汉字是记录汉语的书写符号系统，它的使用和发展都要受所记对象的制约，所以李荣先生强调：“研究文字，必须结合语言，从字形入手而又不拘泥于字形。”然而，汉字学的研究长期只关注汉字的形体或结构，忽略汉字与其所记语言之间的关系，汉字发展史的研究通常也只是梳理字体或结构的演变历史，很少涉及汉语字词关系的动态演变，即词语的用字演变和字符的职能变化。 殷商是汉字体系成熟的重要时期，这时期的汉字使用不仅体现出鲜明的特色，更对此后三千多年的汉字发展产生了深远影响。殷商时期出现的不少词语历代通用，传承至今，它们在现代汉语有的独立成词，有的作为构词语素存在，对于这些词语，我们称之为“殷商已见通今词”。本文借鉴汉字职用学的理论和方法，以殷商已见数千年通用至今的词语作为切入点，梳理它们在每个时代的用字面貌，考察新用字替换旧用字的过程，描写通今词字词的纵横对应关系，进而揭示汉字职用的演变规律并分析其影响因素，这不仅有助于呈现殷商文字在后世的发展演变历史，从语言的角度勾勒汉字文明的传承脉络，也将有助于突破汉字发展史即字体演变史的研究误区，进一步健全汉字发展史的研究框架和论证思路。全文共包括以下几个部分： 绪论部分主要对殷商词汇、汉字发展史、汉字职用演变史的相关研究情况进行了简单回顾，现有成果说明汉字职用演变史是汉字发展史最重要的组成部分，也存在广阔的研究空间。同时提出汉字发展史的研究材料根据有效度可以区分成“同时文本”“后时文本”“泛时性释字材料”，归纳了一些判断用字时代性的方法，并简要介绍了相关研究术语。 第一章主要对35个殷商已见通今词的用字历史进行了个案考察，从大量用字材料中归纳出它们历代先后用过哪些字符记录，系统梳理每个记录字符的产生和消亡时代，厘清不同字符与殷商已见通今词的字词关系以及不同用字之间的字际关系，揭示引发通今词用字更替的主要原因。 第二章主要归纳了殷商已见通今词历时用字的基本类型。在详尽考察第一章35个个案并简释大量其他个案的基础上，根据新旧用字之间的替换关系，我们将殷商已见通今词历时用字的基本类型分为四种：后世传承殷商用字记录通今词的“沿用型”；后世改造殷商用字记录通今词的“改造型”；后世改换与殷商用字毫无构形联系的字符记录通今词，即“换用型”；更多的情况是沿用、改造、换用等不同演变类型交错出现，称作“综合型”。 第三章主要探讨了殷商已见通今词历时用字的替换状况。首先，归纳了通今词新用字的主要来源，包括传承旧字构形、借用他词本字、重造全新本字；其次，分析通今词新旧用字的替换过程，主要包括自然演进渐变、人为规范突变；第三，发现绝大多数通今词的用字在秦汉之际已经定型，并沿用至今；最后，分析了新旧字替换过程中出现的字词错位现象。 第四章主要揭示了殷商已见通今词历时用字的演变趋势。通过大量个案分析，发现单个词语的用字总是朝着强化表音功能、强化表义功能、追求书写便捷的方向发展；意义相关的同类词语的用字总是朝着趋同一致、系统有序的方向发展，体现类别化的特征；通今词在殷商时期用字的原始特征逐渐脱落，“语境异体字”也在朝汰选优化的方向演变。 第五章主要总结了殷商已见通今词历时用字的影响因素。语言文字的内部因素包括：追求用字与词语音义的适切，使汉字记录职能的分工明确，追求书写的便捷，汉字书写的时代变异，历史用字的累积等；社会文化外部因素包括：政治文化环境的变迁，国家用字的规范，个人习惯偏好的差异等；用字选择的原因是复杂多样的，往往是多种因素综合作用的结果。 结语部分对本文的学术意义和研究价值进行了提炼和概括。通过对殷商已见通今词用字历史的详尽个案研究和深入理论分析，可以看出结合语言来研究汉字，能够更细致地揭示出汉语字词的动态演变规律，也是一片亟待开发的新园地。引入语言学的视角，从语言与文字的互动关系入手展开研究，可以在很大程度上推进汉字发展史的研究，可以为文字类工具书的编纂提供新的编选框架和原则，也有助于对疑难字词的考释。因而这种研究值得学术界更多的关注，也会成为汉字学研究领域新的学术生长点。

The Chinese characters are a writing symbol system that record Chinese, so its usages and development are restricted by the object it records. The study of characters must be combined with language, beginning with graphic shape but not sticking to it. However, the study of Chinese characters has long focused on the graphic shape or constitution, ignoring the relationship between Chinese characters and the languages they record. The research of Chinese characters’ history is usually just about the evolution history of graphic form or constitution, rarely involves the change of relations between characters and words, namely, the transformation of the characters ’variation(of certain words) and the functions and usage of Chinese characters. The late Shang dynasty is an important period for the maturity of the Chinese characters system, during which the use of Chinese characters not only reflects the distinctive features, but also has a profound influence on the development of Chinese characters over the next three thousand years. With the guidance of the study on the functions and usage of Chinese characters, this dissertation took the words inherited from the late Shang dynasty and kept until today as an entry point, investigated their use in every age, inspected the process of replacing the once-used characters with the newly used characters, and described the corresponding relationship between the character and the word. On the basis of the above work, we were committed to reveal the evolution rules and factors affecting it, which will certainly contribute to the study on the evolution history of the characters in the late Shang dynasty, as well as drawing the outline of the inheritance of Chinese characters’ civilization. Besides, this dissertation will also help to break through the misconception that the study on the development of Chinese characters equals to that on the evolution of graphic form, thus, a systematic change of the research framework and argumentation for the development of Chinese characters will be triggered. The full text includes the following parts: Introduction: A brief revision of the research about the vocabulary in the late Shang dynasty, the history of Chinese characters and the evolution history of the functions and usage of Chinese characters. The present research results show that the evolution history of the functions and usage of Chinese characters should be the most important part of the history of Chinese characters, and there is broad room for further study. In the meanwhile, in this chapter, we put forward that the research materials can be divided into 3 parts: texts written in the meantime, texts written afterwards, annotations of characters written in uncertain time. Besides, some methods of judging the using time of characters and a number of relative terms have been introduced. Chapter one：A case study on the history of the use of 35 words which inherited from the late Shang dynasty. More specifically, in this chapter, we have described the evolution of Chinese characters that used to record that 35 words in past dynasties, investigated the specific time when the graphic symbols came about and died out, clarified the relations between the 35 inherited words and the graphic symbols recording them and also the relations between the graphic symbols, revealed the main reason for the replacement of characters. Chapter two: A summary of the basic types of the inherited words from the late Shang dynasty .On the basis of the case study, characters recording the inherited words have been divided into four types according to the substitution relationship between newly used characters and once-used characters: inherited type (graphic forms in the late Shang dynasty have been inherited in later ages), reformed type (graphic forms in the late Shang dynasty have been reformed in later ages), replaced type(graphic forms in the late Shang dynasty have been replaced by disparate graphic symbol in later ages), integrated type(Interlaced with different evolution types, such as inheriting, reforming and replacing. More common than the above circumstances) Chapter three: A discussion on the replacement of characters recording the inherited words of all ages. First of all, the main sources of newly used characters have been summarized, including the inheritance of old characters, borrowing the orthograph of other words, and the reconstruction of the younger orthograph; Second, the dissertation analyzed the replacement of newly used characters and once-used characters, mainly including gradual change of natural evolution and sudden change resulted from normative policy; Third, it has been found that most of the characters used to record the inherited words had been stereotyped in the Qin and Han dynasties, and are still in use today; Finally, the misalignment between characters and words during the replacement has been analyzed. Chapter four: A revelation of evolution trend of characters recording the inherited words from the late Shang dynasty. Through a large number of case studies, it has been found that the character used to record single word always tend to strengthen the phonetic representation function or the semantic function, and seek for the convenience of writing; The words owning similar meanings and of the same kind were always developing in the direction of showing a consistent trend, systematically and orderly, and embodied the categorical feature; The original features of the characters used in the late Shang dynasty gradually fell away, and variant characters resulted from context also evolved in the direction of elimination, selection and optimization. Chapter five: A conclusion of affecting factors of the characters ’evolution history that record the inherited words. The internal factors of language and character include: the pursuit of the adaptation of characters and words ’meaning and pronunciation, the motive power to build a pronounced division of the characters ’recording function, seeking for the convenience of writing, Chinese characters’ variation of times, the accumulation of historical characters , etc. External factors associated with society and culture include: the change of political and cultural environment, governments’ normative policy, differences in personal habit or preference (for graphic forms), etc. Conclusion: A summary of the main conclusions and existing problems in this dissertation. Through the study of the characters ’evolution history that record the inherited words, we deemed that the combination of Chinese characters and language is the general research trend. The perspective of linguistics will greatly promote the study of the evolution history of Chinese characters, the compilation of reference books, and the investigation and explanation of difficult words. As this importance has been recognized by more and more scholars, the path of Chinese character research will become wider and wider, and there will be a lot of new achievements associated with it.