本篇論文論證在漢語中動詞以及文獻中所認定的形容詞(putative adjectives)之間的區分是非必要的。本文探討了文獻中區分和辨別漢語形容詞詞類的各項準則，並論證這些準則並無法全面性解釋所有傳統上被視為是形容詞的詞彙，也因此使得漢語語法更加複雜和歧異。文獻中所認定的形容詞在句法上並未呈現出形容詞的特性；相反地，它們無論是從時貌標記來看或就範疇功能(categorial function)等方面而論都與動詞一致。因此，把文獻中所認定的形容詞與動詞歸於一類將可維持漢語語法的簡單性。 此外，我們認為Chomsky (1965)以兩個正負號特徵(±N, ±V)所界定出的四個詞類(名詞、動詞、形容詞以及介係詞)並不是普遍性的(universal)；意即，並非所有語言都需要同時擁有這四個詞類。功能語言學派的看法亦同，他們認為語言中最少只需要兩個詞類來執行語言功能，即動詞與名詞，因此只有這兩個詞類具有普遍性，而另兩個詞類的語意功能可藉由它們來執行。對此，我們引用了缺乏形容詞(如：韓語(cf. Kim 2002a, 2002b))及介係詞(如：賽德克語(cf. Huang 1998))語言的語料來佐證只有動詞與名詞具有普遍性的看法。最後，本文採用Bhat (1994)在觀察跨語言間形容詞詞類的行為表現後所提出的形容詞鑑定標準，來證明漢語中並沒有一個獨立的形容詞詞類。 / This thesis argues that the verb-adjective distinction in Mandarin Chinese is unnecessary. The criteria for identifying a distinct adjectival category have been proposed by many linguists, e.g., Zhu (1982), Yin (2003), Huang et al (2008); however, they fail to accommodate all putative adjectives as a category. A distinct adjective category requires stipulations to account for the verb-adjective distinction and thus complicates the grammar. Descriptively, putative adjectives in Mandarin Chinese do not exhibit adjectival characteristics; rather, they are unmarked predicates and thus behave similarly as verbs in terms of aspectual marking, N’-ellipsis, and reduplication. Putative adjectives should thus be conflated with verbs to maintain the simplicity of the grammar. From a typological perspective, some languages have been argued to lack adjectives (e.g., Korean (cf. Kim 2002)) and others, prepositions (e.g., Seediq (cf. Huang 1998)). Therefore, Chomsky’s (1965) four categories defined by two universal feature specifications [±N] and [±V] do not seem to be ubiquitous. Functionalist linguists also assert that only Noun and Verb are universal, for they represent the elementary and central concepts at two extremes of the world while Adjective and Preposition may not be syntactically realized and their semantic concepts are thus associated with either Noun or Verb. Finally, Chinese putative adjectives are further examined with the cross-linguistic criteria proposed in Bhat (1994). The only logical conclusion is that Mandarin Chinese does not distinguish adjectives as a distinct category.