Chinese Verbs & Essentials of Grammar

by Julian K. Wheatley

Overview

Your one-stop guide to mastering the basics of Chinese

Can one book have all you need to communicate confidently in a new language? Yes—and that book is Chinese Verbs & Essentials of Grammar. It offers a solidfoundation of major verbal and grammatical concepts of the language.

Each unit is devoted to a single topic, so you can find what you need and get concentrated instruction immediately. Concise yet thorough, the explanations aresupported by numerous examples to help you master each concept. Topics range from tones to verb suffixes, from dictionaries to proverbs, from measure words toonomatopoeia, and include a list of common verbs organized by semantic area.

This book gives you:

• An excellent introduction to the basics of Chinese (if you are a beginner) or aquick, thorough refresher (if you already have experience with the language)
• Essential information on the Chinese language—its history, varieties, tonal features, character writing system, and lean grammatical structure
• Numerous examples presented in Chinese characters, Pinyin transcription, word-for-word and idiomatic translations

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780071713047
Publisher:	McGraw Hill LLC
Publication date:	10/06/2014
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Julian K. Wheatley has a PhD in Linguistics from University of California, Berkeley. He is an experienced author of Chinese language materials and has directed Chinese language programs at Cornell University and MIT. More recently, he has been a visiting associate professor at the National Institute of Education in Singapore and at the Hong Kong Institute of Education. Currently he is co-director of the Center for Teaching and Learning in China(CTLC), specializing in the languages and linguistics of mainland Southeast Asia and China.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Acknowledgments xi

Conventions xiii

1 Background

1 The Standard Language 1

2 Regional Mandarin 3

3 Regional Languages 4

4 Origins of the Standard Spoken Language 5

5 The Written Standard 6

6 Writing in the Regional Languages 9

7 Languages Related to Chinese 10

8 Chinese Names for China 10

2 Representing Pronunciation

9 Alternative Systems of Transcription 13

10 The Pinyin System 15

11 Pronunciation 17

3 The Writing System

12 The Origin of Characters 25

13 The Function of Characters 26

14 The Form of Characters 27

15 Dictionaries 29

16 Number of Characters 31

17 The Reading Process 32

18 Traditional and Simplified Characters 34

4 Sentences and Sentence Processes

19 Topic-Comment 37

20 Other Aspects of Word Order 39

21 Questions 41

22 Question Words as Indefinites 44

23 Yes and No 45

24 Negation 46

25 Commands and Requests 46

5 Words

26 Parts of Speech (Word Classes) 49

27 Monosyllabic and Polysyllabic Words 51

6 Nouns

28 Compound Nouns 53

29 Noun Suffixes 54

30 Pronouns and Demonstratives 58

31 Zero-Pronominalization 59

32 Where Are the Articles("a" and "the")? 60

33 Modification and the Particle de ($$$) 61

34 The shì-de ($$$) Construction and Situational de ($$$) 63

35 Place Words 65

36 Time When 68

37 Measure Words 74

7 Verbs in General

Verb Suffixes

38 The Verb Suffix-guo ($$$) 81

39 The Verb Suffix-le ($$$) and Sentence le ($$$) 82

40 The Verb Suffix-zhe ($$$) 86

41 Zài ($$$) + Verb to Signal Ongoing Action 88

42 The Absence of a Suffix 89

43 Verb Reduplication and Tentativeness 90

Idiosyncratic Verbs

44 Shì ($$$): Identity and Category 92

45 Verbs Like shì: Classificatory Verbs 94

46 You ($$$): Possession and Existence 95

47 Zai ($$$): Location 96

48 Gei ($$$): "Give" and Its Derivatives 97

49 Generalized Verbs 99

50 Modal Verbs 102

51 Ambient Verbs 106

8 Adjectives and Adverbs

52 Adjectives and Verbs 107

53 Adjectives as Transitive Verbs 108

54 Verb + Adjective Phrase + yìdianr 109

55 Vivid Reduplication 111

56 Adverbs 115

57 Predicate Complements 119

58 Comparison 120

59 Intensifiers 123

60 The Three des 124

9 Complex Verbs

61 Resultative Verb Compounds 127

62 Directional Verb Compounds 131

63 Potential Compounds 133

10 After the Verb

64 Objects and Complex Verbs 137

65 Postverbal Particles: Goals of Motion and Transformation 139

66 Verb-Plus-Object Compounds 142

67 Mock Objects 146

68 Ditransitive Verbs: Verbs with Two Objects 147

69 Embedded Object Clauses 150

70 Duration Complements 151

71 Extent Phrases 156

72 Conjuctions 157

11 Verbs and Prepositions

73 Verbs in Series 161

74 Verbs and Prepositions 162

75 Prepositions 162

76 The ba ($$$) Construction 164

77 The Preposition bèi ($$$) 166

78 Pivot Verbs 167

12 Miscellaneous

79 Numbers 171

80 Money 174

81 Names, Titles, and Forms of Address 176

82 Proverbs and Sayings 178

Appendix: Common Verbs Organized by Semantic Area 181

Bibliography 195

Index 197