ABSTRACT

Based on different contexts, it has many different uses. In English discourse, the grammatical function of it prevails over its meaning function. It is often used as anticipatory pronoun, demonstrative pronoun, forming the cleft sentence, etc. It can also be used to refer to notional words, like weather, time, distance and so on. By constructing self-directed Corpora of English version of Government Work Reports and the State of the Union Address from 2012 to 2016, and through corpus retrieval and data analysis, this paper, based on modern linguistics and modern grammar theory, aims to compare the use of the word it. The word it has been used 102 times in Government Work Reports through analyzing the two Corpora, which mainly serves as anticipatory it, demonstrative it, and forming the cleft sentence. There are a small amount of it, which is used to combine with “application” to form the pattern “IT application”. However, there are a total of 305 times in the State of the Union Address. Obviously, the use of it in the State of the Union Address is higher than Government Work Reports. In the State of the Union Address, the word it is used as anticipatory it, demonstrative it, forming the cleft sentence, and referring to “time”. This paper can provide some references for the researchers who are engaged in the study of political literatures and the study of the functional word it, and it has a practical significance.

Key Words: Government Work Reports  The State of the Union Address    The Word it  Corpus

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

ABSTRACT

中文摘要

CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION-1

1.1 RESEARCH BACKGROUND-1

1.2 PURPOSE AND SIGNIFICANCE-1

1.3 STRUCTURE OF THE PAPER-1

CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW-3

2.1 STUDIES ON GWR-3

2.2 STUDIES ON SUA-4

2.3 THE COMPARATIVE STUDY OF GWR AND SUA-4

2.4 STUDIES ON THE WORD IT-5

2.5 SUMMARY-6

CHAPTER THREE THE COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE WORD IT IN GWR AND SUA-7

3.1 RESEARCH SUBJECT AND DATA COLLECTION-7

3.2 RESEARCH METHODS-7

3.3 RESULTS AND ANALYSIS-7

3.3.1 The Frequency of the Word it in GWR and SUA-8

3.3.2 The Similarities of the Word it in GWR and SUA-10

3.3.3 The Differences of the Word it in GWR and SUA-12

3.3.3.1 The Different Frequency of the Word it-12

3.3.3.2 The Different Meanings of Empty it-14

3.4 SUMMARY-15

CHAPTER FOUR CONCLUSION-16

4.1 SUMMARY-16

4.2 LIMITATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS-16

BIBLIOGRAPHY-17

APPENDIX-19