Qǐ, Chéng, Zhuan, Hé, Jié the discourse pattern of a chinese text of literary criticism

This paper attempts to describe some of the basic organizational features in Chinese writing as shown in a particular expository text. With detailed analysis of linguistic properties in the text, such as lexical cohesion, conjunction, thematic structure and schematic structure, this paper discusses how the text is organized in terms of qǐ ‘beginning’, chéng ‘transition’, zhuÇŽn ‘turning’, hé ‘synthesis’ and jié ‘end’. The study suggests that the defining features culturally preferred in Chinese writing seem to be related to zhuÇŽn, i.e. the emphasis on the ups and downs, twists and turns, of the argumentative development, which reminds of but by far outshines Kaplan (1972).