Non-Finiteness

A Process-Relation Perspective

Bingjun Yang (Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China)

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English

Cambridge University Press
20 March 2025

Historical & comparative linguistics; Grammar, syntax; Sign languages, Braille & other linguistic communication

'Non-finiteness' is a phenomenon that occurs in most natural languages, whereby a verb is not inflected by grammatical tense, and does not possess the grammatical features of aspect, mood or voice.

Various theories have been developed to explain their distribution and their role in clause structure, but many instances of non-finiteness remain unaccounted for. Taking a functional approach, this study proposes a 'process relation framework' to explain the more complex, previously unaccounted for, instances of non-finiteness in clause structure.

It applies the framework comparatively to non-finiteness in English and Chinese, showing how it can be applied across typologically distinct languages. Drawing on corpus-based instances and observations, it introduces numerous thought-provoking cases, in which constructional (or combining) types and the predictability of non-finiteness co-occur. In terms of application, non-finiteness is decisive in categorising language types, and it is critical in processing natural languages, text segmentation and annotation in particular.

By: Bingjun Yang (Shanghai Jiao Tong University China)
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Weight: 370g
ISBN: 9781009073691
ISBN 10: 1009073699
Pages: 250
Publication Date: 20 March 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

1. Introduction; 2. Non-finiteness in the literature; 3. Theoretical foundation; 4. Basic process relations as one solution to the controversy; 5. Non-finiteness as the bridge for process compression; 6. Revisiting the controversial English constructions with non-finiteness; 7. Revisiting the controversial Chinese constructions with non-finiteness; 8. Conclusion; References; Index.

Bingjun Yang is Professor in Systemic Functional Linguistics at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. His publications include Corpus-based Investigations into Grammar, Media and Health Discourse (Springer Nature, 2020), Language Policy (Routledge, 2017) and Absolute Clauses in English from the Systemic Functional Perspective (Springer, 2015).