Reference and its Semantic Functions in Modern Chinese

Abstract

As part of an attempt to shed new light on reference in Chinese, this paper investigates the correspondence between meaning and structure from the viewpoint of markedness. Research on reference to date has largely been limited to nominal expressions. In contrast, the present study is considerably broader in scope, examining spatial, adjectival, and verbal expressions as well. It is shown that a diverse variety of grammatical phenomena, which have previously been viewed as distinct from one another, can all be revealingly analyzed in terms of reference. Providing a unified account of these phenomena, this paper demonstrates that, in Mandarin Chinese, the opposition between conceptual reference and actual reference—arguably one of the most basic ontological distinctions—is realized as a contrast between unmarked constructions and marked constructions and that, moreover, this contrast can be observed cross-categorially.