(375) Function Words in Male and Female Authors: A Diachronic Investigation of Modern Chinese Prose

Xiaojin Zhang,Haitao Liu

GLOTTOMETRICSIssue 48, pp 67 – 87 (2020)

Abstract

From the perspective of a blended micro- and macro-analysis, the present study mainly investigates the function words in modern Chinese prose since 1912 to 2019. First, we choose the cumulative frequencies of function words; this index is related to h-point as a quantitative indicator. We compare the cumulative frequencies of function words in 50 male and 50 female authors’ books. The diachronic trend of the cumulative frequency of function words clearly shows that the  proportion of male writers is higher than that of female writers. To be specific, the males use more numerals while females use more personal pronouns. Based on the visualized graphs, the macro-developmental trends of function words in modern Chinese prose from 1912 to 2019 are finally presented.

Keywords

Modern Chinese prose, males and females, h-point, cumulative frequency of function words, network analysis