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Chapter Ⅰ Introduction 1.1 Motivation and purpose
In daily life, when people plan to be more expressive or emotional in speech, it is common for them to use intensification. Intensification is usually realized through the use of adverbs, the category of language which has long been discussed fervently (a category of language which has been the subject of much discussion amongst linguists) due to its vagueness. In terms of grammatical function, many researchers have reached a consensus that an adverb can be plausibly utilized as degree, scope, modal particle or negation. In terms of syntactic behavior, an adverb is said to be positioned usually on the predicate or pre-predicate modifying adjectives, some verbs, or the entire predicate (Zhang, 2000; Liu & Pan & Gu, 1996; Biq & Huang, 2016).
Among all the adverbs, it should be noted that the intensification of adjectives relies on the use of a degree intensifier, which serves to situate the meaning of the adverb on a certain scale of gradability such as that of quantity, scope, time, or height. Its
modified elements normally adjectives, are usually gradable. A degree intensifier is to produce the heightening effect on the target entity (Hoye, 1997).
In the extant literature, some of the attention paid to degree intensifiers in the extant literature seeks to sort out the roles played by degree intensifiers in the context of the development of language use and to build up inventories. Stoffel (1901) conducted pioneering research to explore the development of degree intensifiers in both middle and late English. In Bolinger’s study (1972), degree intensifiers are labeled as boosters, a quality scales upward with the capacity to scale a quality upward in intensity. They offer a picture of "fevered invention" (Bolinger 1972: 18) which implies that these special words could motivate the renewal of a language constantly. Next, the interest in degree intensifiers shifted to the discussion of
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theoretical issues such as the interaction between degree intensifiers and modified elements or the processes involved in the grammaticalization process of degree intensifiers. For example, Kennedy & McNally (1999) investigated the internal structure of degree intensifiers and modified adjectives. Gradability is a key concept in explaining the felicity in these two sentences: Gina is very tall and?? Gina is completely tall. Paradis (2001) further indicated another prominent concept boundedness, which is said to highly correlate with gradability. She argues that an adjective may select its degree intensifier and cause the interpretation of the holistic construction to be more restricted or more expanded than the normal usage. These two significant studies raise the issue that certain constraints exist when a degree
intensifier co-occurs with the modified elements.
Many cross-linguistic studies have delved into the issue of degree intensifiers as well. Investigations of degree intensifiers in German are mostly about the syntactic behavior of degree intensifiers and the interplay with modified adjectives (e.g., Löbner 2012). As for Spanish, many researchers take a sociolinguistic approach to observing the use of degree intensifiers in some specific speech community (e.g., Martínez López, 2009; Brown and Cortés-Torres, 2013). As for Japanese, the main research concerns are how a degree intensifier interacts with syntactic structures and nuance usages in regional dialects (e.g., Tsujimura, 2001; Matsubara, 2008).
As for the use of degree intensifiers in Mandarin Chinese, much of the previous literature on degree intensifiers has mainly focused on dealing with the semantic changes or idiosyncrasies of particular individual intensifiers. For example, many studies have investigated the degree intensifier 很 hen3 by way of its syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic aspects (e.g., Chang 2004; Lee, 2011; Chen, 2014). Also, other degree intensifiers such as 非常 fei1chang2, 蠻 man2 , and 太 tai4 have been examined in different genres (e.g., Shang, 2010; Hong & Lim, 2012; Chang, 2013).
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Unlike those in Mandarin Chinese, the representation of degree intensifiers in Taiwan Hakka is different. Two studies in Taiwan Hakka have indicated that
frequently-used degree intensifiers occur mostly in monosyllabic forms (Qi, 2007; Li, 2008). Six degree intensifiers in Taiwan Hakka—當 dong1, 蓋 goi3, 盡 qin3, 恁 an2, 異 i3, and 還 han5 —are identified in both studies to highlight their functions to boost the meaning during speech1. The canonical usages according to the Taiwanese Hakka Dictionary of Common Words and the Hakka Dictionary of Taiwan are
summarized in Table 1.
TABLE 1 Illustration of target usages of six degree intensifiers Degree intensifiers Canonical adjectival usages
恁 an2 恁‧
衰過‧‧
雞仔 又 走忒 三 隻。
an2 coi1go3 gie1e2 iu3 zeu2ted2 sam1 zag2 very unlucky hen again walk-TED three-CL
‘It is really unlucky that the three hens have gone. ’
當 dong1 這領 衫 看起來 當‧
靚‧
，愛 幾多 錢 正 買得著？
lia2liang1 sam1 kon3hi2loi5 dong1 jiang1 this-CL clothes look like very pretty oi3 gi2do1 qien5 zang3 mai1ded4 do32 want how much money so buy-DED-DO
1 Though two relevant studies mainly discuss usage in Taiwan Hakka with examples from the 四縣 xi3ien3 dialect, the author has consulted dictionaries and searched corpora to find that 當 dong1, 蓋 goi3, 盡 qin3, 恁 an2, 異 i3, and 還 han5 also occur in other sub-dialects. Hence, the oral data presented in the present study will include data from four sub-dialects. Notably, one of the sub-dialects 四縣 xi3ien3 shows regional variants. That is, in the northern area, native speakers tend to adopt 當 dong1 and in the southern area, people tend to adopt goi3. In order to discuss Taiwan Hakka thoroughly, the study regards 蓋 goi3 as another independent degree intensifier in the analysis.
2 The following abbreviations are used for the grammatical functions in this thesis: CL (classifier), COP (copular verb), DM (discourse marker), GEN (genitive marker), NEG (negative morpheme), NOM (nominalizer), Q (question marker), PRF (perfective aspect), and PRT (particle).
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‘This clothes looks very pretty. How much should I spend buying it?’
蓋 goi3 這 細妹仔 蓋‧
鬧‧
， 佢 係 麼儕？
lia2 se3moi3e2 goi3 nau3，gi5 he3 ma2sa5 this little girl very pretty she COP Q
‘This girl is very beautiful. Who is she?’
盡 qin3 這兜 魚仔肚 該 條 魚仔 个 味道 盡‧
壞‧
lia2deu1 ng5e2du2 ge3 tiau5ng5e2 ge3 mi3to3 qin3 fai3 these school of fish that-CL fish NOM smell very bad 怕 食毋得 了
pa3 siid5m5ded4 le1 afraid eat-NEG-DED PRF
‘This one of these fish smells very bad. I’m afraid that it can’t be eaten.’
‘That newly-opened store is very large.’
還 han5 佢 生著 還‧
媸‧ 了。
gi5 sang1do2 han5 ze2 le1 she look-DO very ugly PART
‘She is really ugly.’
Speaking of spoken Taiwan Hakka, one can find two interesting linguistic facts when a speaker attempts to employ a degree intensifier to strengthen his or her
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utterances. First, syntactic variations can be found when a degree intensifier of Taiwan Hakka is adopted. As above-mentioned, elements such as verb phrases and adjectival phrases which can be modified by a degree intensifier are fixed and predictable in Taiwan Hakka. However, the scope for the modification of elements appears to be more flexible during speech. Observe the following utterances in example (1), wherein a speaker employs the degree intensifier 當 dong1 to modify a noun 鄉下 hiong1ha3.
(1) [HL70:11]3
F3：頭擺 啊嗬... 斯 戴 當‧
鄉下‧‧
F3: teu5bai2 a3ho2…sii5 dai3 dong1 hiong1ha3 past PART SII live very rural
‘F3: When it comes to my childhood, I lived in a very rural area in the past.’
Second, the linguistic strategies which can be used for intensification cannot be doubly used. Yet, interestingly, in Taiwan Hakka reduplicated forms which already contain a certain degree of intensity can co-occur with the degree intensifier 恁 an2 as in example (2) below.
F1: he3 zon2 nam5pu3 ho1 ia3he3 gong2hi3 sii5 hi3 toi5bed4 ho1 qiu3 kon3do2 xiong2 ai2io2 ge3 ngiong2voi3 an2 pag5pag5e2
3 The sub-dialect, the number of conversation and the turn of excerpted utterance in the spoken corpus will be annotated in the form of [D Num: Turn]. The abbreviations for the sub-dialects are NXI= 北四 縣 bed4xi3ien3 (north); SXI= 南四縣 nam5xi3ien3 (south); HL=海陸 hoi2liug8; TB=大埔 tai3bu1;
NP=饒平 ngiau5pin5.
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F1: and return southern PART or talk about SII go-to Taipei PART then see-DO ponder PART there how come very white
F1: Toward the south, or to talk about it, to Taipei (i.e., the north), I was wondering aww why there were so many white (tong blossoms).
However, a broad picture of how degree intensifiers work with the post-modified elements to be a construction during speech and how the use of degree intensifiers anchors in a speaker's attitude to display the speaker’s subjectivity toward the hearers remain unexplored. Partington (1993: 178) pinpoints that “[t]he importance of
intensification in the communicative process is that it is a vehicle for impressing, praising, persuading, insulting, and generally influence listener's reception of the message.” What’s more, as Athanasiadou (2007: 561) emphasizes, the selection of degree intensifiers in spoken contexts indeed works to “mentally transport the listeners to another space, allowing them to observe the characterization of the entities.” Hence, the aim of this current study is to explore the system of degree intensifiers in Taiwan Hakka based on their authentic usages from the NCCU Corpus of Spoken Hakka (32 daily conversation recordings; time duration in total: 10 hours 19 minutes).
Three related research questions are to be tackled in this study:
(1) What is the distribution of the syntactic categories of the modified elements for each degree intensifier in spoken Taiwan Hakka?
(2) What syntactic and semantic differences can be further teased out with regard to the modified elements?
(3) How does each of the six degree intensifiers differ regarding the degree of grammaticalization, lexicalization and subjectivity?
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The oral data treated in the present thesis is obtained from The NCCU Corpus of Spoken Hakka (http://spokenchinesecorpus.nccu.edu.tw/index.php). Further
supplementary data is also taken from the Taiwanese Hakka Dictionary of Common Words (教育部台灣客家語常用詞辭典) (http://hakka.dict.edu.tw), and the Hakka Dictionary of Taiwan (台灣客家話辭典). Since four sub-dialects (四縣 xi3ien3, 海 陸 hoi2liug8 , 饒平 ngiau5pin5 , and 大埔 tai3bu1 ) will be examined together in this study, the data presented in this thesis are mainly marked in tone categories (調類).
The tone diacritics are sourced from the Hakka Pinyin Manual (客家語拼音方案使用 手冊) on the website of the Ministry of Education, Taiwan
(http://language.moe.gov.tw/result.aspx?classify_sn=42&subclassify_sn=447) and are presented in Table 2.
TABLE 2 Tone diacritics of four sub-dialects Tones
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1.3 Organization of the thesis
The thesis is organized as follows. Following ChapterⅠ, Chapter Ⅱ presents significant concepts and reviews previous studies of degree intensifiers cross-linguistically. Data and methodology are presented in Chapter Ⅲ. Subsequently, Chapter Ⅳ gives an analysis of degree intensifiers including the patterns in the collocations and also the structural variants and semantic differences in the discourse under consideration. Finally, concluding remarks and suggestions for further studies will be proposed in Chapter Ⅴ.
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