A study on the semantic change of the Chinese negative adverb bushen (不甚)

Abstract

The paper aims to account for the multiple interpretations of the Chinese negative degree adverb bùshèn (不甚). In Chongbian Guoyu Cidian (Revised Chinese Dictionary) (2015), it is defined as ‘not very’, however, in the CCL and BCC Modern Chinese corpora, we have found a few cases showing that bùshèn can only be interpreted as positive degree ‘very’. Using the extensive classical and modern Chinese data, we argue that the semantic change has undergone a process of analogy (cf. e.g. Harris and Campbell 1995; Fischer 2007; Traugott and Trousdale 2013), i.e., the use of positive degree of bùshèn was analogized to the extant positive degree adverb bùshèng (不胜). The semantic change has occurred when bùshèn was followed by an adjective or a verb conveying emotions, such as gǎnxiè (感谢), which were the common collocations of the adverb bùshèng, e.g. bùshèng gǎnxiè.