban 'have', and (ge)niman, tacan 'take' + N, and concludes that this type of construction is a native development in English which was reinforced by a parallel form in Latin. The second paper, by MEIKO MATSUMOTO, continues an examination of the development of these verb types in Middle English. By this time the construction has become partially but not highly idiomatiticized, a feature partly revealed by the use of adjectival as opposed to adverbial modification of the expression. In Ch. 4, the third paper, HARUMI TANABE examines 'Composite predicates and phrasal verbs in The Paston Letters', a collection of letters and documents from the late fifteenth century. Tanabe does a frequency count and analysis of the various light verb + N constructions, noting the incidence of modifiers such as zero article, possessive pronouns, and adjectives, and the low frequency of passivization of this construction type. RISTO HILTUNEN picks up the developmental thread for the Early Modern English period in Ch. 5, basing her observations mainly on a corpus of dramatic, poetic and prose texts. Hiltunen identifies four patterns in the constructions based on article use and plurality. For Ch. 6, MERJA KYTÖ conducted a corpus-based study of the light verbs make, have, give, take, and do for the same period, taking special note of similarities and differences between the verbs and their use. Included is an appendix listing which deverbal nouns appear with which verbs. Co-editor Akimoto wrote a comparable chapter for the Late Modern English period, also taking into consideration prepositional phrases such as in connection with and with regard to. Ch. 8, by ELIZABETH CLOSS TRAUGOTT, offers 'A historical overview of complex predicate types'. This chapter summarizes major events in the evolution of this construction type for each period, putting each development into historical perspective. An impressive collection of references for the entire volume appears in the back of the book, and there is a short general index, something not always provided in collections of papers. This carefully and attractively produced volume promises to be a valuable resource to scholars with a particular interest in the growth and enrichment of the English language through complex verb development.

Language, 2006

Información del artículo Writing Panare: Portrait of a linguist on fieldwork (video).

Bulletin of the College of Liberal Arts, National Taiwan University, Jan 1, 1994

In this study we examine a class of exocentric nominal compounds (i.e. compounds with an une... more In this study we examine a class of exocentric nominal compounds (i.e. compounds with an unexpressed noun head) in Spanish, French, and Chinese. This class consists of nominal compounds formed by a verb plus a noun complement, usually though not necessarily a direct object, which combine to describe a function or characteristic of a new whole. In the three languages studied here, compounds of this type tend to fall into three semantic groups: (1) utilitarian objects, such as ‘paperweights’ and ‘armrests’, which are perhaps best and most easily described by their functions; (2) specialized professions, like ‘drivers’ and ‘switchmen’; plus a subcategory of often pejorative, tongue-in-cheek descriptions of certain types of people, like ‘wet blankets’ and ‘quack dentists’; and (3) plants and animals.

The fact that languages in such diverse families as Indo-European and Sino-Tibetan – selectively comparing, however, only SVO languages – exhibit the same type of compound, and use it to indicate extremely similar referents, suggests that certain objects with a prominent function or peculiar characteristic (e.g. an umbrella, the main function of which is to protect one from the rain) are more likely than words not of this type to be expressed in a Verb + Noun exocentric compound, in languages in which this compound type commonly occurs. This is also true of profession names, in which function is an outstanding element, as well as of certain types of people, who are identified chiefly by a particular characteristic (such as being a ‘fight-picker’), and plants and animals possessing some salient feature.

A similar compound type occurs in Burmese and Persian, both SOV languages, but in an inverted Noun + Verb format, bearing out Comrie’s (1989) observation that the syntax of a language is reflected in its morphology.

It is simply that the Greek thinkers on language, and on the problems raised by linguistic invest... more It is simply that the Greek thinkers on language, and on the problems raised by linguistic investigations, initiated in Europe the studies that we can call linguistic science in its widest sense, and that this science was a continuing focus of interest from ancient Greece until the present day in an unbroken succession of scholarship, wherein each worker was conscious of and in some way reacting to the work of predecessors.

Concentric: Studies in Linguistics, Jan 1, 2006

Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, Jan 1, 2006

Hypercorrection in Taiwan Mandarin Karen Steffen Chung National Taiwan University Abstract ... more Hypercorrection in Taiwan Mandarin

Karen Steffen Chung
National Taiwan University

Abstract

In spite of a widening acceptance of attenuated retroflexed initials (zh-, ch- sh-) in Taiwan Mandarin today, there is a parallel movement in seemingly the opposite direction: a growing use of the retroflexed initials in certain contexts. A conflict between the two trends often surfaces in the form of hypercorrection, that is, incorrect substitution of the retroflexed initials for the corresponding dental initials (z-, c-, s-). Labov (1973) observed a trend toward a similar kind of phonetic hypercorrection in New York City English, mainly among the upwardly-aspiring lower middle class. Though this group is also especially susceptible to the use of hypercorrect forms in Taiwan, people in all walks of life with all levels of education have been observed to use hypercorrect forms. This demonstrates, first, that the textbook forms of the retroflexed vs. dental initials are learned imperfectly by a wide spectrum of speakers of Taiwan Mandarin; second, that the retroflexed initials retain a certain cachet in marking speech as more prestigious and authoritative; and third, that retroflexion, hypercorrect or otherwise, has for many people taken on the function of simply marking formal discourse, in addition to its use for disambiguation, highlighting, and stylistic effect.

Language change in East Asia, Jan 1, 2001

The process itself is called 'borrowing', but this term requires some caution. Thus, that which i... more The process itself is called 'borrowing', but this term requires some caution. Thus, that which is 'borrowed' does not have to be paid back; the donor makes no sacrifice and does not have to be asked for permission. Indeed, nothing changes hands; the donor goes on speaking as before, and only the borrower's speech is altered. (Hockett 1958: 402) This is of course not always true. Some of China's loans to Japan were in fact paid back -after a fashion.

Abstract This is a study of the structure and properties of compound verbs in Mandarin Chinese... more Abstract

This is a study of the structure and properties of compound verbs in Mandarin Chinese. The Mandarin lexicon has not been widely studied in the way that Mandarin syntax has, perhaps because of a popular notion that compounds are a kind of “black box”, in which “lexicalization” is explanation enough for the way the components of compounds are put together. In fact, equivalents of many of the same features that typify Mandarin syntax, such as instrumental, aspectual, and passive constructions, are to be found on the lexical level as well.

By excluding separable structures such as Verb-Object phrases and resultative and directional constructions, we are able to establish, first, that verbs, like nouns, are invariably right-headed, i.e. modifiers always precede what they modify; and also that compound verbs with relatively few exceptions are disyllabic.

We divide compound verbs into subordinate, coordinate, embedded, and other miscellaneous compound verb types, based on the contextual part of speech of the component morphemes and their relationship with each other.

Subordinate compound verbs are found to exhibit an extensive system of verbal prefixation, contradicting the popular idea that there are few examples of affixation in Mandarin. Different relative position in a coordinate compound verb sometimes distinguishes different senses of the same morpheme. Included among embedded compound verbs we find lexical aspectual, passive, and causative structures. Aspectual matrix verbs in initial position are found to express intentioned, purposeful action, in contrast to complements of resultative constructions, which indicate a natural outcome of an action. Many of the compound verb types in the “other types” category, such as resultative compounds and transitive VO compounds, mirror other structural types; a few are foreign imports.

While most of the examples given in this study are established lexical items, new analogical formations continue to be created.

In short, separability serves as a clear criterion of what is and is not a compound verb in Mandarin. And in general, Mandarin compound verbs are found to strictly follow rules very similar to those of Mandarin syntax, with word order the most important guiding principle.

Language, Jan 1, 2002

C’s key conclusion is that ‘generics must not be evaluated in isolation, but rather with respect ... more C’s key conclusion is that ‘generics must not be evaluated in isolation, but rather with respect to a set of alternatives under consideration.’ (191) Furthermore, generics ‘are systematically ambiguous between readings,’ e.g. the sentence The Frenchman eats horsemeat. may be making a statement about a custom current among a small number of French people, or may refer to a specific individual. C claims that ‘the notion of alternatives under discussion can account for both.’