Ambiguity of le in Chinese: The perfective as well as imperfective
汉语“了”之双动貌性质: 完成及分割貌
Chien-Chou Chen 陈建州

Abstract 摘要
The most prominent meaning of le has been conventionally recognized as the ‘perfective’ marker, although its non-perfective reading occasionally draws researchers’ attention. This paper starts with viewing the ambiguity of aspectual le in Chinese from the perspective of syntax-semantics interplay, showing that the structural ambiguity results in le’s semantic ambiguity to be interpreted as perfective or imperfective. I argue that the ambiguity of a sentence-final le is predetermined by its syntactic scope over a predicate or a sentence. After the distinction is clear, the special interest is particularly paid to examine the imperfective use of le. I list many examples and grammatical constructions to show that le is able to express imperfectivity, and such analysis can also be accounted for by various theories about the nature of aspect.

传统上多认为汉语”了”最显著的语意是表示完成貌，虽然它所具有的分割貌意涵亦时而引起学者讨论。本文以句法及语意之互动关系为出发点，来探讨”了”字的动貌性质。文中主张位于句末的”了”之所以具有双重语意，乃归因于它有着双重的句法范畴)--动词词组或句子。在解释”了”的两种动貌性质后，本文尤其着重在对其分割貌性质的探讨。文中试着举出各种例子及文法结构来验证”了”所带出的分割貌语意。此项分析亦获得数种动貌理论支持。

Keywords 关键词

Le 了 Perfective 完成貌 Imperfective 分割貌 Inchoative 起始 Progressive 进行 Telicity 密闭

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