The term verb copying refers to the phenomenon in which we find two instantiations of the same verb in one sentence. It can be found when a sentence has a direct object as well as a postverbal adverbial constituent, which can range from duration/frequency expressions to directional, locative and resultative constituents (see Li and Thompson 1981, Tai 1999), as illustrated in (1) (examples adapted from Tai 1999).
1. | a. | 我睡覺睡了三個鐘頭。 |
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| Wǒ shuì-jiào shuì-le sān ge zhōngtóu. (Duration) |
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| 1sg sle… |