A Comparison of Child and Adult Discourse: The Mandarin LE in Conversation

比較兒童與成人口語言談中的中文“了”主語性用法

10.7109/HKJELL.200707.0127

張麗香(Li-Hsiang Chang)

中文了 ； 兒童口語言談 ； 成人口語言談 ； 主語性 ； 互動語言學 ； Mandarin LE ； Child Discourse ； Adult Discourse ； Subjectivity ； Interactional Linguistics

Hwa Kang Journal of English Language & Literature

13期（2007 / 07 / 01）

127 - 142

英文

研究學者指出中文“了”有完成式或完成貌的用法，Chang (2003)以成人口語言談為主的研究報告發現“了”的主語性用法。本研究的主旨是探討中文主語性“了”在兒童自然言談中的功能，並進一步比較中文“了”在兒童自然言談中與在成人口語言談中(Chang 2003)的使用情況之相同性與差異性。本研究指出兒童使用中文主語性“了”與兒童社會活動或兒童在對話互動方式皆有關聯，使用中文“了”預測目前說話者暫時結束，而由另一個說話者繼續對話的進行或使用中文“了”能預測進一步的意念表達。中文“了”在兒童自然言談中與在成人口語言談中(Chang 2003)的使用情況之相同性是S-le使用次數比C-le頻繁的多，但是，明顯的差異乃是C-le在兒童自然言談中只出現過一次，理由為C-le是中文主語性“了”的新用法。還有兒童與成人對話方式並不相同，兒童大多在言談中都是談論事實並非意見。因此，中文主語性“了”在兒童自然言談中就較少出現。本研究結果有助於了解語言結構即是反應說話者在言談中的需要(Du Bois, 2003, Hopper and Thompson, 1980, 2001)。藉由探討中文主語性“了”在兒童與成人自然言談中的功能，本研究已強調出說話者觀點在文法結構所扮演的重要角色，並也提供針對主語性“了”語言習得的認識。

This study investigates the similarities and differences between adult and children naturally occurring conversation in the uses of the Mandarin particle LE. Previous studies have identified the use of LE in Mandarin as a marker of perfect (S-le), perfective (V-le), and comment-LE (C-le). C-le has recently been proposed in Chang's study (2003). This work is primarily devoted to the functions of S-le and C-le in child speech and further comparing their similarities and differences with adult discourse as in Chang's study. The use of Chinese LE expression in child conversational discourse is relevant to ongoing activities. Actions have decisive consequences in shaping the trajectory of talk's development in real time. Also, the use of LE utterance in child conversational discourse is highly correlated with speakers' social action and signals a projected completion point (e.g., turn projection and turn extension). One distinctive similarity between the use of LE utterance in adult and child conversation is that S-le utterance appears a lot more frequently than C-le utterance. However, there is a striking difference of C-le occurrence in child and adult conversation; children barely use C-le utterance in their speech. C-le is a new usage of LE utterances and seldom appears in adult speech and it may be expected to be less frequent or not to be nearly seen in child speech. Besides, younger children's talks are more likely to be factually related to the prior turn rather than to respond to the feelings or attributes expressed by the prior turn like adults do. Accordingly, it is plausible to expect to have less C-le than S-le occurrences in child conversation.

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