ENG 626CORPUS APPROACHES TO LANGUAGE STUDIES

introduction (01)

Bambang Kaswanti Purwobkaswanti@atmajaya.ac.id

What does it mean “knowing a language”?

How do you learn or arrive at the rules of a language?

knowing a language = knowing the sounds, the words, and the rules for their combination

knowledge of sentences and nonsentences▪ your vocabulary is limited, possible combinations limitless▪ you know the grammaticality of the possible combinations

a. John kissed the little old lady who owned the shaggy dog.b. Who owned the shaggy dog John kissed the little old lady?c. John is difficult to love.d. It is difficult to love John.e. John is anxious to go.f. It is anxious to go John.g. John, who was a student, flunked his exams.h. Exams his flunked student a was who John.

knowing a language = knowing the sounds, the words, and the rules for their combination

ohw –nwo –

who, hownow, won, own

sta –sat, taslaim –mail, alim, lima

(1) *You are going where?

(3) A: I’m going to Hawaii for the holidays. B1: You’re going where for the holidays? B2: *Where are you going for the holidays? (Celce-Murcia dan Larsen-Freeman 1999:250)

(2) Where are you going?

(1) *If I will go to Europe next year, I will ask you to come along

(3) I’ll open an account if you will open one.(4) Only if you will, will I go.(5) If oil is mixed with water, it floats.(6) If you boil water, it vaporizes.

“future simple” – “future simple”(7) The more creative will experiment with less conventional architects if it will help them win planning permission.

(2) If I go to Europe next year, I will ask you to come along.

would + base verb and would + base verb(8) It would help if interested people who spot building work going on in what they know, or suspect to be listed buildings, would phone their local planning office to find out if listed building consent has been sought.

LANGUAGE STUDIES• intuition–based approach

• corpus-based approach

traditional grammarnone is always singular regardless of what follows in a prepositional phrase • [noncount] None of the toxic waste has escaped.• [plural, human] None of those firemen enjoys hearing the alarm go off.• [plural, nonhuman] None of the costumes he has tried fits him.

INTUITION-BASED APPROACH

What are native speakers doing and thinking when they use none?

usage surveys

• [noncount] None of the toxic waste ___ escaped. has 100%

• [plural, human] None of those firemen ________ hearing the alarm go off. enjoy 47%; enjoys 53% (Van Shaik 1976)

• [plural, nonhuman] None of the costumes he has tried ____ him. fit 50%; fits 50% (Farhady 1977)

(Celce-Murcia 1999)

Ofc. wrkrs. M.A. stdnts Truckdrvrs (N = 32) (N = 36) (N = 33)

1. None of the negotiations a. is likely to succeed. 44% 9% 24% b. are likely to succeed. 56% 78% 76%

3% either2. None even a. knows how to tie shoes. 44% 28% 61%

b. know how to tie shoes. 56% 69% 39% 3% either

[Peterson 1990:46]three groups with different socioeducational backgrounds: office workers, masters degree students, truck drivers

subject-verb agreement (Celce-Murcia 1999)Do native speakers consistently follow the “proximity principles” (as adhered by traditional grammarians)for either … or, and neither… nor?

Either my sister or my brothers are going to do it.Either my brothers or my sister is going to do it.

Neither the movie nor the books were helpful.Neither the books nor the movie was helpful.

Either your eyesight or your brakes _____ at fault. (van Shaik 1976)Either the professor or her assistants _____ explain every lesson. (Farhady 1977)

was 31%; were 69%

has to 33%; have to 67%

Neither the students nor the teacher ______ that textbook.(van Shaik 1976) likes 49%; like 51%Neither you nor he ___ able to answer the question.

(Farhady 1977)was 40%; were 60%

Neither you nor I ____ trained for that job. (van Shaik 1976)am 12%; is 15%; are 73%

traditional rulesentences beginning with there proximity principle

traditional rule

There are in the rooma girl and two boystwo boys and a girl

proximity principle

There in the roomis a girl and two boysare two boys and a girl

usage surveys:many native speakers (a majority) apply the proximity rule

CORPUS-BASED APPROACH

less vs. fewerWhat is the rule for their distribution (as prescribed by traditional grammar)?

• less before uncountable nouns He has less furniture than you do.• fewer before plural countable nouns He has fewer chairs than you do.

Chen (1982) found two examples of less + countable nouns:• Out of the 170 million people in the country, less than 81 million have IQs that are high. (Harper’s, March 1958)

Celce-Murcia 1999:727)

• Rejoice then that no less than 34 of the 81 past volumes … are back in print. (N.Y. Times Book Review Sections, March 30, 1958)

Chen (1982) • a corpus of more than 180,000 spoken words • a control corpus of about 50,000 written words

26 tokens of less 2 tokens of fewer (in the written corpus only)spoken corpus: six tokens of less (= fewer as prescribed

in traditional grammar)… less people (two tokens)… less than 300 people… less such fellows… less than one person in four… the number of farmers is less every day

less and fewer are not particularly frequent in his corpora

consult native speakers• fill-in-the-blank questionnaire• oral elicitation task (+ pictures)

Chen’s findings:four factors seem to influence the use of less rather than fewer

1. NSs are much less likely to use fewer in informal speech than in formal writing2. Partitive nouns are even less likely to be preceded by fewer than plural countable nouns. • [partitives] less bushels of apples • [plural count nouns] fewer apples/less apples (both occur)3. Separation of fewer from the head noun encourages the use of less: less than fifty people4. Ellipsis of constitutents following less or fewer encourages the use of less (i.e. fewer is rarely used pronominally) • They told us 300 people would come to the rally, but we had less.(See Celce-Murcia 1999:728 for Chen’s further research report)

Ketterman, B. and G. Marko (eds) 2002 Teaching and Learning by Doing Corpus Analysis, 102

Ketterman, B. and G. Marko (eds) 2002 Teaching and Learning by Doing Corpus Analysis, 103