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Research journal "Foreign Languages in Tertiary Education"
ISSN 2072-7607
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Emelchenkova E. N.

Approaches of Chinese linguists to the referential classification of noun phrase in Chinese. Pp. 31–43.

UDC 811.581.11

DOI: 10.37724/RSU.2025.75.4.003

EDN: HLPSRX

 

Abstract. This article presents, for the first time in Russian linguistics and sinology, a comprehensive review of the principal approaches adopted by Chinese linguists to the classification of referential expressions in the Chinese language. The analytical framework for describing referentially significant components of the noun phrase was originally borrowed in the 1980s from English-language scholarship; however, when applied within the context of Chinese linguistics, it encountered a range of linguistic and methodological challenges. These were, on the whole, successfully addressed by Chinese scholars through repeated revisions and extensions of Chen Ping’s foundational concept. The article examines the core terminology of this theoretical framework and its equivalents in Chinese, Russian, and English. Employing comparative analysis, the author explores classifications of noun phrases that are central to contemporary Chinese linguistics, based on a set of parameters relevant to their correlation with extralinguistic reality. Particular attention is given to the fundamental divergences between the approaches of Chinese linguists, as well as to an assessment of their contribution to the formation and development of reference theory in its application to language-specific material.

Keywords: reference, referential status, type of reference, referential status, type of reference, referential classification, noun phrase, structure of the noun phrase, Chinese, articleless language, Chinese linguistics.

 

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