The near-synonymy of classifiers and construal operation
A corpus-based study of 棵
kē and 株
zhū
in Chinese
This paper investigates the near-synonymy of classifiers, using Chinese
kē and
zhū as illustration. We find that in [quantifier] – [classifier] – [noun], the two classifiers have
overlapping semantic prototypes due to their similar behavioral profiles. However, despite a shared functional core, the two
classifiers diverge in terms of which part of plant to profile. In particular, zhū highlights parts of
plant that are small and vulnerable, such as flowers and seedlings. In addition, small is another important
conceptual characteristic exclusively associated with zhū, which gives it a distinctive set of peripheral members
to include in that particular linguistic category, including mold, bacterium, and even biological and
chemical substance. Another important difference is the quantifier that precedes, where kē tends to
occur with lower numbers (typically under 10), while zhū with higher numbers (typically over 1,000). Accordingly,
we conclude that [quantifier] – [zhu] – [noun] tends to invoke a higher-resolution construal.
Article outline
- 1.Classifiers in Chinese
- 2.Near-synonymy in cognitive linguistics
- 3.Scope and method of analysis
- 4.
Kē and zhū as classifiers
- 4.1The nouns modified by kē
- 4.2The nouns modified by zhū
- 4.3A comparison of the nouns modified by kē and zhū
- 5.The quantifier in [quantifier] – [classifier] – [noun]
- 6.When it all adds up: The construal invoked by [quantifier] – [ke/zhu] – [noun]
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Acknowledgements
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Notes
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List of abbreviations used
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References
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Dictionary consulted