ABriefStudyonDiscourseAnaphora

王惠灵

【Abstract】This study introduces two types of discourse anaphor and discusses the syntactic constraints on it. Finally， two unusual uses of third personal pronouns as discourse anaphor in A Dream of Red Mansions are expounded.

【Key Words】anaphora； discourse

Introduction

Anaphora has received a great deal of attention from linguistics， cognitive psycholinguists， philosophers and computer scientists.

In a natural language discourse： “Anaphora is coreference of one expression with its antecedent. The antecedent provides the information necessary for the expressions interpretation”. Anaphora is often studied in the following two layers：

1.Intersentential anaphora， namely， an antecedent is in the same sentence with the anaphor：

Mr. Bingley had soon made himself acquainted with all the principal people in the room.

2.Intrasentential anaphora， namely， an antecedent is in the previous sentence to that of the anaphor：

Mr. Darcy danced only with Mrs. Hurst and once with Miss Bingley， declined being introduced to any other lady， and spent the rest of the evening in walking about the room， speaking occasionally to one of his own party. His character was decided.

Syntactic Constraints on Anaphora

Anaphora is rule-governed. Traditional studies on it suggest that there are two syntactic constraints on anaphora.

1. Agreement （number， person， gender）

An anaphor must agree with its antecedent in number， person and gender.

2. Explicit antecedent and importance of order

The antecedent should precede the anaphor. And it must be realized by explicit linguistic items. Contrast to anaphora， if the interpretation of some linguistic forms should look forward in the discourse， it is called cataphora.

Unusual Discourse Anaphora

There are two kinds of unusual uses of third person pronoun as anaphor in A Dream of Red Mansions， a Chinese classical novel by Cao Xueqin.

1.宝玉道：“我有个主意：袭人上月做了一条和这个一模一样的，他因有孝，如今也不穿。竟送了你换下这个来，如何？”香菱笑着摇头说：“不好。他们倘或听见了倒不好。”

Two third person pronouns（“他” and “他们”） are used in the above text. The third person singular pronoun “他”obviously denotes “襲人” But what about the third person plural pronoun “他们”？ There is no textual clue as to what it is referred to by the pronominal form， although we can infer that it refers to those associated with the protagonists in the novel. No explicit linguistic form plays the role of the antecedent of “他们”.

2.赵姨娘无法，只得同他三人出来，口内犹说长道短。探春便说：“那些小丫头子们原是些玩意儿，喜欢呢，和他说说笑笑；不喜欢，可以不理他。便他不好了，也如同猫儿狗儿抓咬了一下子，可恕就恕；不恕时也只该叫了管家媳妇们去说给他去责罚。何苦自己不尊重，大吆小喝，也失了体统。”

From the context， all of the four third person singular pronouns “他” refer to “小丫头子们”， a plural form in Chinese. Therefore， the anaphor of third person singular pronoun “他” mismatches in number and gender with its referent “小丫头子们”. One point should be made clear that： feminine pronouns were always written as masculine pronouns in Chinese classical literary works. The unusualness here lies in the mismatch in number between the expression and its referent.

What possible factors may explain them？ Two hypotheses can be made. One for antecedent-less pronouns is negligibility principle. A referent denoted by the pronoun is negligible due to the fact that the referent is socially inferior， or low ranking in the feudal hierarchy as represented in Daguan Yuan. On the other hand， the referent is negligible because it is not salient in the discourse context， i.e. it is not necessary to keep track of the identity of the reference in discourse. In example 1， “他們” refers to the minor maids or servants， they are in a inferior position and not salient in this novel. Another is for the mismatch in number between referents and the pronouns： the use of third person pronoun in these cases is not just another form of referring， but as a means to express the speakers degrading attitude towards the addressee， and sometimes also to show ones superior social status over the addressee.

Conclusion

From the above analysis， it can be concluded that anaphor can be a social issue. An understanding of the social structure of society in which referents are situated is critical for the interpretation of anaphoric forms. No matter whether these two hypotheses are enough to explain the two unusual uses of third person pronouns， this approach in the area of sociolinguistic will open a new way further study on anaphora.

References：

[1]Halliday，M. A. K. & R. Hasan. Cohesion in English[M]. London： Longman.

[2]Zribi-Hertz， A. Anaphor binding and narrative point of view： English reflexive pronouns in sentence and discourse[J]. Language， 1989， 65： 695-727.