Ever since the start of Chinese linguistic studies, the description of the Chinese particle LE has remained elusive. The classification has evolved from a listing of sentences and the discussion of contrastive pairs to a more context and discourse-oriented analysis. The development in recent years of inferential models and situation semantics has opened the way for a renewed study of the use of the Chinese particle LE. This book discusses the Chinese data from a 'mental space' perspective and finally reveals the role so-called Chinese 'sentence LE' plays in the construction and maintenance of discourse.

Ever since the start of Chinese linguistic studies, the description of the Chinese particle LE has remained elusive. The classification has evolved from a listing of sentences and the discussion of contrastive pairs to a more context and discourse-oriented analysis. The development in recent years of inferential models and situation semantics has opened the way for a renewed study of the use of the Chinese particle LE. The present book discusses the Chinese data from a 'mental space' perspective and brings out the role so-called Chinese 'sentence LE' plays in the construction and maintenance of discourse.

This revised edition draws on years of lecturing experience and feedback from students. The result is a popular, lively and accessible book which offers an improved and reader-friendly introduction to the art of clear thinking. Developing and applying critical reasoning skills is globally recognised as a basic competency, like reading and writing. Critical thinkers who think for themselves are the key role players in a free and democratic society. Several up-to-date and new examples from major South African socio-political events from the past few years are given, such as the Zuma trial, political conflict, race relations, and xenophobia. Other new examples are based on events that took place in the rest of Africa and the world. New exercises are drawn from newspapers, advertisements, political speeches, literary works, the Internet, and debates about xenophobic violence, crime, the death penalty, abortion, euthanasia, inequality, and health care. Numerous activities lead readers to practise critical reasoning skills. The book is valuable to students of Philosophy but also for those studying Communication Science, Development Studies, Health Care, Law, English Studies, Medical Ethics, Political Science, Psychology and Public Administration.