Abstract
From the perspective of complexity paradigm, language is an organic rather than a mechanistic semiotic system, and related studies should be carried out in the bi-directions-top — down and bottom-up. In the organic semiotic view, this paper proposes a solution to the inconsistencies, complexity and redundancy in functional syntactic description and analysis. The paper assumes that the core concept of the form level of language concerns grammatical categories, including grammatical units — clause, group / phrase, word and morpheme, structural components — such as the clausal elements of Subject, Predicator, Complement, Adjunct, etc. , and items — instances of words, morphemes, etc. The core idea is about grammatical relations, including consisting of — e.g. the clause consists of groups, words, etc., componence — e. g. the clause is composed of Subject, Predicator, Complement, Adjunct, etc. ,filling — e. g. the slot of Subject is filled by a nominal group, a clause, etc. , exponence — e.g. a noun is expounded by an instance “table”, and conflation — e.g. the Operator is conflated by the Auxiliary. Grammatical description and analysis should observe the characteristics of language as an organic semiotic system, including the adoption of organic rank scale hypothesiswhich allows both downward and upward rank shifting, and organic structural standardswhich means that whether a grammatical unit is simple or complex, it should be analyzed as it is actually structured, regardless of its potential structure.
Key words
complexity paradigm /
organic semiotic system /
grammatical categories /
grammatical relations /
grammatical description and analysis
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HE Wei.
Grammatical Description and Analysis: An Organic Semiotic View[J]. Foreign Language Learning Theory and Practice. 2021, 175(3): 12
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