Title: Studies on bei in Chinese Passive Construction
Abstract: Bei in Chinese passive construction is a functional word and occupies the specifier position of CP,marking the NP before bei.Based-generated in the postverbal position the NP is moved to the specifier position of CP serving as a topic due to pragmatic reasons.Bei introduces TP.Whether the specifier-TP position is occupied by a NP or not,the part of speech and the position of bei remains the same.Since bei is followed by TP,resumptive pronouns cannot be bound by the NP in the specifier position of TP but by the NP before bei.In bei construction with retained object the NP before bei is a base-generated topic.The retained object can stay in its original position or move to the position between the topic and bei,which can be analyzed as another topic.Compared with other analyses,the proposal in this paper has both empirical and theoretical merits and is more plausible.
Publication Year: 2011
Publication Date: 2011-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
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