Formations of Substantives from a Perspective of French Sinologists in the Second Half of 19ᵗʰ century : Centering on Léon Wieger’s Rudiments de parler chinois, dialect du 河間府, 1ᵉʳ volume

Taking Léon Wieger’s Rudiments de parler chinois, dialect du 河間府, 1ᵉʳ volume as the core and referring other French sinologists’ works as supplement, this paper studies the French sinologists’ interpretation of the composition of substantives in Chinese in the second half of 19ᵗʰ century. At the same time, this paper compares the views of Westerns with the view of Chinese linguists in the early 20ᵗʰ century to suggest the similarities and differences between Chinese and Western scholars’ understanding of Chinese word formation. We argue that Western scholars generally use word classes as the categorical basis when exploring constructions, and pay more attention to the meaning, lexicality, and variation of the components. However, Chinese linguists, except for Ma Jianzhong, who still insists on the approach of French sinologists, do not place much emphasis on the influence of word category on word formation, but focus more on the interrelationship between components. The influence of the French sinologists of the 19ᵗʰ century is almost non-existent.