Using 'is' in Chinese

[Ruben von Zwack]

I hope Maddie isn't too confused now.

 

Actually this was something that had been forever bugging me, too, so thank you daofeishi and everyone for bringing this up and spelling it out!
 

 

高山高: First 高 is an adjective. Second 高 is a stative verb.

[Guest realmayo]

高山高: First 高 is an adjective. Second 高 is a stative verb

Arguably that type of description is unnecessary beacuse it's fixing English grammar onto Chinese. I mean, you could just as easily say the first  高 is a stative verb too and that 高 always carries the sense of "is-tall", so the sentence above is basically 'the is-tall mountain is tall', but that in order to use western grammar we must say that the first 高 behaves in a way identical to how we would use an adjective, therefore people like to call it an adjective.

[tooironic]

It should be pointed out that many Chinese dictionaries do actually adopt these so-called "Western" categories of parts of speech in their definitions - and I'm not just talking about bilingual dictionaries, but monolingual ones too. See for example Baidu, 國語辭典 and the 现代汉语规范词典.

 

I'm not sure either that splitting hairs about the difference between an adjective and a stative verb is all that helpful for a Chinese learner, especially a beginning one. IMO, learning about sentence structure and usage is much important and practical.

[Guest realmayo]

I'm sure you're right, but at the same time I remember finding it helpful to silently insert an "is" before every "adjective" and see if that explained everything.

 

As for dictionaries, presumably that's part of the learn-from-the-foreigners trend that has been so strong in China the last 100 years or so.

[daofeishi]

I mean, you could just as easily say the first  高 is a stative verb too and that 高 always carries the sense of "is-tall", so the sentence above is basically 'the is-tall mountain is tall'

 

Right, or you could just remember that a copula is not needed when modifying a noun with stative verb, and that NP + SV is a valid verb phrase. Most sciences, linguistics too I would guess, strive towards parsimonious models, i.e. models where unnecessary or superfluous elements have been removed. In 高山 vs 山高, I don't see why it is necessary to retain two categories, one for adjectives and one for stative verbs, and posit that there exist two 高s, one 高(adj) and one 高(SV). Eliminating one of the categories and stating that SV + NOUN is a valid noun phrase and NP + SV is a valid verb phrase seems to be a more parsimonious and equally expressive grammar. I guess the follow-up question has to be if there are any words that can occur as one but not the other, i.e. any words that can occur as an adjective but not as a stative verb or vice versa. If there are words like that, I can see why the two categories are needed. 

[Guest realmayo]

There are such words as in my earlier post #12:

 

32. V.P. (Verb Phrase, Dòngcí Cízǔ 动词词组). This includes (i) descriptive predicates that do not behave as stative verbs, e.g., ǎirán ‘amicable; amiable’, as well as (ii) phrases and longer chunks containing a verb that are not fixed expressions, e.g., bǎiláibǎiqù ‘sway; waver’, áidào tiānhēi ‘bear up until nightfall’.

 

5. ATTR. (Attributive, Dìngyǔ 定语). An attributive is any word, phrase or sentence that is found directly in front of a noun or noun phrase and functions to modify that noun. Just about any word, phrase or sentence in Chinese can easily function as an attributive. Because of this, the label ATTR. is limited in this dictionary only to those entries that have no possible function other than that of attributive. Examples include gōnggòng in gōnggòng qìchē '(public) bus', qián in qiánbàn 'first half', Zhōng-Měi in Zhōng-Měi guānxi 'Sino-American relations', etc.

[daofeishi]

There are such words as in my earlier post #12:

 

Alright, I think I see what is going on. Let's forget about the term adjective completely, and let's use the term attributive for the modifiers that go in front of nouns. Then stative verbs can be used as attributives (like 高), but not all attributives are stative verbs (like 前 and 后). 

[Nathan Mao]

"It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is"

[Guest realmayo]

 Let's forget about the term adjective completely,

That's my preference, but I understand why plenty of people prefer the opposite approach, i.e. saying they're all adjectives and lots of them can act as verbs too.

[Maddie]

I meant 'I think my nose is pretty'

 

xxx

[Hofmann]

Parts of speech of words should be determined by their function in a phrase and not by their common usages or dictionary definitions. Calling the first 高 in 高山高an attributive is correct, but unnecessary and too broad because any attributive before a noun is an adjective anyway.

[Ruben von Zwack]

 

I meant 'I think my nose is pretty'

 

You did say that! What you wrote above was correct. Minus one little mistake - that last 的. Cross that out and then the sentence is perfect!

 

 

我觉得我的鼻子很漂亮[的].

[Guest realmayo]

Calling the first 高 in 高山高an attributive is correct, but unnecessary

Agree, and the snippet I quoted agrees: "the label ATTR. is limited in this dictionary only to those entries that have no possible function other than that of attributive"

 

Parts of speech of words should be determined by their function in a phrase and not by their common usages

I'm not sure that's helpful: why can't I use the 公共 as in 公共汽车 the same way as I use 大?

In 公共汽车 the function of 公共 is as an 'adjective', like the 大 in 大鼻子, so I should be able to use 公共 like 大, but there are times when I can't, because they're different parts of speech, but you wouldn't know that simply by determining the functions of the words in the phrase 公共汽车.

 

Why not say 高山 is a noun-phrase comprising a verb and a noun, i.e. "a verbal qualifier and a noun head functioning as an uncommitted noun-phrase".

 

The reason I ask is: 山鸟

 

Two options.

1.山 is actually an adjective as well as a noun.

2.Or it's a noun qualifying another noun.

 

If you resist saying that words like 山 are adjectives as well as nouns, then you can just as easily resist saying that 高 is an adjective as well as a stative verb. You can say 山 is a noun and a sometimes where you get two nouns following each other in Chinese the first noun qualifies the second one. Sometimes in Chinese where you get a stative verb and then a noun, the stative verb qualifies the noun.

[Hofmann]

why can't I use the 公共 as in 公共汽车 the same way as I use 大?

You're thinking too much in terms of how words can and can't be used instead of how they happen to be used in any instance. In the instance of 公共汽車, 公共 is an adjective. So is 大 in 大鼻子. Yes, you can't use 公共 like 大 but it doesn't effect their function in these instances.

 

Why not say 高山 is a noun-phrase comprising a verb and a noun

Because you have to be more specific. 高 is an attributive verb, and also an adjective. Calling 高 a verb will imply that it's part of a verb phrase.

 

山 in 山鳥 is an attributive noun and an adjective.

 

sometimes where you get two nouns following each other in Chinese the first noun qualifies the second one. Sometimes in Chinese where you get a stative verb and then a noun, the stative verb qualifies the noun.

Again, there is no determining a part of speech without context. If two words that are usually nouns are together, and the first one qualifies the second one, then the first one will cease to function as a noun and functions as an adjective in that instance. (e.g. "We traverse the jungle canopy via zip-line."). If something that is usually a stative verb is followed by something that is usually a noun, and the first word qualifies the second, then the first one must be an adjective and cannot be called a stative verb in that instance.

[Guest realmayo]

You're thinking too much in terms of how words can and can't be used instead of how they happen to be used in any instance.

Ok this is getting a bit existential.

 

We traverse the jungle canopy via zip-line

 

If I am compiling a dictionary, how should I classify the word "jungle"? You say it ceases to function as a noun, in that example sentence, and instead functions as an adjective. So, in the dictionary, do you say it is a noun and an adjective? Or do you say, it is a noun (which can sometimes be attributive)?

 

I'm guessing you choose the latter, right?

 

So what's wrong with calling 高 a stative verb and leaving it at that? Nouns can be attributive, depending on their position in the sentence. Stative verbs can attributive, depending on their position in the sentence. I genuinely don't see why jungle gets the simple classification as "noun" and 高 gets the complex classification 'stative verb or adjective depending on where it is in the sentence'.

 

We're definitely coming at this from opposite angles. You're asking what the function of this or that word is in this or that sentence. I'm asking: how do I classify this or that word so I know how to use it in sentences. For instance, you wrote: "you can't use 公共 like 大 but it doesn't effect their function in these instances" which if absolutely fine, but I want to know how they are used in different sentences then either I read 50 sentences and work out the patterns myself, or I learn that they are classified differently. Again, I think the latter approach is neater because it's quicker.

 

Again, 我昨天买的东西不错, 买 isn't an adjective, it's a verb, but used in this word-order with a 的, its function is to describe a noun. However you wouldn't classify 买 as a verb and an adjective. You'd call it a verb, and assume that the person reading your dictionary knows how verbs work.

 

So why not say 高 is a stative verb and assume that the person reading your dictionary knows that stative verbs can act like English adjectives do. It's just much neater than writing s.v./adj next to thousands of entries. It doesn't mean one way is right the other wrong, just neater.

[Hofmann]

Word are not parts of speech unless they are used. If I just asked "What part of speech is 'jungle?'" without context, most people would say it's a noun, so it's fine to say "高 is a stative verb" and leave it at that, but technically you cannot answer that question without context. "Jungle" is just a word. Dictionaries will list how words are most commonly used, but they are not classified into parts of speech; they are defined.

 

So, in your example, 我昨天买的东西不错, the first definition of 買 a dictionary would give is how it's used as a verb, but saying that 買 in that sentence is a verb is just wrong, which brings us back to the OP. The OP's problem is the misidentification of 漂亮 as an adjective in the sentence 你的頭髮很漂亮, leading to the question of why there's no copula there.

[Maddie]

Thank you so much!!

 

谢谢！

 

xxx

[dispensable]

I would say 你的鼻子很大。