Functional Distinction between Zai and Zhengzai in Mandarin: Evidence from Collocations

Both zai and zhengzai are progressive markers in Mandarin Chinese, and by the principle of economy, there should be some differences in these two progressive markers. With the Sinica Corpus on-line tools, a significant difference is found in the collocation of adverbial adjuncts with the use of zai and zhengzai. This paper discusses three types of adverbials to distinguish these two markers: modality adverbs, time adverbs, and manner adverbs. Zhengzai cannot co-occur with [+iterative] adverbs and adverbs without a specific time reference. It mainly indicates the progression of an on-going event at a given specific time point. On the other hand, zai not only indicates the on-going process but can also signal the progression of repeated event as habitualprogressive.