Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics

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Verb Copying
(1,191 words)

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。

 

 

Wǒ  shuì-jiào        shuì-le        sān      ge     zhōngtóu.  (Duration)

 

 

1sg  sle…

Cite this page
Lisa Lai-Shen CHENG, “Verb Copying”, in: Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics, General Editor Rint Sybesma. Consulted online on 29 March 2023 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/2210-7363_ecll_COM_00000442>
First published online: 2015



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