| Acknowledgements | 第1-7页 |
| Chinese Abstract | 第7-8页 |
| English Abstract | 第8-9页 |
| Preface | 第9-14页 |
| Chapter 1 Introduction | 第14-19页 |
| ·The traditional definition of tense | 第14页 |
| ·The cognitive definition of tense | 第14-15页 |
| ·The approach adopted in the study | 第15-16页 |
| ·The scope and purpose of the thesis | 第16-17页 |
| ·Organization of present thesis | 第17-19页 |
| Chapter 2 Literature Review of Past Tense | 第19-31页 |
| ·Uses of the simple past tense | 第19-21页 |
| ·Event past and state past | 第19-20页 |
| ·Habitual use | 第20页 |
| ·Uses in reported speech events | 第20页 |
| ·Past tense in politeness, conditional and counterfactual form | 第20-21页 |
| ·Traditional approach to past tense | 第21-25页 |
| ·Past tense as a grammatical category | 第21-22页 |
| ·Past Tense as a deictic category | 第22-23页 |
| ·The analysis on past tense | 第23-25页 |
| ·Cognitive approach to past tense | 第25-31页 |
| ·Prototype theory | 第26-27页 |
| ·Conceptual metaphor | 第27-28页 |
| ·Grounding Principle | 第28-31页 |
| Chapter 3 Theoretical Background | 第31-45页 |
| ·A brief introduction to cognitive grammar | 第31-32页 |
| ·Three epistemic models | 第32-36页 |
| ·Basic epistemic model | 第32-34页 |
| ·Elaborated epistemic model | 第34页 |
| ·Time-line model | 第34-36页 |
| ·Perfective vs. imperfective | 第36页 |
| ·Mental Space Theory | 第36-45页 |
| ·Construction of spaces | 第38-39页 |
| ·Access principle, domain mapping and spreading | 第39-42页 |
| ·Access principle | 第39-40页 |
| ·Domain mapping | 第40页 |
| ·Spreading | 第40-42页 |
| ·Some theoretical primitives | 第42-45页 |
| Chapter 4 The Simple Past Tense within Mental Space Framework | 第45-58页 |
| ·Cutrer's principle | 第45-46页 |
| ·The simple past tense within mental space framework | 第46-58页 |
| ·Event past and state past | 第46-47页 |
| ·Habitual use | 第47-48页 |
| ·Uses in reported speech event | 第48-53页 |
| ·Traditional way to interpret uses in reported speech event | 第48-49页 |
| ·Cognitive way to interpret uses in reported speech event | 第49-53页 |
| ·Past tense in politeness, conditional and counterfactual form | 第53-55页 |
| ·Past tense in politeness form | 第53-54页 |
| ·Past tense in conditional form | 第54-55页 |
| ·Past tense in counterfactual form | 第55页 |
| ·Past tense in discourse | 第55-58页 |
| Chapter 5 Conclusion | 第58-60页 |
| ·Significances of the research | 第58-59页 |
| ·Issues worthy of further study | 第59-60页 |
| References | 第60-64页 |
