從「對」字之慣用看語用功能之發展

Ritualization in Evolving Pragmatic Functions: A Case Study of DUI

本研究探討「對」如何在慣例化過程從動詞發展出不同的語用功能。「對」原來是動詞，說話者可用它來造附加問句「對不對」，詢問聽話者關於內容的正確性，而聽話者通常回答「對」。「對不對-->對」的一問一答因為常出現，就形成對話慣例。慣例化的結果是即使說話者沒有問「對不對」，聽話者也慣性說「對」，以認同別人的內容。有時候「對」還表達「同意」的意義。「對」的另一個語用功能是，說話者用來確認自己話語的正確性：當聽話者聽到不確定的訊息，會以「真的嗎／是嗎」反問，而原說話者對自己剛講過的話當然回答「對」。「真的嗎／是嗎 --> 對」的一問一答也形成對話慣例。慣例化的結果是聽話者就算沒有質疑，原說話者仍自動說「對」，以加強或肯定內容的正確性。

Ritualization brings about linguistic changes through routine repetition of utterances in daily use. The purpose of this study is to investigate the process of ritualization in developing the discourse particle dui from the verb in spoken Chinese. Dui originates from a verb conveying the speaker’s belief that what has been uttered is true. The speaker can also negotiate truth with the addressee in the form of a question tag, dui-bu-dui ‘true-not-true’; the addressee’s habituated response is dui. Such adjacency pair of question-answer constitutes a conversational routine for ritualization, in that the addressee commits to the truth of the other’s speech spontaneously, even though the other speaker does not ask for it. The particle dui further evolves a pragmatic function of agreement, as a result of conventionalizing the conversational implicature that commitment to the truth infers agreement with the content. Another line of development concerns the speaker’s own utterance. Though dui is not the main verb, it still maintains an assertive meaning for the speaker to claim explicitly that what has been talked about is true, or to confirm that what follows is the right information to utter, as a result of ritualizing a conversational routine: after the speaker has uttered a proposition, the addressee may ask for truth confirmation by zhende-ma ‘true-QST marker; Really?’ or shi-ma ‘copula- QST marker; Is that so?’; the speaker’s response toward his or her own prior utterance is the habituated dui. As these repeated utterances are ritualized, the speaker strengthens truth spontaneously without the addressee’s request.