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The Reclassification of Chinese Nominal Measure Words Based on Definition Mode

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Chinese Lexical Semantics (CLSW 2019)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 11831))

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Abstract

The classification of nominal measure words is a long-standing problem in Chinese syntactics circle. This paper tries to solve it based on dictionary definition. Through analyzing the definition mode, we find there are some rules hidden in the meaning of nominal measure words, which can be used to reclassify these words into the following categories. When the definition mode is “yongyu(used before)…xing (shape)…”, they belong to the subcategory of highlighting shape of things, such as “tiao (strip)”; when the definition mode is “yongyu (used before) fen (divide)…”, they fall into the subcategory of highlighting constitutive aspect of things, such as “ban (piece)”; when the definition mode is “yongyu (used before)… cheng (become)…”, they fit into the subcategory of highlighting agentive aspect of things, such as “dui (pair)”, etc.…. Compared with the previous classifications, this paper unifies the classification criteria, and enhances the universality and exclusiveness of classification.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The following kinds of nominal measure words can only be used before certain nouns. Therefore, it is necessary to annotate their collocation objects when explaining them.

  2. 2.

    According to Qualia Structure theory, the so-called constitutive aspect of things refers to what a thing is constituted by,what the thing can constitute, and whether there is a "part-whole" relationship with other things [13, 19].

  3. 3.

    According to Qualia Structure theory, the so-called agentive aspect of things focuses on how things are formed, by a natural way, an artificial way, or through a special causal relationship [13, 19].

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Acknowledgments

This paper is supported by the National Social Science Fund (19BYY030), the Youth Fund of the Ministry of Education (18YJC740095, 18YJC740058), the National Basic Research Program of China (2014CB340502), the Project of the National Language Commission (YB135-45). The anonymous reviewers of CLSW2019 put forward many valuable comments. Here, we express our sincere thanks for them!

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. International School of Education and Exchange, Jinan University, No. 336 Nanxinzhuang West Road, Shizhong District, Jinan, 250022, China

    Wang Enxu

  2. Department of Chinese Language and Literature, Peking University, No. 5 Yiheyuan Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100871, China

    Yuan Yulin

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  1. Wang Enxu
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Correspondence to Wang Enxu .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Jia-Fei Hong

  2. Beijing Information Science and Technology University, Beijing, China

    Yangsen Zhang

  3. Beijing Language and Culture University, Beijing, China

    Pengyuan Liu

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Enxu, W., Yulin, Y. (2020). The Reclassification of Chinese Nominal Measure Words Based on Definition Mode. In: Hong, JF., Zhang, Y., Liu, P. (eds) Chinese Lexical Semantics. CLSW 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11831. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38189-9_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38189-9_11

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-38188-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-38189-9

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