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Chapter One   Introduction  

1.1 Rationale of the Study  
V-ing forms have been a hot topic over decades, and linguists in different periods study  different  aspects  of  V-ing  forms.  Different  scholars  hold  different  viewpoints around the classification and analyze their grammatical functions in syntactical level. As  we  all  know,  V-ing  forms  in  modern  English  origin  from  two  different  ways: gerund firstly spelt as V-unge and present participle firstly spelt as V-ende. Based on heterogeneity  between  them,  Otto  Jespersen  (1933)  divided  V-ing  forms  into participles and gerunds. Afterwards, some scholars agreed on the distinction, such as Taylor (1996) held the classification between gerunds and present participles based on different profiles of V-ing forms. Bo Bing (2004), Zhang Daozhen (1995), Lee (2007) and  Pullum  &  Zwicky  (1991)  also  followed  the  classification  approach.  However, others  opposed  the  distinction  and  supported  the  combination  between  them.  For example,  Quirk  (1985)  divided  V-ing  forms  into  three  subclasses:  deverbal  noun, verbal  noun  and  participle,  but  he  aimed  at  pointing  out  the  continuity  between  the characteristics of noun and verb for V-ing forms. Since the boundary between gerunds and  participles  is  vague  and  uncertain,  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  them  clearly  and precisely  for  V-ing  forms.  Cambridge  Grammar  of  English (2004) held the idea that V-ing  forms  could  not  be  divided  from  the  perspective  of  morphology,  syntax  or semantics.  Shen  Jiaxuan  (2015)  stated  that  when  V-ing  forms  functioned  as  gerunds and  participles,  there  was  no  intuitive  difference  in  their  forms.  We  should  insist  on the  principle  of  “same  form,  same  grammatical  category”,  thus  it  was  improper  to classify  V-ing  forms  into  gerunds  and  participles  and  such  a  practice  made  English grammar more complicated. 
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1.2 Objectives of the Study  
This study pays attention to the effects of frequency, usage patterns, social culture and  human  cognition  on  some  V-ing  forms  with  lexical  status  in  Oxford  Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (8th edition) (OALD-8 for short hereinafter). To be more specific, it studies the lexicalization of these V-ing forms and their behind motivations. The objectives of this study can be probed into from these two aspects as follows: (1)  Academically,  this  study  will  offer  evidence  to  stand  by  the  本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。