Integrating thematicity and agentivity: A Cognitive Grammar approach to retained object passives in Mandarin

Abstract

The Mandarin retained object passive (ROP) poses a unique challenge to linguistic theories by allowing post-verbal object retention. This study combines Cognitive Grammar (CG) with quantitative analysis to examine the component structures of the ROP and their integration into the composite structure NP₁ +  bèi  + (NP₂) + P +  le  + NP₃. Findings reveal a prototypicality hierarchy within the predicate core (P), which has multiple phonological manifestations based on a common causative schema: the full instantiation constitutes the core, followed by the action-only instantiation as a secondary extension, and marginal result-only cases. This hierarchy correlates with participant selection, favoring human subjects (NP₁) and body-part objects (NP₃). To clarify the mechanism of object retention in the ROP, this study proposes a dual profile determinance model. This model posits that the passive marker bèi serves as the primary determinant of thematicity, while the RESULT component acts as a secondary determinant of agentivity. Cognitively, the ROP is motivated by the POSSESSOR FOR POSSESSED metonymy. Furthermore, this study explains the absence of the ROP in English and contributes to CG by introducing mixed orientation, in which thematicity and agentivity integrate rather than compete within a finite clause.