的 .. what for?

[dxcarnadi]

Hello

In a Chinese text book I find these sentences.
.
.
你太浪费了！
你以为钱是好赚的吗？
你自己去找个工作就知道钱好不好赚！

 

What (grammatical) role has 的 in the second sentence?
Can somebody explain to me?
Thank you.

[DavyJonesLocker]

Looks like a 是 ..... 的 Construction to me for emphasising the bit in the middle.

 

The 是 is optional I believe.

好 before the verb means "easy to do (the verb)"

 

Long time since I've studied grammar bit there are a lot of grammar gurus on here

 Let's wait for their explanation .

[Publius]

Yes, it's the shi...de construction.

If you want to go more technical, it's a kind of cleft sentence.

If you want to go really technical, 'de' in the shi...de construction is a nominalizer. It's a particle that turns a verbal phrase into a noun phrase (because the Chinese copula 'shi' only accepts a noun as complement).

[dxcarnadi]

Hello Publius

 

Thank you for the comprehensive information.
What do you mean with "technical"? ;-)
I've read "all" pointers.
I'm curious how the Mandarin Chinese language really works ..
I'm a German electrical/software engineer. Technical. But Not a linguist.

 

[Publius]

Hi, dxcarnadi, welcome to the forums.

 

Chinese is in many ways different from European languages. You can find an outline of its grammar at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_grammar. But that being a comprehensive description, some features may not receive enough attention. Here I'd like to highlight three aspects of the language which I think will benefit you long-term. One is that Chinese is a topic-prominent language. Subject-verb-object analysis often does not apply. Two is that Chinese is pro-drop. It's meaning-oriented. Anything that can be inferred need not to be expressed. This includes subject, object, and virtually any part of a sentence. Three is that rhythm plays a big role in Chinese. Seldom do we find a language in which the number of syllables in a word determines the syntactic structure around it. Chinese is such a language.

 

As for the structural particle 的, students usually learn it in this order: expressing possession with "de" (A1), modifying nouns with adjective + "de" (A2), modifying nouns with phrase +"de" (A2), using the "shi..._de" construction (B1). That's a sensible and practical approach. But the lack of deeper analysis might prove unsatisfactory for the linguistically inclined.

 

So I'm offering my take on this, that the underlying, basic function of 的 is as an attributive marker, which unfortunately has no parallel in European languages.

 

An attributive (定语) is a word or phrase within a noun phrase that modifies the head noun. It can be a noun phrase such as 'weapons' in 'weapons program', or an adjective phrase such as 'happy' in 'happy hour', or an verb phrase such as 'emerging' in 'emerging markets'. In Chinese, where all modifiers must precede the modified, and where relative clause is a misnomer because there is no relative pronoun in the language, 定语 basically means anything that goes before and modifies a noun. 的 simply marks the 定语.

 

When the attributive is a noun, the relationship between the modifier and the modified is typically possessive, but it can be other relationships as well. In this regard it's very similar to the English word 'of'. 'The love of God' can be construed to mean either we love God or God loves us. 'Fist of iron' does not necessarily make iron the owner. Noun DE noun simply means these two nouns are related, the former modifies/qualifies the latter in some way.

 

It's tempting to analyze 我的 as a possessive determiner 'my' or a possessive pronoun 'mine'. But really it just means 我 is used attributively. I would even go out on a limb to say that 我 is not a pronoun in the sense 'I' is a pronoun. For two reasons: 1) It can be modified to form a very complex noun phrase, for example, 在人生的十字路口徘徊的我 (lit. 'the at-life's-crossroads-hesitating me'); 2) There's a whole lot of words a speaker can employ to refer to oneself, 我, 俺, 偶, 孤, 寡人, 朕, 臣, 妾, 老身, 卑职, 小的, 在下, 鄙人, 洒家, 贫道, 小编... depending on register and social context. Pronouns do not act this way.

 

When the attributive is an adjective, it's important to remember that there is no real adjectives in Chinese. Chinese adjectives are stative verbs. They can predicate a sentence without the help of a linking verb. In 你快乐所以我快乐 (You're happy, so I'm happy), 快乐 does not mean 'happy', it means 'to be happy'. So adjective + de + noun and phrase + de + noun really are the same thing. Better to interpret 快乐的时光 as 'times that are happy' rather than 'happy times'.

 

Things can get a bit confusing with Chinese adjectives. For one thing, monosyllabic adjectives behave differently from disyllabic adjectives. Monosyllabic adjectives usually can modify a noun directly without 的 (e.g. 新车, 旧车), and generally cannot be used adverbially by simply adding 地 (e.g. *高地举起). Perhaps they are real adjectives after all. Or perhaps not. Because although the 的-less version is preferable, that doesn't mean the 的 version is ungrammatical. For example, 好朋友 means 'close friend' and 好的朋友 means 'friends who are a good influence'. The former is lexicalized. It does not have an antonym 坏朋友 to mean the opposite. (What is the opposite of a close friend anyway? Distant friend? Archenemy?)

 

Now let's move on to when the attributive is a clause (定语从句 in Chinese). In European languages, when a verb is modifying a noun, it must take the non-finite form, e.g. participle, infinitive, or it must reside within a relative clause. In Chinese, where there is no morphological distinction between finite and non-finite, all modifying verbal elements must form a clause that goes before the noun and is marked at the end by 的.

 

There is nothing magical about the 的 in 我写的书 (the books that I wrote). It just marks the boundary where the attributive 我写 ends and where the head noun 书 begins. Without this marker, 我写书 would unfortunately mean 'I write books' because Chinese is an SVO language.

 

And the final case of the so-called shi...de construction is merely an example of the substantival use of the attributive, meaning the head noun is elided and the modifier is treated as if it were a noun. Nominalization of adjectives and verbs happens in English too, for example, 'the rich and the poor', 'the good, the bad and the ugly', 'the haves and the have nots'. They mean 'the rich people and the poor people', 'the good one, the bad one and the ugly one', 'the ones who have and the ones who have not' respectively.

 

When 书 in 我写的书 is understood, it can be dropped. There is no danger of misunderstanding 这本书是我写的 'This book is a book=>one that I wrote' or ——这本书是谁写的？'This book is a book=>one that who wrote?' ——我写的。'(It's) one that I wrote.' To borrow an English grammar term, the omission of the noun after 的 turns a bound relative clause '(a book) that I wrote' into a free relative clause 'what I wrote' which has an inbuilt antecedent (what = that which) and can serve as a noun all by its lonesome. Chinese can do this because the structures of the two types of relative clause are the same. Leave the modified noun out and a bound relative clause (adjectival in nature) becomes a free relative clause (nominal in nature).

 

A phrase like 我写的 that terminates in 的 is called 的字结构 in Chinese grammar. The 的 exists to signify that a head noun is missing and what is normally an attributive phrase leading up to 的 should be interpreted as a noun in its stead. Just like in 'the rich/poor/good/bad', you drop the noun and the adjective becomes the noun.

 

And it's really no different than dropping 书 from 我的书. Speakers of European languages tend to think of 我的 in 这本书是我的 as a possessive pronoun 'mine'. But there is no possessive pronouns in Chinese. From a Chinese point of view, 我的 and 我写的 are just attributives used as a noun when the head noun is dropped.

[dxcarnadi]

Hello Publius

 

I've read your thread/forum-post above  .. all .. with interest .. without understanding.

You wrote
"Two is that Chinese is pro-drop. It's meaning-oriented."

What is "meaning-oriented" in detail? .. Yip used it also.
Can you give me some Chinese sentences as example?

 

I searched the Internet .. but I don't find explanation for "meaning-oriented".
Have you other words/names for it? A linguistic name?

 

Can you give titles of Chinese Grammar books from mainland China .. in bilingual .. Chinese/English?

Maybe I can order from Germany.
Thank you.
 

[Angelina]

On 4/6/2018 at 8:03 PM, Publius said:

Two is that Chinese is pro-drop. It's meaning-oriented. Anything that can be inferred need not to be expressed. This includes subject, object, and virtually any part of a sentence. 

 

@dxcarnadi

 

https://www.sprachforschung.uni-wuppertal.de/fileadmin/linguistik/rathert/Kolloquien/WS12_13/HandoutBisang.pdf

 

 

On 4/6/2018 at 8:03 PM, Publius said:

Three is that rhythm plays a big role in Chinese. Seldom do we find a language in which the number of syllables in a word determines the syntactic structure around it. Chinese is such a language.

 

https://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI9543073/

 

 

[dxcarnadi]

Hello (Publius)

 

After reading & understanding your discourse on f.e. attributive .. now I read mainly .. In China published Chinese grammar books with Chinese examples (but without English translation).
Translation "could falsify" the original examples.
Only the explanation is bilingual.

 

For example .. I didn't know that Chinese does not have a word for "my".
--> (Noun) (attributive-marker DE) (Noun)

 

Thank you.