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The Diachronic Development of Modal Expressions in Chinese : From Late Archaic to Middle Chinese / Barbara Meisterernst.

By: Material type: TextTextSeries: Studies in Language Change [SLC] ; 18Publisher: Berlin ; Boston : De Gruyter Mouton, [2024]Copyright date: 2025Description: 1 online resource (XIII, 372 p.)Content type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9783110737783
  • 9783110733037
  • 9783110733013
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 495.109
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources: Available additional physical forms:
  • Issued also in print.
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Acknowledgments -- Contents -- Abbreviations -- Introduction -- 1 The different modal categories in Late Archaic and Early Middle Chinese and their realization -- 2 The diachronic development of deontic modals in Early Middle Chinese -- 3 Modality and future marking in Late Archaic and Middle Chinese -- 4 Postverbal modals: The case of De -- 5 More on negation and polarity -- 6 A brief overview on the cross-linguistic development of modals -- Conclusion -- References -- Index
Summary: The present study is the first to apply a syntactic approach to the grammaticalization of Chinese modals, based on hypotheses on cross-linguistic diachronic developments of modals from lexical to functional categories as upward movement on a functional spine. The temporal framework of the study covers Late Archaic and Middle Chinese. Early Middle Chinese is a crucial turning point for the development of Chinese from a more synthetic to a more analytic language. This change is attributed e.g. to the loss of a former morphology, which also affects the modal system. Against this background, the negative cycle of Chinese, the relevance of polarity contexts, and the development of a new system of deontic, epistemic and future markers are analyzed. In addition to a comprehensive analysis of the syntactic processes involved in the diachronic changes of the Chinese modal system, the study also provides a comparison with the syntax of grammaticalization of the thoroughly discussed Germanic modals. This constitutes a broad basis for further analyses of the changes in the Chinese language during its long written history, but also for cross-linguistic studies on the syntax of grammaticalization and on linguistic universals.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9783110733013

Frontmatter -- Acknowledgments -- Contents -- Abbreviations -- Introduction -- 1 The different modal categories in Late Archaic and Early Middle Chinese and their realization -- 2 The diachronic development of deontic modals in Early Middle Chinese -- 3 Modality and future marking in Late Archaic and Middle Chinese -- 4 Postverbal modals: The case of De -- 5 More on negation and polarity -- 6 A brief overview on the cross-linguistic development of modals -- Conclusion -- References -- Index

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http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

The present study is the first to apply a syntactic approach to the grammaticalization of Chinese modals, based on hypotheses on cross-linguistic diachronic developments of modals from lexical to functional categories as upward movement on a functional spine. The temporal framework of the study covers Late Archaic and Middle Chinese. Early Middle Chinese is a crucial turning point for the development of Chinese from a more synthetic to a more analytic language. This change is attributed e.g. to the loss of a former morphology, which also affects the modal system. Against this background, the negative cycle of Chinese, the relevance of polarity contexts, and the development of a new system of deontic, epistemic and future markers are analyzed. In addition to a comprehensive analysis of the syntactic processes involved in the diachronic changes of the Chinese modal system, the study also provides a comparison with the syntax of grammaticalization of the thoroughly discussed Germanic modals. This constitutes a broad basis for further analyses of the changes in the Chinese language during its long written history, but also for cross-linguistic studies on the syntax of grammaticalization and on linguistic universals.

Issued also in print.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 20. Nov 2024)