Characteristics of function words
1, attached to the content word or sentence, indicating grammatical meaning;
2. It cannot be a sentence alone, nor can it be a grammatical component alone;
3. Cannot overlap. These are all related to the lack of lexical meaning of function words.
Second, modern function words
According to grammatical functions, words can be divided into real words and function words. Function words are words opposite to "content words". Function words are words that can't act as syntactic components alone, but have the grammatical meaning of connecting or attaching various content words. Function words can be divided into six categories: adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, auxiliary words, exclamations and onomatopoeia, according to what content and relationship words or phrases can be related to. Chinese is a language rich in function words, which is determined by the characteristics of Chinese. Chinese function words are closed, including 1000 which is rarely used. Mastering the meaning and usage of hundreds of commonly used function words in Chinese can be said to be the key to learning Chinese well and of great value.
Adverbs can modify verbs or adjectives; You can't modify nouns. Prepositions cannot act as predicates alone; Often attached to nouns, pronouns and verbs to form prepositional structure; Some prepositions can be attached to verbs to form a whole, which is equivalent to a verb.
Content words are open. There are more than 50,000 notional words in Modern Chinese Dictionary compiled by the Dictionary Editorial Office of the Institute of Linguistics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and more than 90,000 notional words in Ci Hai published by Shanghai Dictionary Publishing House, with about 25,000 commonly used words. The number of function words is much less. As far as the function words in modern Chinese are concerned, there are about 800, and the commonly used ones are about 350.
Although the number of function words is small, they are as important as real words on the whole, and individual words are more important than real words. Some people compare real words to human flesh, bones and hair, and function words to human meridians. This metaphor is certainly inappropriate, but it mainly shows that the number of function words is small but important. Because the use of function words often involves the structure of the whole sentence and affects the meaning of the whole sentence. If we cancel some content words (such as "table", "steamed bread" and "electric light"), it will certainly have some influence on our speech, but it will not have much influence, at least it will not affect normal communication. However, if the words "de, le, ba, bu, ye, ma, ye" in modern Chinese are removed, the influence will be great and normal communication will be affected, which is particularly important in Chinese.
Because function words are much less in number and as important as or even more important than real words, they are used much more frequently in communication than real words. Like "de" and "le", their frequency of use is as high as 3 ~ 5%, which is unmatched by any content word. Function words play an extremely important role in various languages, especially in Chinese. Chinese is analytical in terms of its grammar, and it "lacks morphological changes in a strict sense". Chinese has neither the morphological signs and twists and turns of Russian, French and English, nor the cohesive forms of Japanese and Korean. In this way, function words in Chinese assume a heavier grammatical task and play a more important grammatical role. Therefore, if we Han people want to improve our cultural level and Chinese literacy, and foreigners want to learn Chinese, we must pay attention to the use of function words.
It is not easy to use real words well, and it is even more difficult to use function words well. It may be for this reason that when we say refined words, we only say refined real words and real words, not refined function words and function words. In fact, refining function words and function words is a very noteworthy thing in writing. If a function word is used well, it can not only make the sentence in which it is located receive good expression effect, but also make the whole paragraph or even the whole article vivid and receive unexpected expression effect. For example, the phrase "Spring Breeze and Green Jiang Nanan" in Wang Anshi's poem "Dengguazhou" has always been regarded as a model of rhetoric. Where are the good things? Usually the focus is on the word "green". It is said that Wang Anshi first used the word "Zhi" in his draft, then changed it to "Guo", "Jin" and "Man", and changed it for more than ten times before finally choosing the word "Qing" (Hong Mai's Rong Zhai Xu). This "green" word is really well used. The words "to, to, to, to, to" cannot be inaccurate, but the meaning of "green" is much richer. It not only contains the meanings of the words "Yao, Yao, Yao, Yao", but also is fresher and more vivid than them. Therefore, the word "green" can really be called a model of refining Chinese characters. However, the function word "you" in this poem is also well used, but most people ignore it.
Third, ancient function words.
There are *** 18 function words in classical Chinese, namely:
And, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, why, what, what.
Ancient function words are words with no practical meaning in Chinese, and some of them are equivalent to modern function words. Function words can't form sentences independently, but can only cooperate with content words to complete grammatical structure. Function words are helpful to content words, which include introduction, connection, help, exclamation, vice and image sound. Function words play an important role in conjunctions, and some conjunctions are far from true because of the difference of a function word. Clever use of function words can make conjunctions more colorful and interesting.