목적어 수반 척도류⋅색채류 형용사에 대한 통시적 고찰 －사동⋅비대격구문 분석을 중심으로－

Abstract

There are two main types of constructions in which an adjective accompanies an object: an causative construction and a non-accusative construction. Both construction are identical in that the semantic role of the object is the ‘theme’ and has a change of state event. However, the causative construction is different in that it has another event called ‘CAUSE’ by introducing the external argument of the ‘causer’. This paper is a diachronic study of these two constructions focusing on scale and color adjectives. The color adjective construction begins to appear in the Song Dynasty, which is later than the scale adjective construction. Both adjectives take components related to body parts as objects. However, color adjective construction is mainly used for non-accusative construction, and scale adjective construction is mainly used for causative construction. Since the Ming Dynasty, scale adjective construction has also been used as a non-accusative construction. There are two main ways to form non-accusative constructions. One is that the adjective is combined with an object of a new component that is different from the existing one, and the other is that the subject of a previously used causative construction changes from ‘causer’ to ‘experiencer’. The emergence of non-accusative constructions in Chinese adjectives seems to be the result of the weakening of the existing adjectives’ causative function. Since the weakening of the causative function accompanies the strengthening of the non-accusative function, non-accusative construction can be seen as the realization of adjectives of non-accusative function that have changed from causative function.