万物有灵性
交替(语言学)
语言学
确定性
变化(天文学)
主题(计算)
历史
心理学
计算机科学
哲学
天体物理学
操作系统
物理
作者
Yi Li,Benedikt Szmrecsanyi,Weiwei Zhang
标识
DOI:10.1515/cllt-2021-0048
摘要
Abstract Previous research has tracked the history of the theme-recipient alternation (or: “dative” alternation) in Chinese, but few studies have embedded their analysis in a probabilistic variationist framework. Against this backdrop, we explore the language-internal and language-external factors that probabilistically influence the alternation between theme-first and recipient-first ordering in a large diachronic corpus of Chinese writing (1300s–1900s). Our analysis reveals that the recipient-first variant is consistently more frequent than its competitor and even more common in more recent texts than in older texts. Regression analysis also suggests that there are stable linguistic constraints (i.e., animacy and definiteness of theme) and fluid constraints (i.e., end-weight, recipient animacy). Notably, the diachronic instability of end-weight and animacy points to cross-linguistic parallels for ditransitive constructions, including the English dative alternation. We thus contribute to theory building in variationist linguistics by advancing the field’s knowledge about the comparative fluidity versus stability of probabilistic constraints.
科研通智能强力驱动
Strongly Powered by AbleSci AI