Coherence and Extraction from Adjuncts in Chinese (original) (raw)

Coherence Relations and Clause Linkage: Towards a Discourse Approach to Adjunct Islands in Chinese

This paper proposes that adjunct island effects (Ross, 1967; Cattell, 1976) receive a discourse-semantic explanation. The exact formulation of this explanation builds upon previous work (e.g. Kehler, 2002) on island effects of conjuncts (Ross, 1967), which explains asymmetrical extraction from coordinate structures in English (that is, violations of the coordinate structure constraint) in terms of certain coherence relations (Hobbs, 1979). I show that asymmetric extraction from adjuncts in Chinese (that is, violations of the adjunct island constraint) is also sensitive to coherence relations. I argue that such similarities exist because coherence relations may be expressed by either a coordinative and a subordinative structure, and the variation in the syntactic realizations of coherence relations can be characterized through an independently motivated interclausal relations hierarchy that governs the mapping between semantics and syntactic linkage (van Valin, 2005).

Coherence relation and clause linkage

Studies in Language, 2015

This paper proposes that adjunct island effects (Ross, 1967; Cattell, 1976) receive a discourse-semantic explanation. The exact formulation of this explanation builds upon previous work (e.g. Kehler, 2002) on island effects of conjuncts (Ross, 1967), which explains asymmetrical extraction from coordinate structures in English (that is, violations of the coordinate structure constraint) in terms of certain coherence relations (Hobbs, 1979). I show that asymmetric extraction from adjuncts in Chinese (that is, violations of the adjunct island constraint) is also sensitive to coherence relations. I argue that such similarities exist because coherence relations may be expressed by either a coordinative or a subordinative structure, and the variation in the syntactic realizations of coherence relations can be characterized through an independently motivated interclausal relations hierarchy that governs the mapping between semantics and syntactic linkage (van Valin, 2005).

On the Extractability of Adjuncts in Chinese Relative Clauses

This study attempts to explain the inconsistent acceptability judgments resulting from the extraction of the object of adjunct PPs in Chinese relative clauses. The facts observed is that the extraction of arguments and the object of obligatory adjunct PPs is always judged to be acceptable, whereas the extraction of the object of optional adjunct PPs is sometimes judged to be acceptable and sometimes unacceptable. Such an inconsistency is in contrast to the uniform pattern of acceptability judgment predicted by a syntactic analysis. In this study, a syntactic-pragmatic account is proposed which can better explain the observed facts and is compatible with the Minimalist Program (MP). This study shows that extractions of the object of optional adjunct PPs are syntactically legitimate and the related inconsistent judgments can be resolved by pragmatics. Particularly, a successful enrichment of a structure ensures a correct interpretation of an utterance which in turn entails an acceptab...

Adjuncts and the theory of phrase structure

Manuscript, University of Florence, 1995

la thia article I ah~ll ftrat review the ava1lable ev1dence concerning the poa1t1on of adverbial&. I shall conclude that the claaa1cal X-bar thuoret1cal approach to co~plex adverbials. in term• o1 r1ght adJunction, accounts adequately for the data. On the contrary. Kayne's (1994) and Shomsky's (1995) constraints aga1nst right adjunction lead to serious problems.

Grammatical roles, Coherence Relations, and the interpretation of pronouns in Chinese

Lingua Sinica, 2016

This paper reports on an experimental study of the interpretation of pronouns in Chinese which provides additional support for the proposal in Yang et al. (1999, 2003) that the resolution of pronominal reference in Chinese is more influenced by syntactic information than often assumed in approaches to discourse anaphora in Chinese such as Li and Thompson (1979), Givon (1983), Chen (1986), Christensen (2000), and Pu (2011), where the interpretation of such elements is solely attributed to semantic, pragmatic, and discourse structure-related factors. The paper makes use of a series of sentence completion tasks, adapted from Kehler and Rohde (2013) for Chinese, to try to tease apart the often complex roles played by syntactic position, Coherence Relations, and discourse structure.

On nominal islands and LF extraction in Chinese

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 1994

Evidence from Chinese Wh-questions strongly suggests that LF locality is a matter of referentiality and nominality, while locality in overt syntax involves the requirement of head government. This observation echoes the SVLIT ECP approach of WAHL (1987). Specifically, Chinese arguments and referential adjuncts (when, where, instrumental how and purpose why) contrast with nonreferential adjuncts (manner how and reason why) in allowing wide-scope construals out of islands in LF. Overt Wh-fronting, on the other hand, displays an argument/adjunct asymmetry. This paper proposes to deal with the LF asymmetry within the Generalized Binding framework, in association with the referentiatlnoureferential distinction among Wh-etements. With the ECP reduced to the OENERALlZED BINmN(~ VmNCIVLES (GBPs), it further argues for a type of locality employing the notion of CHECKPOINTS instead of BARRIERS, according to which the [N] feature is checked along with the [WH] feature through Comp-indexing. Consequently, nominal clauses are always islands for nonnominal/nonreferential adjuncts, because either selectional restrictions or the GBPs will be violated by longdistance extraction. This move is independently motivated by a parallel asymmetry in Chinese (non)bridge-verb constructions.

Syntactic Change in Chinese and the Argument-Adjunct Asymmetry

2010

The word order in Chinese has always been SVO, from the earliest attested documents (14-11 c. BC) up to Modern Mandarin. Examined carefully, the observed SOV cases in pre-Archaic Chinese turn out to either involve focalization of the object or object pronouns in the context of negation. Importantly, both structures observe head-complement order, i.e. a pattern consistent with VO. This removes any coherent basis for the claim that pre-Archaic Chinese was a SOV language. Against this background of stable VO order, important changes can, however, be observed for the distribution of adjunct phrases, from both preand postverbal position in pre-Archaic Chinese to exclusively preverbal position in Modern Mandarin, reflecting changes in the format of the vP.

Grammatical Constructions and Chinese Discourse

This chapter begins with a brief overview of the place of discourse in the recent history of linguistics. Following this I will provide a synopsis of research on the interaction of discourse and grammar in Chinese, outlining studies concerned with the ways in which discourse shapes the structure, organization, and usage patterns of grammatical constructions, as well as studies that examine the ways in which grammatical constructions contribute to the construction of discourse and the management of conversation in social interaction. Against this larger background I will then offer a critical discussion of research of the Mandarin shì…de construction. This part of the chapter aims to illustrate the centrality of discourse context to a pragmatically adequate account of grammatical constructions, and to highlight the importance of bridging semantic abstraction and pragmatic elaboration in a functional discourse analysis of grammar.