Affiliation:
1. Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics Hangzhou , China
2. Yangzhou University Yangzhou China
Abstract
Abstract
Fragment questions (henceforth FQs) in Mandarin Chinese usually end up with the particle ne. In the literature (e.g. Wei 2013, 2016, 2018), Chinese ne is construed as functioning similarly to Koeran particle -yo and Chinese FQs are analyzed as a fronting-ellipsis phenomenon. Within the framework of Dynamic Syntax (Kempson et al. 2001; Cann et al. 2005), a parsing-based account of Chinese FQs is proposed, showing that (i) ne in Chinese FQs will trigger the REGENERATION process to re-use a macro of actions stored in the previous context; (ii) Semantically, Chinese FQs are often employed as queries about another relatively separate event in connection with the previous one; pragmatically, FQs shows speakers’ interest towards additional information.
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