[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-135750-105":59,"doc-detail-135750-en":131},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",[7,13,18,23,28,33,38,43,48,51,55],{"id":8,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":10,"show_sort_weight":11,"slug":12},1,"Document","Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":14,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":15,"show_sort_weight":16,"slug":17},2,"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":19,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":20,"show_sort_weight":21,"slug":22},4,"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":24,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":25,"show_sort_weight":26,"slug":27},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":29,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":30,"show_sort_weight":31,"slug":32},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":34,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":35,"show_sort_weight":36,"slug":37},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":39,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":40,"show_sort_weight":41,"slug":42},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":44,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":45,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":47},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":46,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":49,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":50},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":53,"show_sort_weight":52,"slug":54},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":56,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":57,"show_sort_weight":24,"slug":58},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":60,"data":61},"ok",{"site_id":62,"language":63,"slug":64,"title":65,"keywords":66,"description":67,"schema_data":68,"social_meta":124,"head_meta":126,"extra_data":128,"updated_unix":130},105,"en","exploring-ambiguity-based-on-the-grammatical-differences-between-chinese-and-english","Exploring Ambiguity Based on the Grammatical Differences between Chinese and English","","Natural language shows pervasive ambiguity across phonological, lexical, pragmatic, and syntactic levels, and both English and Chinese exhibit this property. Drawing on contrasts in grammatical structure, the article argues that a syntactically ambiguous expression in one language can become clearer when translated into the other. The discussion links grammar-specific features, especially structural organization and tense expression, to how speakers interpret meaning in context.",{"@graph":69,"@context":123},[70,84,106],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/exploring-ambiguity-based-on-the-grammatical-differences-between-chinese-and-english/135750/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/exploring-ambiguity-based-on-the-grammatical-differences-between-chinese-and-english/135750.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Aditya","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-17","2026-08-21",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":105},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",18,{"@type":107,"mainEntity":108},"FAQPage",[109,115,119],{"name":110,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":112},"What does the article identify as the core focus of linguistic ambiguity?","Question",{"text":113,"@type":114},"It focuses on syntactic ambiguity and explains how ambiguity can be influenced by grammatical differences between Chinese and English.","Answer",{"name":116,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":117},"How do Chinese and English verb systems relate to ambiguity?",{"text":118,"@type":114},"Chinese verbs keep the same formal form across time and rely more on adverbs, while English verbs change form with tense, making temporal meaning structurally more explicit.",{"name":120,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":121},"Why might an expression be ambiguous in one language but clearer in the other?",{"text":122,"@type":114},"The article attributes this asymmetry to structural differences: syntactic ambiguity in one language may be avoided because the other language uses grammar that constrains interpretation differently.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":125,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":127,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":129,"site_id":62},135750,1787319267,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":132},{"doc_id":129,"user_id":133,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":134,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":135,"file_id":136,"file_url":137,"file_type":138,"file_size":139,"view_count":105,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":34,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":130,"read_time":105},962085564549,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_085a072bc5b1113ac321206ff7593b45","Exploring Ambiguity Based on the Grammatical Differences  \nbetween Chinese and English  \nFeng Li  \nSchool of Foreign Language, Jinling Institute of Technology, Nanjing, China  \n*Corresponding Author: Feng Li, School of Foreign Language, Jinling Institute of Technology, Nanjing, China  \nABSTRACT  \nNatural language is highly ambiguous, i.e. linguistic ambiguity is very common at every level ---phonological, lexical, pragmatic and syntactic. This is true of both English and Chinese. Being two widely different languages, English and Chinese possess distinctive grammatical features. This article explores ambiguity from the perspective of grammatical differences between Chinese and English, and identifies the interesting finding that a syntactically ambiguous expression in one language may be perspicuous when putin the other; in other words, syntactic ambiguity in one language may be avoided when expressed in the other.  \nKeywords: syntactic ambiguity; grammatical differences; Chinese; English.  \nINTRODUCTION  \nChinese is distinct from English in many aspects, e.g., in writing systems (the former ideography, the latter phonography) and in pronunciation systems (the former characterized by single-syllable words and four tones: level, rising, falling and rising, and falling, the latter featured with many multi-syllable words, stress, and intonation) . However, the most complicated and intriguing difference between the two may lie in how they are organized to express or to communicate, [i.e. in](i.e. in) their grammatical structures, which, undoubtedly, have much to do with their speakers’ thought and thinking styles.  \nPeople’s perception and thought about their living environment has a great influence on their lexicon (e.g. abundance or scarcity of some types of terminology), and their language’simplicature (e.g. “red” possesses very positive implications of “prosperity, jubilation and fortune” in Chinese besides referring to a color) . In the case of grammatical structures, people’s thought and thinking styles play an important role as well. Nisbett (2003: 27) found that the Chinese have developed a type of dialectical thought that seeks to use contradiction to  \nunderstand relations and to see things in their appropriate contexts, which means that events do not occur in isolation from other events, but are instead embedded in a meaningful whole, while a Western dialectic is very “aggressive” in seeking to decontextualize and resolve contradictions.  \nThe Chinese scholar Peng and his colleagues (2006: 256) proposed that in Western dialectical thinking, which is fundamentally consistent with the laws of formal logic, contradiction requires synthesis rather than mere acceptance, while in Chinese naive dialecticism does not regard contradiction as illogical and tends to accept the contradictions in a harmoniously unified way.  \nSimply speaking, Western thought is characterized by being rule- or law-orientated, detailed, analytical and logical, while Chinese thought is featured with context or situation specific, holistic, intuitive, and compatible. We cannot conclude what exactly Chinese language structure is supposed to be, but the Chinese thinking style tells us that its structure probably imposes less emphasis on grammatical forms, and more on language contexts and on wholeness of objects and events. Western  \nthinking style determines that the grammar of English may be analytical, logical and less dependent on context, which requires it to possess some grammatical forms so that messages can be understood correctly even isolated from contexts. Tense for verbs, as oneof the salient differences in grammar between Chinese and English, can offer us more insight and understanding. English verbs change their forms in different temporal situations. In other words, the form of one verb can roughly tell us that it happened, happens or will happen. In Chinese, comparatively, verbs remain unchanged formally in any situations, so we have to res","cbCaikzNw9aufKth","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaikzNw9aufKth","pdf",229566,"English","# INTRODUCTION\n## Grammatical and thinking-style differences\n## Tense and formal change as a source of ambiguity\n## Definitions and functions of ambiguity","[{\"question\":\"What does the article identify as the core focus of linguistic ambiguity?\",\"answer\":\"It focuses on syntactic ambiguity and explains how ambiguity can be influenced by grammatical differences between Chinese and English.\"},{\"question\":\"How do Chinese and English verb systems relate to ambiguity?\",\"answer\":\"Chinese verbs keep the same formal form across time and rely more on adverbs, while English verbs change form with tense, making temporal meaning structurally more explicit.\"},{\"question\":\"Why might an expression be ambiguous in one language but clearer in the other?\",\"answer\":\"The article attributes this asymmetry to structural differences: syntactic ambiguity in one language may be avoided because the other language uses grammar that constrains interpretation differently.\"}]","Exploring Ambiguity Based on the Grammatical Differences between Chinese and English | PDF"]