Revisiting Chinese modality types: A collostructional approach to post-modal verbs

• Autores: Zhuo Zhang, Jinmeng Dou
• Localización: Lingua: International review of general linguistics, ISSN 0024-3841, Nº 328, 2025
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This paper revisits Chinese modality types through a corpus-based analysis of [Modal + Verb] patterns involving seven common two-character modals. Using Multiple Distinctive Collexeme Analysis, the study identifies the most strongly attracted collexemes for each modal pattern and groups them into seven semantic domains. This categorization yields three modality groups—epistemic, dynamic, and deontic, highlighting functional and cognitive (dis)similarities among the modals. Simple Correspondence Analysis and Hierarchical Clustering on Principal Components are subsequently employed to quantitatively validate these results. The findings confirm the traditional tripartite classification of modality as a more decisive factor in modal use and reveal that a possibility–necessity continuum captures variations in modal strength within each type. Methodologically, this research represents the first quantitative corpus-based study of Chinese to systematically compare seven modals across modality types, proposing a replicable framework that integrates quantitative distributional evidence with usage-based functional–cognitive interpretation. This approach enhances our understanding of modality through usage distributions and strengthens the empirical foundation for modality research in Chinese. Pedagogically, it offers insights into modal usage in authentic contexts, supporting more effective instruction. Ultimately, this study demonstrates how distributional corpus methods can uncover semantic variation and contribute to broader cognitive and typological discussions on modality.