The Structures of Chinese Long and Short Bei Passives Revisited *

This paper revisits the categorial status of the Mandarin passive marker bei and the derivational relationship between long and short bei passives. In regard to its categorial status, there have been three major analyses: bei is a preposition, or is a verb, or it has the dual status of being both a verb and a preposition. This paper reviews these views, especially the latter two, pointing out their strengths and weaknesses. On this basis, it makes three claims. (a) Bei is a verb, which is supported by the new evidence from reflexive ziji tests, Chinese fragmentary constructions, and the chameleonic properties of the bei passive alternating between control and raising structures. (b) As for the structures of the long and short passives, by reviewing the uniform and non-uniform approaches, we provide the third approach, arguing that long passives can be further divided into local long and long-distance passives. The local long passive and its corresponding short form may be derivationally related, while the long-distance passive does not have a short form. (c) By reinterpreting the facts from some negation tests, we argue that the semi-lexical verb bei subcategorizes for a non-finite clause that does not involve Aspect phrase (AspP) or Currently Relevant State phrase (CrsP).