Terminological tools of Zhang Shizhao’s grammatical theory

Abstract

The article examines the terminological apparatus of the grammatical description of the Chinese language (wenyan) in Zhong deng guo wen dian (1907). This textbook was written in the initial period of developing approaches to describing the native language in China. During this extremely significant period, basic terms, which are also used by modern linguists, were formed. The study revealed that: 1) Zhang Shizhao distinguishes between words and morphemes, designating them as ci and zi; 2) the author sees understanding of word structure as an integral part of the study of grammar, and therefore introduces the corresponding terms; 3) since ci and zi are strictly distinguished, the variant ci is used to name classes when classifying vocabulary; 4) in the field of sentence analysis, the new terminology reflected: a) a different approach to describing the system of sentence parts; b) the need to describe the types of sentences; 5) the system of parts of speech has not undergone any fundamental changes compared to “Ma shi wen tong” (1898), although some terms have been reworked. Zhong deng guo wen dian is oriented toward the European canon of grammatical description of language, which is reflected in the author’s concepts. While earlier works introduced new terminology very cautiously, Zhang Shizhao, on the contrary, is not afraid to propose new interpretations and terms.

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