The purpose of this study is to investigate the semantic similarities and differences in spatial terms of dimensions of Chinese and Korean from the standpoint of contrastive linguistics.
Target words containing spatial dimensions to be investigated ...
The purpose of this study is to investigate the semantic similarities and differences in spatial terms of dimensions of Chinese and Korean from the standpoint of contrastive linguistics.
Target words containing spatial dimensions to be investigated are the Korean-Chinese pairs of ’large/small’ (’크다/작다’-’大/小’), ’high/low’ (’높다/낮다’-’高/低’), ’long/short’ (’길다/짧다’-’長/短’), ’distant/close’ (’멀다/가깝다’-’远/近’), ’deep/shallow’ (’깊다/얕다’-’深/浅’), ’wide/narrow’ (’넓다/좁다’-’宽/窄’), ’thick/thin[slender]’ (’굵다/가늘다’-’粗/细’), and ’thick[bulky]/thin’ (’두껍다/얇다’-’厚/薄’).
The study proceeds first with basic meanings of the paired target words if they show differences in their meanings and correspondencies. ’Correspondence’ here means a linguistic phenomenon produced when a language is studied contrastively with another language, in that correspondence between Korean and Chinese is the correspondence of a Korean word with a single Chinese word or many of them having the same or similar meanings. In contrastive linguistics there are not only one-to-one correspondencies, but one-to-many, many-to-one or even one-to-none correspondencies because of lack of the corresponding vocabulary with the same meaning in one language compared to the other language or culture. For instance, the Chinese character ’浅’ (shallow) of ’深/浅’ could mean either the Korean correspondence ’얕다’ for its regular meaning or ’옅다’ when it indicates the depth of water. However, there is no other corresponding Chinese for ’옅다’ except for ’浅’ so that the Chinese vocabulary ’浅’ will play a multivocal function in the contrastive linguistics with Korean, which in turn generates a many-to-one phenomenon between Korean and Chinese.
Next, eight terms of spatial dimensions that display a possibility of meaning transfer between Korean and Chinese are selected from the leading dictionaries of Korean and Chinese, then listed as items to be contrasted with regard to transitional phenomena (or meaning extension), so as to be able to check their corresponding aspects. Words, though having customary basic meanings, can exhibit meaning transfer when put in various contexts or situations. As a result, significant similarities and differences are discovered in the eight pairs of spatial terms of dimensions. For example, there is correspondence of ’크다’ (’big’ in Korean) with ’大’ (’big’ in Chinese) when both pertain to size, scope, degree, character, amount of money, unit, influence, degree of courage, resolution, achievement, kinship or possibility, whereas there appears no correspondence when they relate to scope, degree, age, acquaintance, duration in marriage or of time. Correspondence is made for the meaning of Korean ’작다’ and Chinese ’小’ when both designate standard, scope, degree, sound, quantity, age or strength, but no correspondence between ’작다’ and ’小’ when concerned with kinship, time, degree, number, modesty, titles and character.
In Chaper 3, based on the results of previous chapters, the following features and characteristics are examined.
① Correspondence shows the features of basic meanings and transitional meaning,
② Meaning transfer (or extension) displays transference or transition toward abstract meaning and sense of spatial dimensions,
③ Aspects of transitional (extensional) meaning manifest positive as well as negative meaning transfer,
④ Asymmetry or non-correspondence reveals multivocal and antonymous asymmetries.
The study thus sheds light on the aspects and structure of multivocal extension of spatial terms of dimensions in Chinese and Korean.
Language is never used in the way that a word corresponds with a single meaning only. A given vocabulary can be accompanied or diverted with a new meaning when necessary, especially when a new concept is created and its use is urged. Such divert or transferred meanings of a word can be settled not only as a divert usage but as evidence for entirely a new vocabulary which gives rise to a multivocal word or polysemy. Although it might be a desirable phenomenon for native speakers to obtain linguistic economy to the extent that the multivocal lexicon raises the speaker’s ability for a variety of expressions and representations, the foreigners who try to learn the language in question may have hard time understanding the multivocal vocabulary and may put themselves in confusion with employment of the terms. It also create a burden on memory. Accordingly, it can be said that more contrastive studies on meaning difference between Korean and Chinese are desired to reduce the learning fallacies for the Korean learners of Chinese or the Chinese learners of Korean.
，韩语毕业论文，韩语论文范文 |
