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Part of
Topics in Theoretical Asian Linguistics: Studies in honor of John B. Whitman
Edited by Kunio Nishiyama, Hideki Kishimoto and Edith Aldridge
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 250] 2018
► pp. 157–180

Chapter 8
Resultative and termination

A unified analysis of Middle Chinese VP-YI

| University of Washington | Humboldt University Berlin
| University of Washington | Humboldt University Berlin

This paper proposes an account of the reanalysis of the Chinese morpheme 已yǐ from an intransitive verb meaning ‘end, terminate’ into a functional category marking completive aspect. We posit that this grammaticalization was triggered by the loss of aspectual affixes, prompting YI to be reinterpreted from a lexical verb to a secondary predicate supplying the endpoint to an event expressed by a preceding predicate. The use of YI as a secondary predicate was made possible in part by changes in Chinese VP structure which allowed an endpoint-denoting secondary predicate to occupy a VP-internal position in this period.

Keywords: aspect, grammaticalization, Middle Chinese, resultative, telicity
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Aspect in Late Archaic Chinese
  • 3.Evolution of YI from verb to secondary predicate
    • 3.1Late Archaic Chinese YI
    • 3.2Structural reanalysis
  • 4.Extension of aspectual YI as a native development
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 12 December 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.250.09ald
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