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Article published In:
Language and Linguistics
Vol. 21:2 (2020) ► pp.254–284

A comparative study of how and why in Taiwan Southern Min and Mandarin Chinese

| National Taiwan Normal University
| National Tsing Hua University
From looking into the same and different properties of how and why between Taiwan Southern Min and Mandarin Chinese, this paper aims to explain the post-verbal how construction with negative speaker attitude. Based on our observations and findings of the specific usages of sī and leh, we propose an analysis for the construction in question. According to our analysis, this construction is not a simple product of a single element, but a composition of sī and leh, which together generate the negative speaker attitude, and the verb with a post-verbal how, which produce a causal how reading.
Keywords: wh-adverbials, non-canonical questions, Southern Min
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Comparing how and why between TSM and MC
    • 2.1The rising of the bare how form in TSM
    • 2.2Using how as what
    • 2.3The post-verbal how as causal how
  • 3.The non-aspect leh and the sī leh sequence
    • 3.1The non-aspect leh
    • 3.2The role of sī
    • 3.3Summary
  • 4.The analysis
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].

Published online: 2 April 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lali.00055.sen
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