Readers 读者
Reciprocal Verbs in Mandarin
汉语中的交互动词
Jiun-Shiung Wu 吴俊雄
Abstract 摘要
This paper is a study of reciprocal verbs in Mandarin, which are derived by replacing one syllable of the verb stem with the reciprocal prefix hu ‘RCP’, the first syllable of the reciprocal adverbial huxiang ‘mutually’. A reciprocal verb can either reduce or retain the valence of its verb stem. It reduces the valence of its verb stem by binding off one of the arguments of its verb stem. This kind of reciprocal verb is called a Valence-Reduced (VR) reciprocal verb. A reciprocal verb retains the valence of its verb stem by inducing a binding relation between the subject of the reciprocal verb and its other argument. The reciprocal verbal prefix hu is argued to be responsible for the valence reduction/retention of reciprocal verbs. The Thematic Role Hierarchy is argued to determine which argument of the verb stem of a reciprocal verb is bound off or anaphorically bound. Lexical-Mapping Theory is used to mark the bound argument of the verb stem. A lexical binding rule binds this bound argument with the highest thematic role on the argument structure to form a composite thematic role. This is how a VR reduces the valence of its verb stem. For a VI to retain the valence of its verb stem, a syntactic binding rule marks the highest thematic role on the argument structure with ANT(ECEDENT) and the bound argument with ANA(PUOR). All of the arguments on the argument structure are mapped to grammatical functions (GFs). The Inside-out Functional Uncertainty determines exactly which GF can be anaphorically bound.