B21900401.Pdf
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Table of Contents Abstract------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------V Acknowledgements-------------------------------------------------------------- --------------IX List of Figures and tables--------------------------------------------------------------------- XI List of Abbreviations------------------------------------------------------------------------- XII Chapter 1 Introduction ............................................................................ 1 1.1. Research background ..................................................................... 1 1.1.1. Two different approaches to the study of language contact and language change ................................................................................... 1 1.1.2. Linguistic borrowing as a specific social behavior ................................ 3 1.1.3. Constraints on Morphosyntactic borrowing........................................... 6 1.1.4. Morphosyntactic borrowing in Hong Kong Written Chinese ................ 8 1.2. Objectives of this study ................................................................. 9 1.3. The data ........................................................................................ 11 1.4. The organization of this dissertation ............................................ 12 Chapter 2 Literature Review ................................................................. 14 2.0. Introduction .................................................................................. 14 2.1. The theory of language change .................................................... 14 2.1.1. The history of language change study ................................................. 15 2.1.2. The principles of language change....................................................... 17 2.1.3. The duration of language change ......................................................... 20 2.1.4 .The rate of language change ................................................................ 22 2.1.5. Syntactic change .................................................................................. 24 2.1.6. Language change and speech community............................................ 30 2.2. Language change induced by language contact .......................... 40 2.2.1. The concept of language contact .......................................................... 41 2.2.2. The history of language contact study ................................................. 42 2.2.3. Contributions of sociolinguists to the study of language contact ........ 46 2.3. Morphosyntactic borrowability ................................................... 50 2.3.1 The concept of linguistic borrowing ..................................................... 51 2.3.2. Linguistic borrowing and other related concepts ................................. 53 2.3.3 The controversy of morphosyntactic borrowability .............................. 59 2.4. Morphosyntactic borrowability and its constraints ..................... 62 2.4.1. The concepts and classifications of constraints ................................... 63 I 2.4.2. The problem of universal constraints ................................................... 65 2.4.3 Typological constraints ......................................................................... 74 2.4.4. Summary .............................................................................................. 76 Chapter 3 Methodological considerations ............................................ 78 3.1. Approaches................................................................................... 78 3.2. Models for explaining morphosyntactic borrowing .................... 81 3.2.1. The continuum of written Chinese in the Hong Kong speech community ......................................................................................... 81 3.2.2. The process of linguistic borrowing .................................................... 84 3.3. Summary ...................................................................................... 90 Chapter 4 The Hong Kong speech community and Hong Kong Written Chinese ...................................................................................... 93 4.1. Introduction .................................................................................. 93 4.2. The Hong Kong speech community ............................................ 94 4.2.1. Hong Kong and Hong Kong people..................................................... 94 4.2.2. The language situation in Hong Kong ................................................. 99 4.2.3 A changing multi-level-diglossic system in the Hong Kong speech community ....................................................................................... 105 4.3. Hong Kong Written Chinese ...................................................... 110 4.3.1. The differences in the use of Chinese characters between HKWC and SWC ................................................................................................. 112 4.3.2. HKWC and Cantonese ....................................................................... 115 4.3.3. HKWC and English ........................................................................... 117 4.3.4. Some special features in Chinese versions of Mr. Tsang‘s Chief Executive‘s Policy Addresses .......................................................... 119 4.3.5. HKWC in the bilingual legal system of Hong Kong ......................... 123 4.4. The future of HKWC in the Hong Kong speech community .... 130 Chapter 5 A case study: morphosyntatic borrowing patterns in HKWC ................................................................................................... 132 5.1. Introduction ................................................................................ 132 5.2. Lexical borrowing in HKWC .................................................... 133 5.2.1. Types of lexical borrowing ................................................................ 135 5.2.2. Two categories of morphemes having undergone changes ................ 143 5.3. Patterns of morphosyntactic borrowing in HKWC ................... 148 5.3.1. Patterns of morphological borrowing ................................................ 148 5.3.2. Word class and class shifts in the borrowing process ........................ 158 II 5.3.3. Patterns of structural borrowing in HKWC ....................................... 165 5.4. Conclusion ................................................................................. 185 Chapter 6 Explanations for morphosyntactic borrowing in HKWC ................................................................................................................. 189 6.1. Introduction ................................................................................ 189 6.2. An analytic approach ................................................................. 190 6.2.1. Sociocultural constraints .................................................................... 193 6.2.2. Linguistic constraints ......................................................................... 206 6.3. A hypothesis on morphosyntactic borrowing in HKWC ........... 211 6.4. Summary .................................................................................... 218 Chapter 7 Conclusions.......................................................................... 219 7.1. Conclusion in general ................................................................ 219 7. 2. Theoretical and practical significance of this dissertation ....... 220 7.2.1. Contributions of this study to Chinese Linguistics ............................ 220 7.2.2. Contributions of this study to general linguistics .............................. 221 7.3. Prospects for future research ..................................................... 222 Appendices: sample texts of Written Chinese in Hong Kong .......... 223 Appendix 1: A text of Standard Written Chinese ............................. 223 Appendix 2: Texts of Hong Kong Written Chinese .......................... 226 Appendix 3: Texts of a Mixture of Standard Written Chinese and Written Cantonese ....................................................... 231 Appendix 4: Texts of Contemporary Hong Kong Written Cantonese ........................................................................................................... 235 Appendix 5: A text of Traditional Written Cantonese ................... 238 References .............................................................................................. 241 III Abstract As a result of language contact between Chinese and English, as well as between Standard Chinese and Cantonese, Hong Kong Written Chinese (henceforth HKWC) has accumulated many unique features and has attracted a substantial amount of research effort. Major differences between HKWC and Standard Written Chinese have been described, classified and discussed in previous studies. However, at the present time, understanding of the nature of the Hong Kong speech community, the features of HKWC, the patterns of morphosyntactic borrowing, the constraints on morphosyntactic borrowing, the factors affecting the morphosyntactic borrowing, and so forth, is still limited and there is clearly a need for further investigation. The present study takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of morphosyntactic borrowing in HKWC that is the result of language contact. It has established two models for describing and explaining morphosyntactic