Reliable Source for Parts of Speech?

[Apollys]

Anyone have a reliable source they can recommend for telling me the part of speech of any Chinese word?  I keep getting native speakers telling me I'm using a noun and it needs to be a verb, and I say, well the dictionary I used (Pleco or whatever) said it was a verb.

 

It's super weird to me that part of speech isn't information that is considered integral to a standard Chinese dictionary, e.g. 新华字典.

[889]

Are Chinese kids taught how to diagram a sentence⸮

[Wei-Ming 魏明]

That's quite a can of worms you've opened. Check out this blog post.

[mungouk]

OK, this has been bothering me for a while.

 

To what extent do linguists agree that Chinese really does have verbs, nouns, prepositions, adverbs etc. in the way that, say, European languages do?

 

Is this a "Western analytical framework" that has been imposed on the language, but which doesn't really work consistently?

 

Learning that prepositions or nouns can sometimes be verbs etc. is certainly one of the more confusing aspects.

 

[Apollys]

Chinese definitely has parts of speech, because parts of speech simply mean classifications of words that perform the same grammatical functions.  Are they all the same as English? No, for example 了.

 

Does Chinese clearly have verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and conjunctions?  Verbs and nouns 100% yes.  Adjectives and adverbs also yes, but the difference between the two is often just a 得/地.  Prepositions and conjunctions? Well there are things we call prepositions and conjunctions, but they way they function can be quite different from what we're used to: 连他都不知道。

 

So just in case anyone's doubting "Do parts of speech actually exist in Chinese?", just remember every language has a grammar (grammar just means patterns in the language) and parts of speech are just classifications of words that perform similar grammatical purposes.

 

I'm sure in 10 years, parts of speech will be considered a fundamental component of a dictionary entry in Chinese just as it is in English.  It just baffles me that hasn't happened already.

[mungouk]

6 hours ago, Apollys said:

in case anyone's doubting "Do parts of speech actually exist in Chinese?",

 

Well just to clarify: I wasn't. 

 

Considering how old Chinese language is, I  was wondering what the ancient Grammarians had independently developed as a way of talking about their own language and whether it had interesting differences with other how other languages have historically been described.

 

When I start to hear things like "this word is a noun, but is can also be used as a verb or sometimes a preposition" I'm curious whether that's a limitation of the analytical framework*, or a feature of the language itself.

 

* My favourite example of this is when a duck-billed platypus gets called a "freak of nature" on some TV programme. No, the DBP *is* nature... there's just a limitation in the way we have decided to describe birds and mammals.

 

[Apollys]

4 minutes ago, mungouk said:

When I start to hear things like "this word is a noun, but is can also be used as a verb or sometimes a preposition" I'm curious whether that's a limitation of the analytical framework*, or a feature of the language itself.

 

It's totally fine for words to be overloaded, and that doesn't mean there's a limitation in the analytical framework.

 

Book can be a thing you read or a verb that means to reserve something.

[markhavemann]

 

3 hours ago, mungouk said:

When I start to hear things like "this word is a noun, but is can also be used as a verb or sometimes a preposition" I'm curious whether that's a limitation of the analytical framework*, or a feature of the language itself.

From my experience it does seem like Chinese linguists (or at least my lecturer) question the usefulness of using the normal "western" methods to approach Chinese grammar. 

 

Chinese grammar focuses on 主语、谓语、定语、壮语 which seem like they don't really correspond all that perfectly to what I'm used to and have used with ancient Greek and Latin, and English. Largely because of the "flexiblity" of Chinese word usage. My knowledge is pretty shallow so I don't think I can add more than this, but I do think that there is definitely some validity in what you say. 

[mungouk]

Thanks! 

 

Should that be:

状语    zhuàng yǔ    adverbial adjunct (adverb or adverbial clause)

 

[markhavemann]

39 minutes ago, mungouk said:

Should that be:

状语    zhuàng yǔ    adverbial adjunct (adverb or adverbial clause)

ooops, you're right.