The aim of this thesis is to investigate the discourse function of connectives in Chinese narratives. It is found that connectives , being a kind of cohesive ties , operate at different levels of discourse as boundary markers. The present study also points out that the occurrences of Chinese connectives are governed by semantic relatedness and discourse structure of the connected discourse units. Chinese connectives are classified on the basis of their meanings into four categories. In describing the positions of the four types of connectives in discourse , the author asserts that Chinese discourse is hierarchically composed of recursive micro-structures and macro-structures , with units occuring at a lower level exhibiting tighter connection. The four categories of connectives occur in discourse to link units at different levels. Additives , with the meaning of “in addition” , generally occur within topic chain to link micro-structures. Causals, which serve to connect expressions bearing causal relations , are mostly used at the connections of micro-structures and less frequently to link macro-structures. Adversatives, which mean "contrast" or "contrariness" , occur at the connections of macrostructures where discourse usually shifts to a different view point. Temporals , indicating temporal sequence , may be used either to link micro-structural expressions of events or actions or to mark shifts of the temporal settings at macro-structural level. The above findings are verified with a quantitive analysis of topic continuity which is proposed to be the indicator of semantic relatedness. The quantative analysis reveals that additives are associated with high topic continuity , and causals , adversatives and temporals are related to low continuity. The thesis also includes an experiment on empirical validity of the findings. The results of the test show that the conclusion proposed in this study adequately describes the native speakers ' competence in using Chinese connectives to organize discourse.

This experimental study investigates the second language acquisition of the four Mandarin aspect markers -le, -guo, -zhe, and zai- by native Swedish university students enrolled in Chinese language courses in Sweden. The main points of inquiry are acquisition order, the Aspect Hypothesis, the Distributional Bias Hypothesis, and the Prototype Model. The study contains a cross-sectional study and a longitudinal study. Both written and spoken data are collected. The tasks in the cross-sectional study include film-retelling, picture-retelling, grammaticality judgment, fill-in-the-blank questions and comprehension. The longitudinal study includes written data produced by seven students in their tri-monthly journal. The study shows that perfective markers are produced before imperfective markers. The results of the experiments are consistent with the Aspect Hypothesis. The Distributional Bias Hypothesis can account for most of the Aspect Hypothesis but there are exceptions that indicate that other factors could also influence the acquisition process, such as L1 transfer. The Prototype Model cannot be conclusively proven. Apart from contributing to second-language acquisition theo-ries on cross-linguistic tense-aspect morphology, this study can provide empirical evidence with significant pedagogical implications for the second-language learning classroom.

本論文旨在探討「掉」出現在動詞後面時的語意內涵與語法地位。我們認為當「掉」身為結果補語時，它的意思為「被往下移除」；身為動相標誌時，意思為「被移除」；身為動貌標誌時，則標示起始意。「掉」經常與及物和非作格動詞形成複合動詞：與靜態動詞、瞬間動詞及達成動詞構成達成複合動詞，與動作動詞及完成動詞則構成完成複合動詞。雖然V-掉的論元結構經常是其前置動詞與「掉」之論元結構的結合體，但在某些情況下「掉」可能會壓制前置動詞的論元、幫V-掉複合動詞增加新論元或先壓制前置動詞的論元再幫V-掉複合動詞增加新論元。最後，我們採用虛化的理論來解釋為何「掉」具有多重語意及多重語法地位。由於「掉」符合Hopper (1991)所提出的虛化原則，因此我們相信「掉」的確正處在虛化的過程中。 / There are two main questions about post-verbal diao we dealt with in the present study: one is its meanings, and the other is its syntactic status. We argue that when diao acts as a resultative complement, it means ‘to be removed in a downward direction’, when it acts as a phase marker, it means ‘to be removed’, and when it acts as an aspect marker, it bears a grammatical meaning indicating inchoative. Post-verbal diao usually co-occurs with transitive and unaccusative verbs to form compounds. When diao goes with State, Semelfactive and Achievement verbs, the V-diao compounds will be Achievements, when diao goes with Activity and Accomplishment verbs, the V-diao compounds will be Accomplishments. In most cases, the argument structure of a V-diao compound is a composition of the argument structure of the preceding verb and that of diao. However, diao will suppress the Goal argument when co-occurring with three-place transactional verbs; it will create an argument for the V-diao compound when the argument of the preceding verb and that of diao are incompatible; it will suppress an argument of the preceding verb and create a new one for the V-diao compound when occurring with verbs which have an incremental theme. Grammaticalization is taken to account for the polysemy and the multiple syntactic status of post-verbal diao. Because except specialization, diao follows all of the principles (i.e. Layering, Divergence, Persistence, and De-categorialization) proposed by Hopper (1991), we suggest it is in the process of grammaticalization.