Download It never entered my head to be sacred

ENG 626
CORPUS APPROACHES TO LANGUAGE STUDIES
language teaching (1)
Bambang Kaswanti Purwo
[email protected]
Hunston Ch. 5
application of corpora in language teaching
▪ production of dictionaries and grammars
▪ use of corpora in critical linguistics (the study of ideologies)
▪
in translation
▪ contribution of corpora to literary studies n stylistics
▪ use of corpora in forensic linguistics
▪ use of corpora in designing writer support packages
dictionaries and grammars
new emphases on
▪ frequency
▪ collocation and phraseology
▪ variation
▪ lexis in grammar
▪ authenticity
emphasis on frequency
▪ speaker intuition very little use
▪ important for dictionary users: which sense of a word
to show first
▪ [corpus can show the diversity of use] – more detailed
information about the words
comparison of senses between
▪ Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 2nd 1987
▪ Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 3rd 1995
▪ Collins COBUILD English Dictionary 1995
» KNOW
20-40-30
» MATTER 10-30-20
» MAY
7-8-15
» PLACE
20-30-30
 dictionaries not divide info between senses in consistent
ways
the increases number of senses – more info about the very
frequent ones
L 1987 matter ‘something wrong’ What’s the matter?
L 1995 + four more senses: asking about
illness or state of being broken
feelings
statement there’s something that the matter with
NEG statement there’s nothing the matter with
L 1987 I know ‘uttered when someone gets a sudden idea’
What can we get her for her birthday? Oh I know, we’ll
get her some flowers
L 1995 + two
‘given agreement’: I’m so worn out. Yeah, I know.
‘forestalling disagreement’ It sounds silly I know, but try it
anyway.
‘prefacing a disagreement’
‘showing sympathy n understanding’
frequency and grammar reference books
Mindt (2000) four meanings of the present perfect
(a) indefinite past
(b) past continuing into present
(c) recent past
(d) a use indicating that an action is completed,
though at an unspecified time
(a) 80% of occurrence
(b) second in rank
(c) and (d) are rare
in many course books: (b) and (c) prototypical
frequency can be linked to discourse
▪ the most frequent use of the in academic prose :
at the beginning of complex noun phrases
the disorientating effect of zero gravity
▪ the most frequent use of this and these in academic prose
to refer back to ideas previously mentioned
TELL and PROMISE most frequently used in:
▪ TELL “verb + indirect object + complement clause”
You can’t tell her to get off.
▪ PROMISE “verb + complement clause”
They promised to write.
▪ PROMISE frequent V intr. (I promise)
▪ TELL rarely (Time will tell)
▪ very infrequent uses can legitimately be ignored
Mindt (2000) reports 98% of verbs in the past tense refer to
past time
hypothetical future very rare
 Hypothetical meaning unimportant to teach?
It is important for learners to learn to express the hypothetical
in some context (e.g. what if ___)
▪ students learning the past tense can safely ignore
hypothetical future
▪ students learning to express hypotheticality cannot ignore
hypothetical future
[Hunston Ch. 6]
corpora  a new description of language
 the content of what the lang T is teaching is changing
what is language like?
• words tend to occur in preferred sequences
▪ not randomly or
▪ in accordance with grammatical rules only
language as phraseology
» collocation
utterly different, not: utterly similar
utterly ridiculous, not: utterly sensible
» phrases n variation
▪ open to considerable creativity and exploitation
where there’s smoke there’s fire
no smoke without fire
sometimes there is smoke without fire
» tendency for certain verbs to occur
▪ in passive rather than in active
Manchester is hemmed in by industrial areas
cf. industrial areas hem Manchester in
▪ in the negative rather than in the positive
It never entered my head to be sacred
cf. it entered my head to be sacred
» occurrence of complementation patterns
suggestion that, decision as to whether, obligation to do
three important consequences – challenge to current views
about language
▪ no distinction between pattern and meaning
▪ language: two principles of organization
▫ idiom principle
▫ open-choice principle
▪ can phraseology indeed be taken to be the basis of what
a learner needs to know?
▪ is phraseology simply an important adjunct to grammar?
• pattern and meaning
▪ a word [+ several senses], each sense diffrent set of patterns
mobile [used of things] ‘can be moved’: mobile unit/library
[used of people] ‘not prevented from moving by disability or lack of resources’: I’m still very mobile
MAINTAIN (verb) see Hunston p. 139
▪ relation between meaning n pattern is not one-to-one
▫ not to treat MAINTAIN as a single word w/ three meanings
(cf. traditional dictionaries)
▫ but to propose three phraseologies (each has its own meaning)
‘maintain something’
‘maintain that something is true’
‘maintain something at a level’
 phraseologies replace the word as the unit of vocabulary
teaching
L’s task more difficult: three instead of one lexical item to learn
L’s task simplified: each lexical item + info about its use
• other aspect of pattern/meaning association
words with the same pattern tend to share aspects of meaning