Sprouts of grammar studies in China

My study on the History of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies obviously begins with the first genuinely Chinese, i.e. written by a Chinese in Chinese for a Chinese audience. It may surprise many that this book was published in 1898. Chinese scholarship had not developed systematic grammar studies until Chinese started learning European languages and got familiar with terms like ‘noun’ or ‘subject’. I will devote a following LinkedIn article on the reasons behind this lack, but will first give insight in the remarks by ancient Chinese philologists about language structure that did not lead to a complete systemic study of grammar, but are referred to by Chinese scholars as ‘sprouts of grammar studies’.

These ‘sprouts’ of grammar studies are almost exclusively concerned with words, i.e., the word-syllable referred to as zi (字 character). While the Chinese paid little attention to structure, they were extremely meticulous about vocabulary and the earliest Chinese literature includes a number of dictionaries.

When, in the first century B.C. (Han dynasty), Chinese scholars started to study the ancient books anew, they came across many words whose meaning was obscure or completely unknown to them. They referred to this kind of words with the term ci (詞 or 辭 as opposed to zi). E.g., in a commentary on the Book of Songs, a collection of folk songs, hymns, etc., we often find the following phrase:

X ci ye X詞也

‘/the word/ X is a ci’

This must be interpreted as ‘the meaning of this word is unclear’. The term ci was occasionally modified by an attributive phrase indicating the function of the word. E.g., in one of the early Chinese dictionaries, the Shuowen Jiezi (completed in ± A.D. 100), the final particle yi is defined in the following way:

 yi yu yi ci ye 矣語已詞也

‘yi is a word marking the end of an utterance’

It is tempting to translate the term yuyici as ‘final particle’. This, however, would be misleading, as other final particles (hu 乎, er 而 etc.) are named differently. The definition is based on the meaning of this particular word, not on its position in the sentence.

The term ci had been used in earlier philosophical writings, especially those of the school of Mo Di (3rd century B.C.). But there the term refers to ‘deliberately composed utterances, phrased for ceremonial, aesthetic, or persuasive effect’, not to single words. The Han commentators probably chose this particular term, because they believed that these words were merely used to embellish the language.

The concept of ci developed into the feeling that a text was constituted of words with a rather concrete meaning, while their mutual relations were expressed by means of ‘auxiliary words’ (zhuyu /yuzhu 助語/語助), a term first used by Liu Xie (ca. 465 - 522) in his book on literary theory Wenxin Diaolong ‘The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons’.

During the Tang dynasty some philologists extended the term ci to yuci 語詞 or fayuci 發語詞, without changing its meaning. We can find this term in the sub-commentary of the ‘Book of Songs’ by Kong Yingda (574 - 648). This work provides us with an interesting example for comparison: about the sentence initial particle si 思, the Han dynasty commentary remarks:

si ci ye 思詞也

si is a ci 28

This is a similar formula as described above. Kong Yingda's commentary on that same passage is as follows:

si yuci bu wei yi 思語詞不為義

‘si is a yuci, is has no meaning’29

Using yuci instead of ci does not change anything; yuci is at most clearer than just ci. The phrase bu wei yi is added for a further explanation of yuci. Apparently Kong Yingda was not sure whether merely using yuci would be sufficient even for his contemporary readers.

Another Tang author, Liu Zongyuan (773 – 819), used the core term zhuzi 助字 which also means ‘auxiliary word’. This term has been used until present times.

During the following Song dynasty, until the early Qing dynasty (1644 - 1911), a major development took place. The grammatical words were renamed as xuzi 虛字 ‘empty words’, and the content words were analogously named shizi 實字 ‘full words’. Until then, there were only terms referring to the grammatical words, a part of the vocabulary had been determined. With the appearance of the xuzi/shizi the whole of the vocabulary was covered, thus constituting a minimal system of parts of speech.

The earliest source of this terminology is a manual of poetics called Ciyuan 詞源‘Fundamentals of Ci-poetry’, by Zhang Yan (1248 - l320). Zhang, as Liu Xie before him, held that a text cannot solely be built up using full words. The empty words are necessary to express the mutual relations between the various full words.31 The terms xuzi and shizi are still used today, and several dictionaries of xuzi have been compiled during the following centuries.

A further refinement was made by Wang Yun (1784 - 1854) in his commentary on the Shuowen jiezi. Wang calls shan 苫 ‘straw mat’ a ‘state word’ (jingzi 靜字), and shan (same character) ‘to cover with a straw mat’ an ‘action word’ (dongzi 動字).32

The final terminological refinement was the division of empty words into several subclasses. This was done by very few people, e.g., Wang Mingchang (dates unknown) in his Bianzijue 辨字訣 Methods to Determine Words’. Wang distinguishes the following categories:

qiyuci 起語辭 ‘initial words’ - sentence initial particles.

jieyuci 接語辭 ‘continuative words’ - words which link a sentence to the

         previous one, without negating the latter's content (words meaning: ‘then’,

         etc.).

zhuanyuci 轉語辭 ‘adversative words’ - words which link a sentence to the

         previous one, negating the latter's content (words meaning: ‘but’).

chenyuci 襯語辭 ‘inserted words’ - structural particles, auxiliary words,

         coverbs.33

shuyuci 束語辭 ‘linking words’ - words or phrases meaning: ‘in general . . .’,

         ‘in summary . .

tanyuci 歎語辭 ‘exclamation words’ - interjections.

xieyuci 歇語辭 ‘pause words’ - final particles.34

So far the beginnings of an indigenous system of parts of speech that never actually developed into a full system. Similar remarks on sentence structure are even rarer. The only one known is the use of the objective third person pronoun zhi 之 to paraphrase transitivity. The earliest source of this use of zhi is the Gongyang commentary on the ‘Spring and Autumn Annals’ (a chronicle covering the years 721-667 BC) dating from the Han dynasty. In the main text we find the following sentence‘

Xing qian yu Chenyi 邢遷於陳儀

‘Xing withdrew to Chenyi’38

The word qian can both mean ‘to withdraw oneself’ and ‘to withdraw something’

(troops, etc.); the commentator explains the ambiguity in the following way:

遷者何其意也遷之者何非其意也

Qian zhe he? Qi yi ye. Qian zhi zhe he? Fei qi yi ye.

‘How about to withdraw /himself/? That is the meaning. How about to withdraw something? That is not the meaning’.

Although the commentator clearly uses zhi to paraphrase the transitive meaning of qian, it should not be considered a sign of grammatical insight or even as its ‘sprouts’. This use of zhi simply is a regular grammatical device of classical Chinese. In English it is allowed to say ‘I am eating’, not specifying what is actually eaten. In Chinese dummy objects are used in these cases. In classical Chinese, zhi often performs this function, as is the case in the above example. Two reasons can be named why the commentaries discussed above do not qualify as ‘grammar studies' in the proper sense.

The above is an abbreviated excerpt from my book The History of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies (Springer, 2015). Check out the Table of Contents

1 Introduction............................................................................................... 1

1.1 The Aim of This Study........................................................................ 1

1.2 The Chinese Language and Beginnings of Grammar Studies in Traditional Chinese Philology............................................ 3

1.3 The Definition and Scope of Grammar Studies.................................. 10

1.4 Beginnings of Grammar Studies in Traditional Chinese Philology............................................................................... 13

1.4.1 Beginnings of Grammar Studies............................................. 13

1.4.2 Reasons for the Lack of Grammar Studies............................. 18

1.5 The Teaching of Foreign Languages in China and Early Western Studies of Chinese Grammar................................ 21

1.5.1 The Study of Foreign Languages in China............................. 21

1.5.2 Early Western Studies of Chinese Grammar........................... 23

1.6 Language Policy and Grammar Studies in Twentieth-Century China................................................................ 27

1.6.1 Language Policy in Twentieth-Century China........................ 27

1.6.2 An Overview of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies..................................................................... 31

1.7 Problems Pertaining to the History of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies................................................................................. 35

1.7.1 The Problem Areas in Chinese Grammar Studies................... 35

1.7.2 The Reference Works.............................................................. 36

2 The Mashi Wentong................................................................................... 39

2.1 Introduction......................................................................................... 39

2.1.1 The Authors of the Mashi Wentong........................................ 39

2.1.2 The Authorship of the MSWT................................................ 41

2.2 The Grammatical System of the MSWT............................................. 42

2.2.1 The Parts of Speech................................................................. 43

2.2.2 The Grammatical Functions.................................................... 50

2.2.3 The Sentence Positions........................................................... 52

2.2.4 Syntax...................................................................................... 54

2.2.5 Examples of Analysis.............................................................. 63

2.3 Evaluation of the MSWT.................................................................... 67

3 The Period of Imitation (1898–1930)........................................................ 71

3.1 Introduction......................................................................................... 71

3.2 Zhang Shizhao’s “Intermediate Chinese Grammar”........................... 75

3.2.1 Comments on the Conspectus................................................. 77

3.3 Chen Chengze’s “A Draft of Chinese Grammar”............................... 80

3.4 Yang Shuda’s “Advanced Chinese Grammar”.................................... 85

3.5 Liu Fu’s “Comprehensive Discussion on Chinese Grammar”............ 88

3.6 Jin Zhaozi’s “Study of Chinese Grammar”......................................... 94

3.7 Li Jinxi’s “New Grammar of the National Language”........................ 97

3.8 Recapitulation..................................................................................... 104

4 Innovation and Maturation (1930–1949)................................................. 107

4.1 Introduction......................................................................................... 107

4.2 New Approaches to Grammar in the 1930s........................................ 113

4.2.1 Wang Li................................................................................... 113

4.2.2 Meng Qi’s “Words and Sentences”......................................... 120

4.3 The Discussion on “Innovation of Grammar”..................................... 124

4.3.1 Object and Methodology of Grammar Studies....................... 124

4.3.2 One-Line System vs. Two-Line System.................................. 125

4.3.3 Monosyllabic vs. Polysyllabic................................................ 129

4.3.4 Wenyan vs. Baihua; Diachronic vs. Synchronous................... 130

4.3.5 Liao Shuqian’s “Vernacular Grammar”.................................. 131

4.4 Wang Li’s “Modern Chinese Grammar”............................................. 133

4.4.1 Basic Grammatical System..................................................... 133

4.4.2 Secondary Topics.................................................................... 137

4.4.3 Evaluation of Wang’s Grammar.............................................. 138

4.5 Lü Shuxiang’s “Outline of Chinese Grammar”.................................. 141

4.5.1 The Grammatical System........................................................ 141

4.5.2 Evaluation of Lü’s Grammar................................................... 145

4.6 Gao Mingkai’s “Theory of Chinese Grammar”.................................. 147

4.6.1 Outline of the Grammatical System........................................ 147

4.6.2 Evaluation of Gao’s Grammar................................................ 150

5 The Age of Standardization...................................................................... 153

5.1 Introduction......................................................................................... 153

5.2 The Grammar Section’s “Talks on Modern Chinese Grammar”.............................................................................. 158

5.2.1 Outline of the Grammatical System........................................ 158

5.2.2 Evaluation of “Talks on Modern Chinese Grammar”.................................................................. 162

5.3 Lü Shuxiang and Zhu Dexi’s “Talks on Grammar and Rhetorics”..................................................................................... 165

5.3.1 Outline..................................................................................... 165

5.3.2 Evaluation of “Talks on Grammar and Rhetorics”.................. 168

5.4 Zhang Zhigong’s “Essentials of Chinese Grammar”.......................... 168

5.4.1 Outline of the Grammatical System........................................ 168

5.4.2 Evaluation of “Essentials of Chinese Grammar”.................... 172

5.5 The Provisional System....................................................................... 173

6 Summary and Conclusions....................................................................... 177

6.1 An Overview of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies.......................... 177

6.2 An Appraisal of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies.......................... 182

Appendix........................................................................................................... 185

Bibliography..................................................................................................... 187

Index.................................................................................................................. 197