UNDERSTANDING CHINESE KĀI AND GUĀN WHEN REMINDING PEOPLE TO SWITCH MOBILE MODE

Abstract

This study investigates why people identically understand both Mandarin expressions 請將手機開震動/qǐng jiāng shǒu jī kāi zhèn dòng and請將手機關震動/qǐng jiāng shǒu jī guān zhèn dòng, which both mean please set your phone to vibrate. Four perspectives can be employed to explain. Firstly, the embodiments or imageries of 開/kāi/open and關/guān/close function in the expressions. However, only examining both expressions via imageries is insufficient to explain all the aspects. Relevance theory and the figure and ground relationship influence people’s selection of the expressions because the focus is different. Finally, people may directly connect the two actions kāi and guān to a single action, 按/àn/press, because of the development of touchscreen technology. Therefore, kāi and guān become similar under the context of reminding people to change their mobile into silent or vibration mode because no matter which expression is heard, the only action people have to do is to press or touch a specific icon on their smartphones.