Abstract
This article deals with the acquisition of four Mandarin sentence final particles ma, a, ba, ne by Italian native speakers. The research gives a contribution to the study of sentence final particles from an acquisition and didactic perspective, which has been scarcely investigated in the linguistic literature. The article proposes a quantitative and qualitative experimental analysis with two groups of Italian learners, one at elementary proficiency level and one at intermediate level. The research shows that ne and ba are the most challenging particles to acquire by Italian learners. We argue that this due to the fact that ne and ba are highly polyfunctional and they do not simply determine the type of clause. The functions of ne and ba tested in this paper, in fact, are better defined as discourse particles, whose meaning is highly dependent from the context. Moreover, the experiment demonstrates not only that the proficiency level is straightforward correlated to the mastery of sentence final particles, as expected, but also that the didactic tools play a crucial role. As a matter of fact, the results of this study opens up a number of pedagogical implications in relation to the teaching of Mandarin sentence final particles to Italian learners.
Article Note: This paper is the result of the close collaboration between the two authors. In particular, Badan takes responsibility for the sections from page 1 to page 9 and Romagnoli for those from page 9 to page 17. We are very grateful to dr. Conti for his help in statistical analysis.
Appendix
A: 你是小李的哥哥____？
B: 对，我是。
A: 这是你的书____？
B: 是。
A: 我用一下，好____？
B: 好____。
A: 现在几点？
B: 你自己有表____！
A: 今天我不工作，我不舒服。
B: 休息休息____！
A: 妈，明天我骑自行车去学校。
B: 骑自行车要小心____！
A: 这本书你已经看了； 那本书____？
B: 我还没看。
A: 你会说中文____？
B: 会。
A: 日文____？
B: 不会。
A: 那个孩子那么高____！那个女人这么漂亮！看一看____！
B: 不要烦我 。我有事___。
A: 你喜欢熊猫____？
B: 喜欢。你____？
A: 不太喜欢。
A: 这朵花儿真香____！
B: 又香又好看，我也喜欢。
A: 昨天你去看电影了____？
B: 我去了。
A: 我太累了。
B: 你还是休息一下_吧___。
A: 你这次考试考得不好。
B: 我不是不想学习，是没有时间____。
A: 去吃中国菜怎么样？
B: 好____。
A: 你是王老师____。
B: 我就是，你怎么知道？
A: 这条裤子多么酷____！
B: 那你买____。
A: 我的书包____？
B: 不知道，你去卧室看。
A: 你来过这里____？
B: 你怎么知道？
A: 下雨了____？
B: 我不知道。
A: 你的书____？
B: 这本书就是我的____。
A: 你爸爸在办公室____？
B: 我不知道。
A: 你妈妈____？
A: 他们在____？
B: 不在。
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