An LFG account of empty pronouns in Mandarin Chinese
This thesis incorporates a study of the syntactic distribution and pragmatic properties of empty pronouns in Mandarin Chinese (Chinese in short) from the point of view of Lexical-Functional Grammar (LFG). With reference to various accounts of Chinese empty pronouns by previous researchers (e.g., J. Huang 1984; Y. Huang 1995; Pan and Hu 2000) and the problems with their analyses, we offer a conjunctive approach to capture how Chinese zero anaphora is constrained at the level of syntax and the level of pragmatics. A series of syntactic rules are proposed and every occurrence of Chinese empty pronouns must strictly obey these absolute, inviolable syntactic constraints. Intersententially, discourse-dependent pragmatic conditions based on Lambrechtâs (1994) information-structure theory form the second part of our two-way characterization of Chinese empty pronouns. Lastly, we present a comparison between the case study of empty pronouns in Japanese by Kameyama (1985) and our current study of empty pronouns in Chinese, and demonstrate two distinctive pro-drop phenomena. Chapter 1 is an introduction to the notion of pro-drop, types of empty pronouns identified in Chinese, and the theoretical frameworks assumed in
Liao, Wei-Tai
An LFG account of empty pronouns in Mandarin Chinese. This thesis incorporates a study of the syntactic distribution and pragmatic properties of empty pronouns in Mandarin Chinese (Chinese in short) from the point of view of Lexical-Functional Grammar (LFG). With reference to various accounts of Chinese empty pronouns by previous researchers (e.g., J. Huang 1984; Y. Huang 1995; Pan and Hu 2000) and the problems with their analyses, we offer a conjunctive approach to capture how Chinese zero anaphora is constrained at the level of syntax and the level of pragmatics. A series of syntactic rules are proposed and every occurrence of Chinese empty pronouns must strictly obey these absolute, inviolable syntactic constraints. Intersententially, discourse-dependent pragmatic conditions based on Lambrechtâs (1994) information-structure theory form the second part of our two-way characterization of Chinese empty pronouns. Lastly, we present a comparison between the case study of empty pronouns in Japanese by Kameyama (1985) and our current study of empty pronouns in Chinese, and demonstrate two distinctive pro-drop phenomena. Chapter 1 is an introduction to the notion of pro-drop, types of empty pronouns identified in Chinese, and the theoretical frameworks assumed in
lfg account empty pronouns mandarin_chinese incorporates study syntactic distribution pragmatic property empty pronoun mandarin_chinese chinese short point_view lexical_functional grammar lfg reference various account chinese empty pronoun previous researcher pan problem analysis offer conjunctive capture chinese zero anaphora constrain level syntax level pragmatic series syntactic_rule propose every occurrence chinese empty pronoun must strictly obey absolute syntactic constraint discourse dependent pragmatic condition base information_structure theory form second_part two_way characterization chinese empty pronoun lastly present comparison case_study empty pronoun japanese current_study empty pronouns chinese distinctive pro_drop phenomenon introduction notion pro_drop type empty pronoun identify chinese theoretical_framework assume