The Semantic Status of Chinese Classifiers

中文分類詞的語意地位

李鴻麟(Larry Hong-Lin Li)

《興大人文學報》 51期 (2013/09) Pp. 207-225

摘要

關於中文分類詞語意定位的問題，Greenberg（1972）表示他們主要是用以強化名詞的語意特質，但是他們本身並不具有語意內容。此外，Gebhardt（2011）認為他們只扮演功能性的角色而並非具有語意內涵。Her and Hsieh（2010）也具有相同的觀點，他們提供了測試的方法來證明中文分類詞不具有實質意涵。雖然我們同意Gebhardt（2011）的立場，主張中文名詞具有可數與不可數的區隔，但是我們質疑中文分類詞語意空泛的說法。本研究提供了額外的證據來顯示中文分類詞可以指涉真實世界的事物，因此，中文分類詞並不是語意空乏的。

關鍵字

分類詞 ； 測量詞 ； 描繪性

並列摘要

Regarding the semantic status of Chinese classifiers, Greenberg (1972) announced that they only serve to reinforce the semantic attribute in the noun; they do not have semantic content. In addition, Gebhardt (2011) stated that Chinese classifiers are functional rather than lexical. Taking the same view regarding the status of classifiers, Her and Hsieh (2010) offered diagnostic tests to show that Chinese classifiers are semantically vacuous. Although we agree with Gebhardt (2011) that Chinese has a mass-count distinction, we question the view that Chinese classifiers are semantically empty. In this study, we offer additional evidence to demonstrate Chinese classifiers play a role in reference to real world entities and thus are not semantically vacant.

並列關鍵字

classifiers ； measure words ； profiling

參考文獻

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