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4 - Serial Verb Construction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 March 2023

Yuzhi Shi
Affiliation:
National University of Singapore
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Summary

In Old Chinese, where two or more verb phrases within a single clause (including adjectival and adverbial phrases) had to be connected by the conjunction ér or qiè, serial verb construction did not exist. In this grammatical system, it was impossible for any fusion and reanalysis across verb phrases to take place because the reanalysis had to involve a context consisting of more than one element that occurred adjacently. However, these conjunctions started to decline in Late Old Chinese and eventually died out in the first half of the Middle Chinese period, which enabled many grammatical changes to happen. Then, the first verb in a serial verb construction became grammaticalized into one of various grammatical markers.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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  • Serial Verb Construction
  • Yuzhi Shi, National University of Singapore
  • Book: The Evolution of Chinese Grammar
  • Online publication: 16 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108921831.004
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  • Serial Verb Construction
  • Yuzhi Shi, National University of Singapore
  • Book: The Evolution of Chinese Grammar
  • Online publication: 16 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108921831.004
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Serial Verb Construction
  • Yuzhi Shi, National University of Singapore
  • Book: The Evolution of Chinese Grammar
  • Online publication: 16 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108921831.004
Available formats
×