(A) Contrastive Study of English and Chinese Demonstratives from a Functional Perspective

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Abstract

The present thesis is devoted to a contrastive study of English and Chinese demonstratives from a functional perspective. As we know, semantically，this corresponds with 这，both as proximal demonstratives; that corresponds with 那，both as distal demonstratives. When used as exophoric reference to indicate the concepts of space and time in the real world, this/that and 这/那 have no much difference between them. But when used as exophoric reference in text, things tend to be complicated. For example, 这 can be used, sometimes, to refer to the event that has just happened, the indication of which, in English, is often realized by that. 这 can also be used by the speaker to refer to something said by his interlocutor, while in English this indication is almost always realized by that. Many linguists have noticed this phenomenon and tried to give some rules to account for this. Among them, Xu Yulong’s study can be said to be a striking one, in that for the first time, the concept of psychological distance is applied in the contrastive study of English and Chinese demonstratives. To account for the above difference between English and Chinese demonstratives, his generalization is that Chinese demonstratives are more affected by psychological distance than English ones when indicating distance in text. Psychological distance, in Chinese, affects the indication of three kinds of distance: spatial, temporal and textual (here textual distance is only used in its restricted sense, that is, the distance between dialogues in text. In fact, since the three kinds of distance are made within the text，all should be viewed as under the greater category of



textual distance); in English，it seems to affect the indication of future time
only. Not agreeing with what Xu has found，the present thesis aims to prove that psychological distance exists in both English and Chinese demonstratives when spatial, temporal and textual distances are to be indicated. It’s hard to say which language is more influenced by psychological distance. For no matter in which language, English or Chinese, the function of demonstratives is always a complex problem.
I will use Halliday’s theory of cohesion as the theoretical foundation of our analysis. The thesis consists of five chapters.
Chapter One: Introduction. Introduce the current situation of the field, point out what the thesis aims to do and its practical value.
Chapter Two: A contrastive study of the systems of English and Chinese demonstratives. In this chapter, we consider how the demonstrative systems of both languages are defined in each language’s traditional grammar.
Chapter Three: A contrastive study of English and Chinese demonstratives from a textual perspective. In this chapter, we shift our attention to the concept of cohesion, an essential component of Halliday’s theory of functional grammar, to discuss how demonstratives work in text.
Chapter Four: A functional interpretation of the difference between English and Chinese demonstratives. The chapter on which most of our efforts are placed is composed of two sections. The first section is a review of Xu Yulong’s contrastive study of English and Chinese demonstratives. The second section is the writer’s own findings, which aims to complement and revise what Xu has found.
Chapter Five: Conclusion. Summarize what we have found about the contrastive study and point out its practical value in translation and language teaching.

국문 초록 (Abstract)

국 문 초 록

영어와중국어의 지시대명사의 의미연구
이 정 영어영문학과 대학원
우석대학교


본 논문은 중국어와 영어의 기능의 관점에서 지시대명사를 비교 분석한 글이다. 중국어의 这와 영어의 this가 다 근칭이고, 那와 that이 원칭이다, 같은 범위가 아닐 때에 그들이 지시한 시간과 공간에서 this/that과 这/那가 큰 차이가 없다, 즉, this와 这는 다 근칭이고, that과 那는 원칭이다. 그러나 같은 범위에서 상황이 좀 복잡해진다.
예를 들면 중국어에서 금방 생긴 일을 말할 때 대명사 这를 쓰는데 영어에서는 that을 써야 한다. 또한, 같은 문장 중에 다른 사람에게 하는 말이나 방금 생길 일을 표현할 때 这가 대명사 역할을 하는데 영어에서 that이 그 역할을 한다. 많은 학자들은 이 차이점에 대한 규칙을 찾고 있다. 그 학자들중에 대표자가 许余龙교수님이다. 许余龙교수님의 관점은 문장의 거리를 가리킬 때는, 중국어의 지시대명사가 영어보다 더 심리거리에 영향을 미친다는 것이다. 즉, 공간거리와 단락거리가 있다는 것이다, 영어의 심리거리는 미래시간를 가리키는 것에만 영향을 미친다.
본 논문은 여러 관점에서 심리거리는 중국어뿐만 아니라 영어에서도 영향을 미친다는 것을 증명한다. 어떤 언어에 영향이 더 큰지 말하기는 어렵다. 영어나 중국어에 지시대명사의 기능이 아주 복잡하다, 본 논문은 5장으로 나눠서 韩礼德교수님의 연결이론을 근거로 하여 지시대명사를 분석연구를 한다.
햄심어: 지시대명사, 심리거리, 기능

목차 (Table of Contents)

• Contents
• Abstract..........................................................................................i
• Chapter One: Introduction 1
• Chapter Two: A contrastive study of the systems of English and Chinese demonstratives 5
• Chapter Three: A contrastive study of English and Chinese demonstratives from a textual perspective.. 9
• 3.1 Halliday’s theory of cohesion
• 3.2 English and Chinese demonstrative
• compared in text
• Chapter Four: A functional interpretation of the difference between English and Chinese demonstratives 21
• 4.1 Review of Xu Yulong’s Study
• 4.2 Further explorations into English and
• Chinese demonstratives from a functional
• perspective
• Chapter Five: Conclusion 45
• Works Cited: 47