A Study of the Criterion for Distinguishing Simple from Complex Sentences in Modern Mandarin Chinese within the Framework of the Cardiff Grammar

The Cardiff Grammar stresses the importance of the concept of process, which inspires this paper for the exploration of criterion for distinguishing simple from complex sentences in modern mandarin Chinese.The process criterion distinguishes simple from complex sentences on the basis of how many major processes could be identified in one sentence: sentences expressing one major process are simple sentences while those expressing more than one are complex sentences.Taking the process criterion as its basis, the paper also argues that only two types of sentences could be identified in the system network of sentence patterns in modern mandarin Chinese, which are simple and complex sentences.