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1、Does Confucius孝 travel across time论孔子的“孝道”Yuanting wangDepartment of EnglishUniversity of BirminghamYuanting.wangAbstract This dissertation aims to explore the meaning of孝 (xiao): an important Chinese traditional concept originated from Confucian morality. By investigating three different discourses
2、 across time, based on the authentic language data drawn from two ancient Confucian texts and the Chinese Internet Corpus, the meaning of孝 as a social phenomenon in different time and is extracted. Based on the research from the perspective of corpus linguistics, I find 孝 in ancient Chinese refers t
3、o a complicated relationship in male-dominated feudal society, while 孝 in modern Chinese has narrowed its range of meaning and no gender bias is in connection with 孝.1 Introduction With two-thirds of the population of East Asia and a splendid 5,000-year-old history as its foundation, China always pl
4、ays an important role on the stage of the world. Its ancient glorious civilization is not only inherited by Chinese but also learned in East Asian countries like Korea, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and so on. In these countries, there is a certain similar culture, also regarded as their tradi
5、tions, in which the most significant is a system of philosophical ideas called Confucianism. A record of the words and teachings of Confucius, The Analects is considered the most reliable expression of Confucian thought. The Analects is the only place where we can actually encounter the real, living
6、 Confucius. In this sense, the Analects to Confucius is what the Gospels are to Jesus.” (Leys, 2000, 4). As an ancient classic, it sets up an authentic Confucius system of philosophies which have been dominating not only China but East Asia for thousands of years. Five spirits of Chinese virtues are
7、 cornerstones of Confucianism, which are all reflected in the Analects known as: 孝（filial piety）， 仁（benevolence, charity, humanity, love），义（righteousness），礼（propriety, good manners, ceremony），忠 （loyalty）. Foremost among these is 孝（filial piety ）a basic ethic requirement for thousands of years in Chi
8、na, which received its first and most detailed record in Confucian classics over 2000 years ago. Therefore, the concept孝(xiao), respectively in ancient Confucius time and in modern China is worth every effort in discussion. This thesis aims to investigate the meaning of 孝 a critical component of tra
9、ditional Chinese culture represented in Confucius time and modern China. According to Teubert (2004, 37) meanings as a social phenomenon can be discussed by the members of discourse community and there is no right and wrong. My hypothesis is that the Two discourses differentiate in a way that constr
10、uct their own distinctive understandings of 孝. My research, therefore, is conducted in the corpus-based analysis of two corpora: the ancient Confucian text corpus and Chinese Internet Corpus. My thesis, hereby, based on the data extracted from the two corpora in the form of collocation profiles, giv
11、es a thorough picture of different patterns that孝 forms with its significant collocates in ancient Chinese and modern Chinese, and discusses different meanings and ideologies revealed by these patterns. 2 Theoretical Considerations2.1The importance of studying Confucius 孝(xiao) 2.1.1 The importance
12、of孝(xiao) 孝(xiao), one of the most important ethical concepts of China, has been playing an important role in Chinese society for thousands of years, which is deeply rooted in every Chinese heart as a moral standard. Huang (2008) points out, “to the Chinese, it is the central ideology, and moreover,
13、 provides the foundation for all other attitudes.” Chow (2001, pp.125) claims that “for thousands of years, the Chinese culture has been described as one of respecting the old, or xiao as known in the old classicsit is still very much treasured and upheld by Chinese people all over the world.” Holzm
14、an (1998, pp.25) suggests, “the role filial piety has played in Chinese society and still continues to play is much too important to leave uninvestigated.” Undoubtedly, 孝 is worth every effort to study because of its significance in Chinese culture and thoughts. Confucius is the first one who puts t
15、he concept of孝 into a philosophical system. His teachings, as they are recorded in the Analects set a good standard of practicing孝 for Chinese, which has been observed and respected up till now. Another Confucian classic Xiao Jing (The Classic of Filial Piety) is the first classic in Chinese history
16、 using 孝 as its dominant theme. Reese (2003) argues that “Filial piety was an integral part of Chinese culture and therefore was embraced by three of Chinas main religions: Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism. Among the three, Confucianism, with its well documented- social hierarchy, supported the id
17、eals of filial piety the most.” This is why we should study孝(filial piety) within the context of Confucius, which is the central to understand 孝 in Chinese thought and culture. 2.1.2 The previous study of Confucius孝(xiao) As one of primary virtues and a basic Confucian ethic in China, the concept of
18、孝 is discussed by numerous sinologists, who are interested in studying its values from different perspectives. Roetz (1993) pursues the classical concept of 孝 by going through the early Confucian texts. He claims (Roetz,1993, pp.53) that 孝 comprises three main aspects- care, obedience and moral. Bas
19、ed on the ancient texts such as the Analects, Xiao Jing (The Classic of Filial Piety) etc. and referring to some researches in Neo-Confucianism, Roetz explains the three aspects in his own critical way. Chow (1994, pp.26) combined Confucian classics with Buddhist practice in late imperial China and
20、pointed out during that period “Confucian precepts such as filial piety were integral to Buddhist discipline.” And after exploring a number of philosophical texts in Ming dynasty, Chow (1994, pp.36) discovers that the moral authority reflected in Confucian filial piety has been damaged by Buddhist i
21、deas. Oldstone-Moore (2004, pp.216) considers filial piety as a religious teaching, which is a good evidence to show “Chinese ethics evince a remarkable ability to synthesized diverse strands of religious teachings into a comprehensive system.” Obviously, for Oldstone-Moore Confucianism is a religio
22、n rather than a Chinese philosophy, which should be understood in the context of religions. It can be seen that some previous studies of 孝 are focusing on philosophy or religion. My survey of the relevant literature shows that so far hardly any data-driven and systematic studies in Confucian classic
23、s have ever been carried out. Therefore, it might not be groundless to argue that part of my research is among the type of work at the forefront at which the original meaning of孝is exclusively extracted from real language data of the two Confucian texts the Analects and Xiao Jing (The Classic of Fil
24、ial Piety) without relying on secondary sources. 2.2 Applying corpus linguistics to a study of孝(xiao) 2.2.1 Corpus linguistics Corpus Linguistics is the study of language through real examples of texts or computer-based data(corpora). The task of corpus linguists is to analyze the data from a corpus
25、 and explore how language(s) is used. Teubert(2004, pp.37) concludes that:Corpus linguistics sees language as a social phenomenon. Meaning is, like language, a social phenomenon. It is something that can be discussed by the members of a discourse community. There is no secret formula, neither in nat
26、ural language nor in a formula calculus, that contains the meaning of a word or phrase. There is no right or wrong. Thus, corpus linguistics is interested in the meaning of semantically connected context segments extracted from a certain corpus rather than the structural analysis of a language explo
27、red in the traditional linguistics such as lexicography and grammar. A corpus, especially text corpus (corpus can be collected as text form and voice form) is a large structured set of texts and now is usually electronic stored and processed. Researchers look at a large amount of raw texts directly
28、to get objective evidence (Sinclair,1991, pp.1). Sinclair also points out “a corpus is a remarkable thing, not so much because it is a collection of language text, but because of the properties that it acquires if it is well-designed and carefully-constructed.” (Sinclair, 2004, pp.4) Through the wel
29、l designed corpus linguists can conduct a more practical researchuncover the actual use of language in real life texts rather than make judgment of grammaticality. Therefore, in order to explore the meaning of孝(xiao), it is necessary to explore the use of it in real life, which is reflected in three
30、 corpora respectively standing for ancient Confucius age and modern China. 2.2.2 Meanings in texts Sinclair(1991, pp.6) argues what we get from traditional dictionary is just representing a words discrete meanings, and is irrelevant to the word itself used in practice properly. Stubbs(2001, pp.31) a
31、lso advocates this idea by saying, “dictionaries are mainly organized around individual words(lemmas), which are listed alphabetically with their meanings, but they do also usually list other longer phrases, where the meaning may not be predictable from the individual word- forms.” Teubert(2004, pp.
32、80) suggests, “meaning is in discourse.meaning is usage and paraphrase.” In Teuberts forthcoming paper he points out that we need to interpret a word not only in a specific text but also in texts of roughly the same period of the one (Teubert, forthcoming). It is necessary to go back to the text to
33、extract the comprehensive meaning of a word rather than consulting dictionary, and also it is why I need to consult some ancient texts to find out what 孝 has been said in ancient Confucius age. In light of this, the meaning of 孝 in Confucius time is investigated in the original Analects and a text t
34、itled Xiao Jing (The Classic of Filial Piety) appearing in the same time. The two texts comprise the discourse of ancient Confucian philosophy, from which the concordances of孝 are extracted to analyze the meaning and the use of孝 during that time. Consisting of modern Chinese texts from all types of
35、genre, Chinese Internet Corpus is taken as a discourse of modern Chinese from which the meaning and use of孝 is extracted. Firth states that: “the complete meaning of a word is always contextual, and no study of meaning apart from a complete context can be taken seriously” (1935, pp.37). For me, cond
36、ucting collocation analysis to identify words which typically co-occur with the node helps to decode the information about the meaning. 3 Data collection and research methodology3.1 Data collection In this section, I will present the process of my collecting data from two corpora, namely, a corpus c
37、omprising of two Confucian classics and the Chinese Internet corpus. The tool I am using for my analysis is WordSmith.4, a recently published new version of Mike Scotts WordSmith program which offers many innovations for those who interested in doing corpus research by studying word frequencies and
38、word patterns. Relevant collocates of the word孝 of the original Chinese text the Analects and Xiaojing (The Classic of Filial Piety) are extracted by WordSmith, and all the concordances of 孝 extracted from the Chinese Internet Corpus are processed in Wordsmith.4 to extract the relevant collocates. H
39、owever, in the Bank of English, the online concordance tools provided by the database are available to extract the relevant collocates of the different translations of 孝. 3.1.1 Corpus compilation To conduct the comparative analysis of孝, a corpus of texts from the age of Confucius is required. A text
40、 titled Xiao Jing (The Classic of Filial Piety), according to unofficial history, compiled by Confucius himself together with the analects are exploited in the corpus. The two texts were downloaded from the internet and saved as plain texts. To make sure the Chinese language can be processed by Word
41、Smith.4 properly, all the Chinese texts were converted into Unicode-based form, and ICLAS (Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Lexical Analysis System) was applied to make the Chinese texts segmented. 3.1.2 Data collection in ancient Chinese texts Two ancient Chinese plain texts in Unicode fo
42、rm were respectively processed in Wordsmith to extract the concordances of 孝. The relevant collocates of孝 from the Analects and Xiao Jing (The Classic of Filial Piety) would be collected and analysed in two categories, specifically, grammatical collocates and content collocates. 孝 only occurs 19 tim
43、es in the Analects, which is in quite low frequency. So, when the relevant collocates were extracted, WordSmith.4 was set to compute the collocates within the window of five to the left and five to the right, in the frequency of minimum twice with the length of one character, and give the result by
44、Z score. Whereas when 37 occurrences of孝 were extracted from Xiao Jing, the concordance tool was set in the minimum frequency of five times. The top 20 collocates of 孝 were asked respectively from the two texts and categorized based on content collocates and grammatical collocates, and then the coll
45、ocates were further subcategorized based on part of speech. The most typical ones from these subcategories were selected, and the WordSmith.4 was asked to extract the citations of these collocates, based on which the analysis of the meaning of Confucius 孝 was conducted. 3.1.3 Data collection in the
46、Chinese Internet Corpus. The Chinese Internet Corpus with 280 million characters was compiled by Serge Sharoff from the Internet in February 2005 using automated search engine queries. All the frequently used forms of孝 found from the Advanced Chinese Dictionary were gathered and categorized by part
47、of speech. Thus, I had two verbal forms of孝 like 孝敬(xiao jing) and 孝顺(xiao shun), and three nominal forms 孝道(xiao dao), 孝心(xiao xin)，and 孝子(xiao zi). These modern forms of孝 were respectively taken as a query in the online Chinese Internet Corpus, and the concordances extracted by the online concorda
48、nce tool were saved as plain texts in Unicode form. When set in the span of 5 to the left and right with the minimum frequency of 5, WordSmith.4 was applied to process the concordances of modern lexical items of 孝 and relevant collocates were extracted to analyze. The top 100 nominal collocates of verbal terms 孝敬(xiao jing) and 孝顺(xiao shun) were extracted, from which the ones function as subject and object were listed in the table. When taken the nominal terms 孝道(xiao dao), 孝心(xiao xin)，and 孝子(xiao zi) as queries, WordSmith.4 gave the 94 collocates for
