Modality in English and Chinese : a typological perspective

To the memory of my grandparents Li Mao-ch'ing and Kao Ts'ui-hsien ማ৊ᆸࡼᔚঊෲರඋ༴ሌညਜ਼঱࠾ልๆိ iii Acknowledgements First of all, I would like to extend my gratitude to the University of Antwerp Department of Germanic Languages and Literature that offered an opportunity for me to enjoy a graduate life again. It is at the Center of Grammar, Cognition, and Typology (CGCT) on the UIA campus that I really appreciated the spirit of inquiry that has been cultivated here over the years and the uniqueness of the community of scholars from many different places of the world. I have specific debts of gratitude for Prof. Dr. Johan van der Auwera for his continuous encouragement, critical comments, and luminous directions. He has showed me the way towards an initially rather obscure destination. Without his patience and thorough supervision, this research could never have been completed. I would particularly like to thank Prof. Dr. Hermann Bluhme and Prof. Dr. Jan Nuyts. They showed deep concern for me, made inspiring suggestions, and offered extensive comments on my thesis. Their work added immeasurably to bringing this study to completion. Besides, I wish to thank Dr. Ann Hierman of Ghent University for her recommendation of the grammar books on Ancient Chinese. The collection of her department helped me greatly with my writing about the diachrony of Chinese modals. I should also thank Prof. Dr. Viviane Alleton, Emeritus Sinologist of the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris and Chair of the European Association of Chinese Linguistics (EACL), for the papers she mailed to me and her talk with me about Chinese auxiliary verbs at the Rome Conference of the EACL in 2001. I am also grateful to Dr. Jeroen Wiedenhof of Leiden University for his suggestions on my research plan and comments on Chinese modality. I also owe many thanks to my colleagues Mr. Andreas Ammann and Mr. Ceyhan Temürcü for their comments on my thesis and help with the printing. My other colleagues who have lent generous help to my research are Mr. Ms Izabela Kopczynska. The discussion and exploration I had with them are among the purest specimens of joyful inquiry I have experienced as a linguist. I would like to thank Mr. Jef Beckers for his talents in solving my computer problems and Ms Lus Van den Bossche, as well as Ms Gilberte Maerschalk and Ms Brigitte Brusselmans, for their help with the …