Tense and Aspect in Han Period Chinese: A Linguistic Analysis of the ’Shiji’

538 Pages·2014·4.49 MB·English

by  Barbara Meisterernst

Barbara Meisterernst
Tense and Aspect in Han Period Chinese
Trends in Linguistics
Studies and Monographs
Editor
Volker Gast
Editorial Board
Walter Bisang
Jan Terje Faarlund
Hans Henrich Hock
Natalia Levshina
Heiko Narrog
Matthias Schlesewsky
Amir Zeldes
Niina Ning Zhang
Editor responsible for this volume
Walter Bisang
Volume 274
Trends in Linguistics
Studies and Monographs
Editor
Volker Gast
Editorial Board
Walter Bisang
Jan Terje Faarlund
Hans Henrich Hock
Natalia Levshina
Heiko Narrog
Matthias Schlesewsky
Amir Zeldes
Niina Ning Zhang
Editor responsible for this volume
Walter Bisang
Volume 274
Barbara Meisterernst
Tense and Aspect
in Han Period
Chinese
A Linguistic Analysis of the ‘Shĭjì’
DE GRUYTER
MOUTON
ISBN978-3-11-033932-1
e-ISBN(PDF)978-3-11-033954-3
e-ISBN(EPUB)978-3-11-039401-6
ISSN1861-4302
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Acknowledgments
A detailed study of the extended verb phrase with all its arguments and ad-
juncts in Pre-Medieval Chinese, of which the present study is the first part, was
inspired first by my late teacher Ulrich Unger and later by my contact with the
researchers at the Centre de Recherches Linguistiques sur l’Asie Orientale,
CNRS, in Paris. In its initial stage, this study was made possible by a grant from
the Lise-Meitner foundation which generously supported the first three years of
my research and enabled me to visit several international conferences where I
was able to meet with fellow scholars and to discuss with and be advised by
them. Without this grant it would not have been possible to continue my re-
search after my Ph.D and I am deeply grateful to the Lise-Meitner foundation for
their financial support. The application to the Lise-Meitner foundation was
encouraged and supported by Reinhard Emmerich who also gave me the oppor-
tunity to teach at the Institute of Sinology in Münster for several years which
was a very enlightening experience for me. I would like to express my apprecia-
tion for his encouragement. After my grant was finished Alain Peyraube and
Redouane Djamouri of the CRLAO in Paris suggested that I apply for a post-doc
position in their centre in Paris and gave me all the help and support to contin-
ue my research work during my time there and since then. They enabled me to
participate in several projects, amongst them one – under the responsibility of
Feng Li – which was devoted to the analysis of tense and aspect in Chinese. This
project also financed a one-month sojourn at the Beijing Daxue. Between 2005
and 2008 an ACI project under the responsibility of my friend and colleague
Walli Paul allowed me to continue my close contact with my friends and col-
leagues in Paris, in particular with Walli Paul and Redouane Djamouri with who
I had many fruitful discussions. It also funded several short stays in China and
enabled me to continue to visit international conferences to present my research
work there. My particular thanks for all this support go to Walli Paul, Redouane
Djamouri and Alain Peyraube, but also to all the other friends and colleagues in
the CRLAO who always gave me a warm welcome when I came and always
found a desk for me to work at. Without the frequent discussions with Walli
Paul on syntactic issues in particular this book would have looked quite differ-
ently and I am very grateful for her continuous help. Additionally I would like to
thank Alain Peyraube and Xu Dan for giving me the opportunity to present
some of my research in their classes. My particular thanks go to the University
of Hamburg and especially to Michael Friedrich for accepting this study as a
Habilitation thesis in June 2012. The final shape of the book profits greatly from
the many discussions I had with my friend Edith Aldridge in particular during
vi | Acknowledgments
two stays at the University of Washington in 2012 financed by the German Re-
search Council (DFG) within my project on Aspect and Modality in Pre-Tang
Chinese; I profited greatly from her expertise in the syntax of Classical Chinese
and from her help and support. I would also like to thank all those who gave me
advice at the conferences where I presented first results of my research work.
Here I would like to mention in particular Christoph Harbsmeier and Jiang
Shaoyu who always made valuable comments on my presentations. I would
also like to thank Prof. Jiang Shaoyu for all the help and support he gave me
during my stay at the Beijing Daxue in 2005. For the technical preparation of the
final version of the book I am particularly grateful to Elisabeth Schulze, secre-
tary in the Seminar of East Asian Studies at the Humboldt University, Berlin and
to our student assistant Kai David Olsen who was most helpful in the final stage
of the preparation of the manuscript for printing. Finally, I have to thank Des-
mond Durkin-Meisterernst – who also corrected my English – and my daughters
Maria and Charlotte who allowed me to be away so often for my work in Paris
and to spend so much time at conferences; without their support it would not
have been possible to finish this book. Scientifically I remain deeply indebted to
my late teacher Ulrich Unger who always insisted on being precise in the analy-
sis of the grammar of Classical Chinese.
Contents
Acknowledgements | v
List of abbreviatons | xi
1 General introduction | 1(cid:3)
1.1 Topic | 1(cid:3)
1.2 The text | 3(cid:3)
2 The category tense | 8(cid:3)
2.1 The present tense | 11(cid:3)
2.2 The past tense | 12(cid:3)
2.3 The future tense | 13(cid:3)
3 The category aspect | 15(cid:3)
3.1 Grammatical aspect | 17(cid:3)
3.2 Lexical aspect | 20(cid:3)
3.3 Pragmatic functions of aspectual representation | 31(cid:3)
4 Tense and aspect in Chinese | 33(cid:3)
4.1 Morphological distinctions in the verb in Chinese | 33(cid:3)
4.2 Tense in Chinese | 39(cid:3)
4.3 Aspect in Chinese | 41(cid:3)
4.3.1 Grammatical aspect | 41(cid:3)
4.3.1.1 Perfective and perfect | 42(cid:3)
4.3.1.2 The progressive or durative aspect | 47(cid:3)
4.3.1.3 The experiential aspect | 51(cid:3)
4.4 The Lexical aspect or situation type (Aktionsart) in Chinese | 54(cid:3)
4.4.1 State verbs | 57(cid:3)
4.4.2 Activity verbs | 62(cid:3)
4.4.3 Event verbs | 64(cid:3)
4.5 Aspect, temporal relations and adverbs in Chinese | 71(cid:3)
5 The syntactic and semantic analysis of temporal adverbials and
duration phrases | 76(cid:3)
5.1 The analysis of temporal adverbials (TA) in the Shĭjì | 82(cid:3)
5.1.1 The semantic analysis of temporal adverbials indicating a point of
time | 83(cid:3)
viii | Contents
5.1.2 Proper adverbs indicating a point of time | 88(cid:3)
5.1.2.1 Examples for proper adverbs in sentence-initial position | 90(cid:3)
5.1.2.2 Examples for proper adverbs in preverbal position | 111(cid:3)
5.1.3 Noun phrases indicating a point of time | 121(cid:3)
5.1.3.1 Calendar temporal adverbials in sentence-initial position | 122(cid:3)
5.1.3.2 Dependent / anaphoric temporal adverbials in sentence-initial
position | 135(cid:3)
5.1.3.3 Dependent temporal adverbials with hòu (cid:5564) in sentence-initial
position | 139(cid:3)
5.1.3.4 Calendar adverbials in preverbal position | 157(cid:3)
5.1.3.5 Dependent temporal adverbials in preverbal position | 158(cid:3)
5.1.4 Prepositional phrases indicating a point of time | 162(cid:3)
5.1.4.1 Adverbial prepositional phrases referring to a closed
domain | 163(cid:3)
5.1.4.2 Adverbial prepositional phrases referring to an open
domain | 183(cid:3)
5.1.5 Concluding remarks on point of time adverbials | 211(cid:3)
5.1.5.1 Concluding remarks on proper adverbs indicating a point of
time | 212(cid:3)
5.1.5.2 Concluding remarks on noun phrase point of time
adverbials | 215(cid:3)
5.1.5.3 Concluding remarks on prepositional phrases referring to a point of
time | 217(cid:3)
5.1.5.3.1 Prepositional and related phrases referring to a closed
domain | 217(cid:3)
5.1.5.3.2 Prepositional phrases referring to an open domain | 219(cid:3)
5.2 The syntactic and the semantic constraints of duration
phrases | 222(cid:3)
5.2.1 The syntax of duration phrases | 225(cid:3)
5.2.2 The semantics of duration phrases | 229(cid:3)
5.2.3 Examples for duration phrases in the Shĭjì | 232(cid:3)
5.2.3.1 Preverbal duration phrases expressing situational duration | 232(cid:3)
5.2.3.2 Postverbal duration phrases included in the VP [vP DPSubj [V’ Vi [VP
DPObj] [V’ ti DPdur]]] | 245(cid:3)
5.2.3.3 Postverbal duration phrases as predicates of the sentence [vP [DP [vP
DP VP] [vP DPdur]]] | 258(cid:3)
5.2.3.4 Duration phrases in temporal clauses in topic position | 265(cid:3)
5.2.4 Concluding remarks on duration phrases | 270(cid:3)