The Semantics of the Cantonese Sentence-Final Particle lo1

Sentence-final particles (SFPs), or utterance particles, are essential in colloquial conversation usage in many Asian languages, namely Chinese, Japanese, Thai and Vietnamese. They are necessary for self-expression, indicating speakers’ attitudes towards addressees or situations, assumptions, intentions, or emotions (Wierzbicka, 2003; Leung, 2016). As one of the languages with the most significant number of SFPs, Cantonese SFPs have been richly investigated, especially from a formal syntactic perspective. Yet, scholars have diverse views on them; some consider they have ‘no semantic content’ (Luke, 1990) or ‘subjective’ and ‘illogical’ (Wierzbicka, 1986). Another problem arose when most studies had not considered the disparity between the meaning of the SFP and the attaching utterance. The present study intends to carry out a semantic analysis of a frequently used Cantonese SFPs, lo1 (high-level tone), using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach.

Cantonese Sentence-final Particles

Wierzbicka (1986) characterizes SFPs as indispensable linguistic tools that help make human speech distinctly human. Understanding their meanings is vital to interaction, especially in Cantonese, indicating a speaker's semantic and communicative competence (Leung, 2016). Thus, Cantonese speakers would mostly acknowledge that a dialogue without SPFs seems profoundly unnatural. There are around 30 ‘basic’ fundamental particles in Cantonese (Kwok, 1984), but the actual amount would be 100 or more, considering that particles could be used together as clusters (Matthews & Yip, 1994). Cantonese SFPs are commonly divided by their meanings and functions into five main categories (Matthews & Yip, 1994; Tang, 2015): question/declarative, assertive, imperative/persuasive, evidential, exclamatory/affective.

Sybesma and Li (2007) further established Minimal Meaningful Units (MMUs) in Cantonese, which identify the minimal semantic meanings in initials, rhymes and tones of SFPs. For example, l as in laa1 and lo1 indicates the realization of state, o as in lo1 and wo3 marks noteworthiness, and the first tone could show ‘forward-looking’ and mark ‘hearer-orientation’. By using the formula and combining all these MMUs, a type of cumulative semantic content is formed.

Previous analyses of lo1

Most Cantonese analyses categorized lo1 as a focal and evidential expression or showing obviousness (Fung, 2000; Kwok, 1984; Matthews & Yip, 1994; Tang, 2015), seeking agreement and settlement (Matthews & Yip, 1994), indicate certainty (Chor, 2018) and referring to a current situation. This ‘obviousness’ has further been perceived that the speaker has a strong ‘epistemic commitment’ to the truth value of the propositions in the utterance (Chor, 2018), and hence performing the function of epistemic modulation by marking lo1 to an upgraded epistemic stance. lo1 may also be used to invite agreement, cooperation or sympathy. Luke (1990) illustrates how it assists in negotiating endings to communications. Pragmatically, lo1 is found to carry an evaluative sense and associate with negative attitudes such as reluctance and irony (Fung, 2000; Law 1990). It could even relate to impatience and irritation, especially when the hearer fails to apprehend something obvious (Law, 1990).

The study aimed to explore (1) whether the NSM approach results in a similar and stable semantic meaning of lo1 as the formal approach did and (2) whether the proposed meanings be tested and substantiated by evidence from a corpus of naturally spoken Cantonese.

Methodology

The present study adopted the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach, initiated by Polish linguist Wierzbicka and established by Goddard. It is a system of ‘meaning representation based on empirically established universal semantic primes’ (Goddard, 2008), which could be seen as a small subset of lexical meanings. It entails that every language has a fundamental semantic core, with a small lexicon of indefinable expressions and related syntax (Wierzbicka, 1996; Goddard, 2008). The explanation through NSM is formulated from the speaker’s perspective, enabling substitution and testing, leading to maximum translatability (Leung, 2012). Existing semantic research has been concentrated on formal semantic analysis. NSM directs the research to a more conceptually realistic approach, capturing the indigenous or native conceptualization (Goddard, 2008). The studies by Leung (2012; 2016) have been given unique and valuable viewpoints on examining SFPs via the method. However, they were limited to a few (laa1, wo3, gaa3, laa3 and zaa3) and some examples of clusters formed by them only. Wakefield (2011) attempted to investigate lo1 using NSM, yet his focus was on the English translation equivalents, lacking formal semantic interpretation.

The Cantonese data are obtained from Hong Kong Cantonese Corpus (HKCanCor), collected by Luke and Wong (2015) from 1997 to 1998. They will be utilized to test the NSM explication and provide examples for the implication of lo1 in various contexts.

NSM elucidation of lo1 and Discussion

Regarding the previous studies of lo1 explicitly on the focal and evidential modality, obviousness and epistemic feature, here is the proposed explication:

(a) I think you know this.

ngo5 lam2 nei5 zi1dou3 li1 go3.

I      think  you  know  this  CL

(b) I think this is true.

ngo5 lam2 li1 go3 hai6 zan1.

I      think  this CL  be   true

‘I’ refers to the speaker, and ‘you’ indicates the addressees of the utterances. ‘This’ refers to the topic of the conversation or the attaching utterances. The above explications will be tested in the following examples:

A: 跟住 慢慢 行 ，趷 趷 下 趷 咗 返去 吖 嘛 。

gan1zyu6 maan6maan1 haang4 , gat6 gat6 haa5 gat6 zo2 faan1heoi3 aa1 maa3 .

      Then          slowly       walk   ,  hobble-hobble Aux hobble Aux go-back SFP SFP.

      ‘Then I walk slowly and hobble back.’

B: 喀 。

      haak6.

      MP .

      ‘Hmm.’

A: 跟住 後來 呢 就 有 人 幫 我 ，誒 ，整 嗰啲 嘢 囉 。

      gan1zyu6 hau6loi4 ne1 zau6 jau5 jan4 bong1 ngo5 , e6 , zing2 go2di1 je5 lo1.

      Then  after-that  MP  Conj have someone help I , Interj , make that-Det thing SFP.

      ‘Then after that, someone help me make that.’

            The dialogue was between two female friends in their 20s, discussing a past accident when speaker A ran with a broken shoe and got injured. lo1, in this case, is closely related to go2di1 je5 in the utterance. Speaker A expected speaker B to know what thing (je5) she was referring to with the determiner (go2di1), which A thought was evident and obvious in their conversation. In other words, contextually, it is logical that A (I) thinks B (you) know this (go2di1 je5/that). Explication (a) of lo1 could be substantiated, showing the same incarnation as the function of evidential marker (Fung, 2000; Kwok, 1984; Matthews & Yip, 1994; Tang, 2015).

A: 噉 你 咪 俾 正常 嘅 嘢 佢 磨 牙 囉 。

gam2 nei5 mai6 bei2 zing3soeng4 ge3 je5 keoi5 mo4 ngaa4 lo1 .

Conj you  Adv  give    normal      Poss thing it    grind teeth SFP .

‘You could just give it something normal to grind its teeth, right?’

B: 係 囉 。

      hai6 lo1.

      Be SFP .

      ‘Sure.’

C: 係 囉， 咪 我 嗰 部 單車 囉 。

      hai6 lo1 , mai6 ngo5 go2 bou6 daan1ce1 lo1.

      Be SFP, Adv      I       that  CL   bicycle    SFP.

      ‘Yes, which is that bicycle of mine.’

            The conversation was between three friends, talking about the problem of speaker C’s pet rabbit grinding its teeth. The occurrence of lo1 was highly dense due to the intense epistemic processes. Speaker A attempted to give a suggestion, which seemed to be an obvious choice in the setting, and at the same time, seek other speakers’ agreement. Speaker B expressed her viewpoint of agreeing by hai6 indicating positive and lo1 to intensify her stance. Explication (b) could be proven, as B (I) thinks this (bei2 zing3soeng4 ge3 je5 keoi5/giving it something normal) is true. The dialogue underwent a kind of epistemic modulation (Chor, 2018) when C replied sarcastically, referring to ‘something normal’ as his bicycle, which is not normal. lo1 in this utterance has a solid pragmatic meaning of irony (Fung, 2000).

Concluding Remarks

            The NSM explications reveal a similar semantic meaning of lo1 as the previous research found out, though the pragmatic connotation of negative attitudes was not specifically elicited. The Cantonese corpus data further verified the proposed explanations. However, the examples could be more diverse and include more up-to-date conversational utterances to observe a possible semantic change in SFPs. More should also be done to connect the MMUs and the NSM approach to examine whether they semantically sustain each other.

References

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Appendix

Table 1 List of English and Cantonese NSM Semantic Primes

Adapted from Goddard and Wierzbicka (2002), Leung (2012; 2016) and Wakefield (2011), with modifications