Patterns and Meanings of Intensifiers in Chinese Learner Corpora

Patterns and Meanings of Intensifiers in Chinese Learner Corpora

Intensification plays a major role in spoken and written interaction, enabling the writer or speaker to express different levels of commitment. This book explores the patterns and meanings of intensifiers in Chinese learner English by ways of comparison with native English. The study adopts the method of contrastive interlanguage analysis (CIA) and is conducted within the theoretical framework of Firthian contextual theory of meaning, the Sinclairian model of extended units of meaning (EUM) and Hunston’s pattern grammar. This book is the first attempt to investigate the patterning and meaning features of intensifiers systematically with the corpora data in Chinese learner English. Readers will obtain a relatively complete picture of how Chinese learners use intensifiers to realize their attitudinal meanings. Chunyan Wang is an associate professor at the School of Foreign Languages, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Her research interests include data-driven learning, second language acquisition, language teaching and language testing.

China Perspectives series

The China Perspectives series focuses on translating and publishing works by leading Chinese scholars, writing about both global topics and China-related themes. It covers humanities and social sciences, education, media and psychology, as well as many interdisciplinary themes. This is the first time any of these books have been published in English for international readers. The series aims to put forward a Chinese perspective, give insights into cutting-edge academic thinking in China and inspire researchers globally. For more information, please visit https://www.routledge.com/series/CPH. Forthcoming titles The Use of L1 Cognitive Resources in L2 Reading by Chinese EFL Learners Wu Shiyu On Aesthetic and Cultural Issues in Pragmatic Translation Feng Xiuwen Assessing Listening for Chinese English Learners Developing a Communicative Listening Comprehension Test Suite for CET Pan Zhixin Complementarity between Lexis and Grammar in the System of Person A Systemic Typological Approach Wang Pin Language Policy A Systemic Functional Linguistic Approach Yang Bingjun &Wang Rui A Study of Academic English Genre Lei Xiuyun

Patterns and Meanings of Intensifiers in Chinese Learner Corpora Chunyan Wang

First published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2017 Chunyan Wang The right of Chunyan Wang to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN: 978-1-138-20253-5 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-47373-4 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC

Contents

List of diagrams List of tables Acknowledgement List of abbreviations

vi vii xi xii

1

Introduction

1

2

Literature review

5

3

Research design and methodology

29

4

Data distribution

36

5

Patterning features of intensifiers in Chinese learner corpora

51

6

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

88

7

Conclusions and implications

123

Appendices References Index

130 169 179

Diagrams

2-1 3-1 4-1 4-2 4-3 4-4 4-5 4-6 4-7 4-8 5-1 5-2 5-3 6-1

Subtypes of intensifiers (from Quirk et al., 1985: 589–590.) Partial retrieved results by PowerGREP Frequency distribution of INT-adj Observed frequency of intensifiers in each corpus Token percentage of different frequency intensifier groups Type percentage of different frequency intensifiers groups Double intensifiers in each corpus The percentage of amplifiers and downtoners in each corpus Frequency of intensifiers and adjectives in each corpus Frequency of intensified adjectives and intensified multi-adjective collocates Overall percentage of typical pattern types in CLEC and LOCNESS Frequency of the pattern neg MAX adj pattern The pattern VERY VERY adj in different registers of BNC Frequency of the five maximizers in the CL corpora and NS corpora

6 34 37 39 41 41 42 43 46 47 54 56 66 89

Tables

2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8 4.9 4.10 4.11 4.12

Classification of degree modifiers (Paradis 2000) Different syntactic positions of really Sizes of the corpora used in this research (1) Sizes of the corpora used in this research (2) Frequency distribution of INT-adj collocations Top-twenty, most-frequent INT-adj collocations in each corpus Frequency of intensifiers in each corpus Token number and percentage of intensifier groups Type number and percentage of intensifier groups Frequency of double intensifiers in each corpus Statistics of amplifiers and downtoners Top-twenty, most-frequent intensifiers in each corpus Frequency of adjectives in each corpus Frequency of intensified adjectives in each corpus Frequency of multi-adjective collocates in each corpus Top-twenty, most-frequent intensified adjectives with standardized frequency in each corpus 5.1 Overall frequency and percentage of typical patterns in CLEC and LOCNESS 5.2 The investigated intensifiers in each functional category 5.3 Frequency of the pattern neg MAX adj 5.4 Concordance lines for neg MAX adj in FROWN 5.5 Pattern neg MAX adj in native English 5.6.1 Concordance lines for neg COMPLETELY adj in WECCL 5.6.2 Concordance lines for neg ABSOLUTELY adj in WECCL 5.6.3 Concordance lines for neg FULLY adj in WECCL 5.7 Pattern neg MAX adj in learner English 5.8 Frequency of quite in CL corpus and NS corpora 5.9 Concordance lines for QUITE adj in FROWN 5.10 Concordance lines for quite in CLEC 5.11 Patterns of QUITE adj in CL and NS corpora 5.12 Concordance lines for the pattern a QUITE adj n in FLOB 5.13 Concordance lines for the pattern QUITE a adj n in FLOB

8 10 32 33 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 45 46 46 47 49 53 54 55 56 57 57 57 58 58 60 61 61 62 63 63

viii Tables 5.14 5.15 5.16 5.17 5.18 5.19 5.20 5.21 5.22 5.23 5.24 5.25

Concordance lines for the pattern QUITE a adj n in CLEC Concordance lines for the pattern a QUITE adj n in CLEC Concordance lines for the pattern VERY VERY adj in CLEC Collocates of so in each sub-corpus of CLEC Concordance lines for improper use of SO many in CLEC Concordance lines for improper use of SO much in CLEC Concordance lines for SO much in the FROWN Frequency of too in CL and NS corpus Improper usage of TOO much in CLEC Improper usage of TOO many in CLEC The pattern v-link TOO much to be v-ed in CLEC Concordance lines for the pattern v-link intensifier TOO much in NS corpora 5.26 Concordance lines for TOO many in CLEC 5.27 Concordance lines for TOO many in FROWN 5.28 Concordance lines for the pattern TOO adj to v in FROWN 5.29.1 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in CLEC(1) 5.29.2 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in CLEC(2) 5.30 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in FLOB 5.31 Concordance lines for MORE AND MORE in CLEC 5.32 Concordance lines for the pattern INCREASINGLY adj in CLEC 5.33 Concordance lines for the pattern INCREASINGLY adj in FROWN 5.34 Collocational behaviors of MORE AND MORE 5.35 Typical patterns of almost 5.36 Typical patterns of rather 5.37 Typical patterns of a little 5.38 Typical patterns of hardly Frequency of the five maximizers in the CL corpora and 6.1 the NS corpora 6.2 Concordance lines for completely in FROWN 6.3 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of completely in NS corpora 6.4 Concordance lines for totally in FROWN 6.5 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of totally in NS corpora 6.6 Concordance lines for absolutely in FLOB 6.7 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of absolutely in the NS corpora 6.8 Concordance lines for entirely in FLOB 6.9 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of entirely in NS corpora

64 64 65 67 67 68 69 69 70 70 71 71 72 73 74 75 76 76 77 77 78 78 79 80 80 81 89 90 91 92 94 95 95 96 96

Tables 6.10 Concordance lines for fully in FROWN 6.11 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully in NS corpora 6.12 Semantic preference and semantic prosody of maximizers in NS corpora 6.13 Frequency of the five maximizers in CL corpora 6.14 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of completely in the CL corpora 6.15 Concordance lines for completely in WECCL 6.16 Concordance lines for totally in CLEC 6.17 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of totally in CL corpora 6.18 Concordance lines for absolutely in WECCL 6.19 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective of absolutely in CL corpora 6.20 Concordance lines for entirely in CLEC 6.21 Concordance lines for fully in WECCL 6.22 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully in CL corpora 6.23 Semantic preference and semantic prosody of maximizers in CL corpora 6.24 Semantic preferences of very in NS corpora 6.25 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of very in NS corpora 6.26 Semantic preferences of so in NS corpora 6.27 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of so in NS corpora 6.28 Semantic preferences of too in NS corpora 6.29 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of too in NS corpora 6.30 Semantic preference and prosody of very, so and too in NS corpora 6.31 Semantic preferences of very in CLEC 6.32 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of very in CLEC 6.33 Semantic preferences of so in CLEC 6.34 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of so in CLEC 6.35 Semantic preferences of too in CLEC 6.36 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of too in CLEC 6.37 Semantic preference and prosody of maximizers in CLEC 6.38 Frequency of the observed downtoners in NS and the CL corpora 6.39 Concordance lines for a little in FROWN

ix 97 98 98 99 99 100 101 101 102 103 103 104 104 105 106 106 107 107 108 109 110 110 111 111 112 112 112 113 114

x

Tables

6.40 6.41 6.42 6.43 6.44 6.45 6.46 6.47 6.48

Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and the neutral adjective collocates of a little in NS corpora Concordance lines for a bit in FROWN Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a bit in NS corpora Concordance lines for a little bit in NS corpora Concordance lines for a little in CLEC Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a little in CLEC Concordance lines for a bit in CLEC Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a bit in CLEC Concordance lines for a little bit in CLEC

114 115 115 116 117 117 118 118 119

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank all the people who have helped me in completing this book, which was originally my doctoral dissertation for Shanghai Jiaotong University. I feel most deeply indebted and grateful to my supervisor, Prof. Wei Naixing, who has always been a strict but kind, skillful and patient mentor. Without his professional supervision and warm encouragement, this book would not have come to fruition. I am also obliged to Prof. Wang Tongshun, Prof. Hu Quansheng, Prof. Qu Weiguo, Prof. Ma Qiuwu, Prof. Shao Zhihong, Prof. Chen Yongjie, Prof. Hu Kaibao and Prof. Tian Yan for their time and energy spent on this dissertation. Their valuable criticisms and constructive suggestions have contributed greatly to the refinement of my dissertation. I would also like to extend my sincere thanks to Prof. Li Wenzhong, Prof. Liangmaocheng and Prof. Xu Jiajin, who kindly gave me suggestions for my dissertation. My sincere thanks also go to all the other teachers in the School of Foreign Languages at Shanghai Jiao Tong University including Prof. Yang Huizhong, Prof. Wu Jiang and Prof. Zhu Zhengcai, whose enlightening lectures and instructions kindled interests in my PhD study and guided me into the research field. Special thanks go to my colleague and friend Wu Yong, who was generous to share her useful material with me. Finally, I would like to extend my gratitude to all my family members: my parents, my sisters, my husband and my son. Their unreserved love and unswerving support are the source of my courage in pursuing my doctorate study and fulfilling this project.

Abbreviations

BNC CA CIA CL CLAWS CLEC DDL EA EFL EUM F FLOB FROWN ICLE INT-adj KWIC L1 L2 LOCNESS MAX Neg NNS NS POS SF SPSS WECCL

British National Corpus Contrastive Analysis Contrastive interlanguage analysis Chinese learner Constituent Likelihood Automatic Word-Tagging System Chinese Learner English Corpus Data-driven learning Error analysis English as a foreign language Extend units of meaning Raw frequency Freiburg-LOB Corpus of British English Freiburg-Brown Corpus of American English International Corpus of Learner English Intensifier-adjective collocations Key Word in Context The first language The second language Louvain Corpus of Native English Essays Maximizer Negative marker Non-native speaker Native speaker Part of speech Standardized frequency Statistical Program for Social Science Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners (1.0)

1

Introduction

1.1

Research background

The knowledge of collocations is a critical element for a foreign language learner to achieve native-like accuracy and fluency (Pawley & Syder, 1983). Proficient native language users are intuitively aware that some words in their language tend to co-occur in relatively fixed and recurrent combinations, and they reject violations of such lexical combinations, even when they seem to be grammatically acceptable (Bartsch, 2004). Foreign language learners may know quite a lot of individual words which they struggle to use, along with their grammatical knowledge, but they lack the ability to use those words in a range of collocations which pack more meaning into what they say or write (Lewis & Conzett, 2000: 14). So learners must know how to use words in appropriate combinations if they wish to acquire a native-like fluency in English (Benson et al., 1997). The importance of collocation acquisition has already been recognized by many researchers, including Channell (1981), Bahns and Eldaw (1993), Lewis (1993) and Taeko (2005), etc. A wide range of empirical research has been carried out from different perspectives to uncover patterns of collocations and to reveal pedagogical implications. Studies of collocation in the first language (L1) and the second language (L2) in China have been carried out by many researchers (Pu, 1999, 2003; Wei, 2002a; Wang, 2005; Sun, 2006). However, the collocational study of intensifiers in Chinese learners’ English has not yet been conducted systematically based on a large-scale corpus. Intensifiers express an interpersonal message, which signals personal commitment and their judgments of truth and value (Lorenz, 1999: 24). Linguistically, the use of intensifiers is the most typical way of realizing intensification to show the attitudinal meaning. From the systemic functional perspective, intensifiers serve a modal function, and they convey an interpersonal meaning and provide information about the social and emotional stance of the speaker (Labov, 1985; Partington, 1993; Halliday, 1994; Peters, 1994; Klerk, 2006). Intensification plays a major role in spoken and written interaction, enabling the writer or speaker to express different levels of commitment ranging from caution and doubt (e.g. fairly certain) to certainty and emphasis (e.g. absolutely vital). It is pervasive in all uses of language (Stubbs, 1986).

2

Introduction Partington (1993: 178) emphasizes the importance of intensification. He argues, Intensification is a direct indication of a speaker’s desire to use and exploit an expression of hyperbole. . . . The importance of intensification in the communicative process is that it is a vehicle for impressing, praising, persuading, insulting and generally influencing the listener’s reception of the message.

Labov (1985) stresses strongly the importance and necessity of the description of language that recognizes social and emotional elements in the central components of linguistic structure. He argues for the importance of intensity by the following statements: “At the heart of social and emotional expression is the linguistic feature of intensity.” (Labov, 1985: 43) The study of intensifiers from a collocational point of view has attracted great attention from researchers (Alternberg, 1991; Granger, 1998a; Kennedy, 2003). Their research findings indicate that the use of intensifiers is subject to a number of syntactic, semantic, lexical and stylistic restrictions. Intensifiers actually remain a rather difficult area for language learners, even for those at more advanced levels of proficiency (Lorenz, 1999). Chinese learners of English display their weakness in using intensifier collocations (Chen, 2003; Liang, 2003; Zhang, 2008). Yang and Gui (2003) find that learner errors of the intensifier-adjective collocations account for rather low percentage among all the collocational errors in learner English. They point out that the low percentage of intensifier-adjective collocations reflects learners’ limited skill of using intensifiers rather than their competence of using intensifiers properly. It is of vital importance of investigating how learners use intensifiers to realize their attitudinal meaning.

1.2 Aims and objectives This research sets out to conduct a systematic study of the use of intensifiers in learner English, with a view to characterizing their salient patterning and meaning features and functions. Specially, the following objectives are expected to be achieved. First, this research attempts to explore the overall tendency of intensifier distribution in learner English and the relationship between the learners’ use of intensifiers and their English proficiency level. Therefore, the data distribution of intensifiers in learner corpora in comparison with that in the native corpora will be described. Second, patterning features of the intensifiers in learner English with reference to native English will be uncovered in terms of their collocation, colligation, semantic meaning and function. Third, this research seeks to characterize the semantic and pragmatic features of intensifiers in learner English in comparison with those in native English. To meet this objective, the semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers will be examined. Fourth, this study endeavors to find out the underlying factors for the existing problems of using intensifiers by Chinese learners of English. Pedagogical

Introduction 3 implications of teaching and learning of intensifiers will be made based on the research findings.

1.3

Significance of the present study

Compared with previous studies, the present study has its significance in the following aspects. Methodologically, retrieving data from the pos-tagged corpora and checking the retrieved data by manual work guarantee the representativeness and reliability of the research data. Different from most previous studies in which only a limited number of intensifiers are analyzed, this study aims to derive a relatively comprehensive picture of how Chinese learners use intensifiers in the written language production. Both the native corpus and the learner corpus employed in this research are pos-tagged, which can yield valuable linguistic insights about the differences and similarities among the investigated entities (Granger, 1998a; Borin & Prütz, 2004). All the intensifier-adjective collocations in the employed corpora are retrieved. The retrieved results are manually checked in order to remove the inaccurate intensifier collocations. By this method, the overall picture of the data distribution of intensifiers in the studied corpora and the detailed frequency information of intensifiers in each sub-corpus can be worked out. The most frequently used intensifiers by learners will be studied in depth with regard to their patterning and meaning features. In consequence, this research is believed to result in more comprehensive and convincing conclusions than by the previous studies. Theoretically, this study is carried out within the framework of Sinclair’s extended units of meaning (EUM). In traditional linguistic studies, a word is regarded as the carrier of meaning or a meaning unit. The EUM model regards the multi-word units as the normal carrier of meaning. The meaning of a word stretches out into its context through different levels of co-selections in terms of collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. The EUM model has been increasingly used in descriptive linguistic studies (Sinclair, 1996; Tognini-Bonelli, 2001; Li, 2010). However, in most cases, it mostly focuses on native English and is rarely used for the study of learner English. Therefore, it is of significant value to investigate intensifiers in learner English within the four categories of collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody in the framework of EUM. By doing so, we expect to bring more insights into the descriptive system of units of meaning and thus gain a more comprehensive picture of the intensifier use in learner English. Pedagogically, the description of intensifier collocations in native English and learner English offers insights into English teaching in China. The traditional teaching of English in China treats lexis and grammar as separate entities. According to this teaching paradigm, learners are taught to create sentences by connecting individual words based on grammatical rules. An inevitable problem is that many generated sentences are grammatically acceptable but lack idiomaticity and nativeness (Pawley & Syder, 1983; Howarth, 1998). This study will describe collocational

4

Introduction

patterns of intensifiers in native English and the existing problems of intensifier use in learner English. By doing this, the collocational patterns of intensifiers are suggested to be included in the teaching materials including teaching syllabus, learner dictionaries and textbooks. Therefore, this will contribute to raising learners’ awareness of collocations and guaranteeing learners’ fluency and accuracy in English expression.

1.4

Organization of the book

This book is composed of seven chapters. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the research background by briefly introducing the importance of collocation study and the nature and significance of intensifier collocation study. Research objectives and an organization of the book are also included in this part. Chapter 2 reviews the literature of related theories and previous studies on learner collocation as well as research on intensifier collocation in western academia and inside China. Definitions and classification of intensifiers in previous studies and this research are also introduced. Chapter 3 deals with the research design and research methods through defining the analytical framework, intensifiers to be explored in-depth, research instruments and research procedures. Chapter 4 covers the quantitative description of intensifier collocations in Chinese learner English corpora and native corpora. Overall data distribution of intensifiers is described. The developing features of intensifier collocations of Chinese learner English are spelt out in terms of the frequency information. Chapters 5 and 6 explore the patterns and meanings of intensifier collocations in Chinese learner corpora in terms of their collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. In-depth study is carried out for the intensifiers in learner corpora in comparison with native corpora. Chapter 7 summarizes the major research findings, pedagogical implications and limitations of this research. Suggestions for future studies of intensifier collocations are offered in the final chapter.

2

Literature review

This chapter briefly reviews the relevant theories and previous research related to this study. Definitions and classifications of intensifiers and the intensified adjectives in previous studies and for the present study are discussed and delimited at the beginning of this section.

2.1

Defining schemes

The defining schemes of intensifiers and adjectives vary in different studies depending on their different linguistic stands and research purposes. They will be explained in this section. 2.1.1

Intensifiers in the previous studies

Terms referring to realizing devices of intensification are not uniform among scholars. Bolinger (1972: 18) refers to them as “degree words” without separating them from downtoners. In the terminology of Quirk et al. (1985: 567), they are “amplifiers”; Stöffel (1901) calls them “intensive adverbs.” Primus (1992) refers to “degree words” as not only intensifiers but also focus modifiers. Ito (2003: 258) uses “intensifier” to refer to adverbs that maximize or boost meaning. Classification of intensifiers is various, based on different criteria and research philosophy. Bolinger (1972), Quirk et al. (1985), Allerton (1987), Johansson (1993), Paradis (1997, 2000), Klein (1998), Lorenz (1999) and Biber et al. (2000) have grouped intensifiers differently in their studies. Bolinger (1972: 17) explores the usage of intensifiers and defines the term “intensifier” as “any device that scales a quality, whether up or down or somewhere between the two.” The devices are multifarious, and even syntactic forms and figures of speech have been stereotyped for the purpose. Thus he presents considerably wide categories, though he holds that most of the devices are lexical. He distinguishes between four types of intensifiers according to the region of the scale that they occupy: Boosters: upper part of a scale, looking up – for example, “He is a perfect idiot.” “She is terribly selfish.”

6

Literature review Compromisers: middle of the scale, often trying to look both ways at once – for example, “He is rather an idiot.” “She is fairly happy.” Diminishers: lower part of the scale, looking down – for example, “It was an indifferent success.” “They were little disposed to argue.” Minimizers: lower end of the scale – for example, “He is a bit of an idiot.” “I do not care an iota for that.”

Bolinger’s definition of intensifier has a wide coverage, and the four functional categories are generally rough. For example, “compromiser” refers to intensifiers on a middle of the scale and is explained as “trying to look both ways at once.” However, it is not a clear delimitation of the degree of intensification. Quirk et al. (1985: 589) point out that intensifiers “indicate a point on an abstractly conceived intensity scale, and the point indicated may be relatively low or relatively high.” The relatively high point on the abstract scale is amplifier and the relatively low point on the other scale is downtoner by definition. Or amplifiers scale upwards from an assumed norm and downtoners scale downwards from an assumed norm (Quirk et al., 1985: 445). Amplifier and downtoner can be further divided into sub-categories as shown in Diagram 2-1. In Diagram 2-1, amplifiers are divided into maximizers and boosters. Maximizers occupy the upper extreme of the degree scale, and boosters display a high degree but without reaching the extreme end of the scale. Downtoners are subdivided into four categories: approximators, compromisers, diminishers and minimizers. Quirk’s definition and classification have enjoyed a wide acceptance among the subsequent studies for its detailed specifications for each of the functional groups. However, the boundary between categories also remained blurred. For example, the line between an approximator and a compromiser is not clear-cut. Phrasal intensifier “more or less” is regarded as a compromiser as is shown in Diagram 2-1. However, why can it not serve the function of approximating? Also, intensifier “generally” is grouped as an approximator, but why is it not a compromiser? COMP: In all diagrams, “en dashes” should replace “hyphens” in the titles and page ranges.

Allerton (1987: 17) uses the word “intensifier” to indicate “a particular semantic type of adjective modifier, one which corresponds to adverbs of degree.” He lists three types of adjective modifiers: degree (rather/very resentful); aspect (psychologically harmful) and manner (openly hostile), in which degree modifiers are adjective intensifiers. However, Allerton also gives examples to show “the one between manner and degree intensifiers therefore has an uncertain border area.”

Amplifiers Intensifiers Downtoners

Maximizers (e.g. completely) Boosters (e.g. very much) Approximators (e.g. almost) Compromisers (e.g. more or less) Diminishers (e.g. partly) Minimizers (e.g. hardly)

Diagram 2-1 Subtypes of intensifiers (from Quirk et al., 1985: 589–590.)

Literature review 7 He distinguishes three sub-varieties of degree intensifiers: scalar, telic and absolutive intensifiers, and later he adds an additional type differential intensifier. The four categories of intensifiers are defined and illustrated as follows (Allerton, 1987: 19). Scalar intensifiers indicate mental scales of assessment of degree, which ranges from immeasurably high down to zero. They represent prototypical gradability and include infinitely, extremely, very, pretty, rather, reasonably, fairly, somewhat, slightly, not specially, not very and not at all, which are in a rough order of ranks with the possibility of an unintensified adjective appearing between very and pretty. In this way, boosters, moderators, diminishers and zeroizers are distinguished. In addition, the comparatives and superlatives more (or -er), most (orest), less and least belong to this category. These intensifies co-occur with adjectives such as big, small, bright and surprising. Telic intensifiers relate the actual degree of the adjectival quality to the degree required for a particular purpose and are placed above or below that mark, either by a wide margin or by a narrow margin. They include easily, barely, only just, hardly, virtually, nearly, not quite and nowhere, which occur with adjectives such as sufficient, cooked, afloat and fully grown. Absolutive intensifiers emphasize that the degree of the adjectival quality is genuinely within the range required by the superlative adjectives with which they occur. The principal intensifiers in this subclass are absolutely and utterly, with totally and entirely as marginal members. Typical superlative adjectives are ridiculous, huge, scorching (hot) and freezing (cold). Differential intensifiers indicate the difference of degree between the item being described and some reference point, including far, much, a lot, marginally, which are limited to differential adjective complex (with more/-er, less or too), slightly and a bit, which also occur with scalar adjectives, although they suggest a differential kind of meaning (cf. a bit big and “a bit too big”). Allerton’s definition and differentiation of adjective intensifiers (intensifiers in his term) is not clear, especially for the definition of “telic intensifiers” – the actual degree of the adjectival quality to the degree required for a particular purpose, placed above or below that mark, either by a wide margin or by a narrow margin – because when it comes to “the actual degree of adjectival quality,” it is hard to measure. Johansson (1993: 40–45) explores the adverb-adjective collocations in the tagged LOB corpus. He lists ten semantic patterns based on the semantic roles of adverbials. The ten patterns are degree and extent (largely, attractively, etc.), emphasis (clearly, definitely, etc.), manner (accidentally, agreeably, etc.), time ( formerly, frequently, etc.), space (internationally, locally, etc.), viewpoint and respect (politically, functionally, etc.), evaluation of truth (obviously, perhaps, etc.), basic and typical qualities (basically, essentially, etc.), value judgment (sadly, frighteningly, etc.) and quality and state (gravely, harmlessly, etc.). But for his classification of the ten semantic patterns, the distinction between categories is not clear, as Johansson has admitted (Johansson, 1993: 40), “The classification certainly cannot be exhaustive. There is a great deal of overlap, and there are examples which do not fit neatly into any one pattern.”

8

Literature review

Paradis (1997, 2000) investigates a set of degree modifiers and the adjectives they combine with in spoken British English – e.g. absolutely marvelous, very nice, rather small, and a bit funny, etc. Her main focus is on semantic and intonational features, but she also pays attention to their use in terms of frequency and collocability in authentic speech. The methodological approach to analyze degree modifiers and their adjectives is cognitive. She holds that concepts are built up by domains that are of two kinds: content domain and schematic domain (or mode of construal). The interpretation of degree modifiers is dominated by schematic domain, and the content domain is backgrounded. Schematically, degree modifiers map onto two different modes of construal, totality (an either-or conception) – e.g. completely and almost – and scalarity (a “more-or-less” conception) – e.g. very and fairly. Based on the totality/scalarity configurative modes of conceptualization, degree modifiers fall into two main categories: totality modifiers and scalar modifiers. As is shown in Table 2.1, degree modifiers form five types based on their reinforcing and attenuating functions (maximizers, boosters, approximators, moderators and diminishers, respectively). Paradis argues that maximizers and approximators are both associated with totality and combine with adjectives, which are associated with a boundary. Maximizers have a reinforcing function, while approximators are attenuators. Approximators indicate that the denoted adjective falls short of the expected limit. Boosters, moderators and diminishers are scalar modifiers, conceptualized against a mode of “more or less,” and they modify an unboundedly gradable property of the adjective they apply to. Boosters reinforce the gradable property denoted by the adjective. Moderators approximate an average range on a scale. They are classified as attenuators with a hedging function (Paradis, 1997: 69). Diminishers indicate the lowest possible degree of a certain property and a bit up from that point. Thus the function of diminishers is to indicate not only a certain degree of a scalar adjectival property but also a degree of tiredness and a bit up from there. As listed in Table 2.1, the definition and classification of intensifiers by Paradis are mainly based on a cognitive conceptualization rather than on their functional properties. Klein (1998: 37) classifies degree adverbs into eight groups: “absolute” – e.g. completely, absolutely, really; “approximative” – e.g. almost, virtually; “extremely high” – e.g. extremely, awfully; “high” – e.g. very; “moderate” – e.g. rather, pretty; “minimal” – e.g. somewhat; “quasinegative” – e.g. little, hardly; and “negative” – e.g. not, not at all. Klein’s classification of degree modifiers is similar to that of Van Os (1988) which classifies them into “absolute,” “extremely high,” “high,” Table 2.1 Classification of degree modifiers (Paradis, 2000) Degree

Totality Modifiers

Scalar Modifiers

reinforcers attenuators

maximizers: completely (full) approximator: almost (full)

booster: very (tired) moderator: quite (tired) diminisher: a bit (tired)

Literature review 9 “moderate,” “diminishing,” “approximate” and “minimal.” This classification is based supposedly on the degree expressed by adverbs and on their distributional properties, which may cause confusion because it is difficult to distinguish between “absolute” and “extremely high.” Lorenz (1999) categorizes intensifiers into two general grammatical groups: closed-class intensifiers and open-class intensifiers. The closed-class intensifiers are all, almost, little, rather, so, indeed, most, somewhat, too, just, much, very, well, enough and quite. The open-class intensifiers are adverb intensifiers ending with the suffix -ly. They are classified into five sub-groups in terms of semantic function: scalar, modal, evaluative, comparative and semantic copying groups. Phrasal intensifiers specified by Lorenz are a bit, a little bit, a little, to a certain degree, to a certain extent, to an extent, to some extent, as good as, more and more, more or less and more than. One special category of intensifiers is called “open-class items used as closed-class intensifiers,” which include stone, wide, dead, pretty, real and whole. The six functional groups of intensifiers proposed by Lorenz (1999) are a great contribution to the classification of intensifiers. However, he fails to categorize the closed-class intensifiers by criteria, which leaves a vague field in his research. Biber et al. (2000: 554–555) classify adverbs of degree into two groups: amplifier (or intensifier) and diminishers (or downtowner). In his definition, amplifiers (or intensifiers) are degree adverbs that increase the intensity. Some of intensifiers modify gradable adjectives indicating the degree on a scale, such as very in “Our dentist was very good.” Other intensifiers indicate an end point on a scale, such as totally in “But snow and ice accumulate in a totally different way from sedimen.” Biber et al. (2000) define diminishers (downtoners) as the degree adverbs that scale down the effect of the modified items, which include less, slightly, somewhat, rather and quite (in the sense “to some extent”). Biber et al. give a clear definition and differentiation between amplifiers (or intensifiers) and diminishers (or downtowners), and it has a great practicality in empirical research. However, it seems true that classifying intensifiers into two categories is too rough to show the accurate information of the attitudinal meaning of the speakers. 2.1.2

Intensifiers in this study

As stated previously, manifestations of intensity are commonly associated with adjectives and adverbs. Bäcklund (1973: 79) states that adjectives, comprising 79% of all intensified items, being by far the most frequent focus of intensification. Thus it can be argued that adjectival qualities are the most important aspect of intensification. That is why this research only takes intensifiers for adjectives into the study focus. Intensifiers for adverbs, verbs and for prepositional phrases are excluded from consideration. To be more specific, the term “intensifier” in this research refers to adverbial devices that scale a quality, whether up or down, or somewhere between the two. For practical reasons, adjacency principle is adopted to determine whether the adverb is an intensifier or plays other roles in the whole sentence structure. As observed by Stenström et al. (1986), when really is placed next to the adjective as

10

Literature review Table 2.2 Different syntactic positions of really (1) this question is really surprising (2) this is a really surprising question (3) this is really a surprising question (4) this really a surprising question (5) really this is a surprising question From (Stenström, 1986: 151)

in (1) and (2) in Table 2.2, it is a degree modifier which serves as an intensifier of surprising. But the further really is moved to the left, the less the emphasis is on surprising and the more it stresses the whole phrase of a surprising question. When really is placed in the initial position, as in (5), it no longer intensifies a single clause element but serves as a comment on the whole position. In this research, intensifiers refer to those adverbs or phrasal adverbs which position adjacently before or after adjectives and scale the quality of adjectives either upwards or downwards. Intensifiers for adverbs, verbs and prepositional phrases are beyond the focus of this research. Intensifiers are classified functionally and semantically in Quirk et al. (1985). The present research employs Quirk’s classification of intensifiers. Slight moderations have been made, considering the special features of learner English. The reason why Quirk ’s method is adopted is threefold: a) The notion of classifying intensifiers in Quirk et al. (1985) and the present research are the same: language is functional and social. b) The way of conducting the classification is practical and can be carried out clearly and practically. c) Quirk et al. (1985) define the detailed classifications of different-level intensification in a relatively reasonable way. In addition, many studies concerning intensification adopt this method. Therefore, research conclusions can be compared. However, we will also change the Quirk definition a little (e.g. quite), which will make the classification more reasonable and the conclusion more informative. 2.1.3

Definition of the intensified adjectives

Since this study will focus on the use of intensifiers in learner English by the investigation of intensifier-adjective (INT-adj) collocation, the definition of the word class adjective is necessary. Adjectives constitute a major word class in English. Members of this class are undergoing disappearing, modification and emerging processes (Lyons, 1968: 436). Quirk et al. (1985: 402–403) suggest four criteria for adjectives: (a) They can freely occur in attributive function – i.e. they can premodify a noun, appearing between the determiner (including zero article) and the head of a noun phrase. (b) They can freely occur in predicative function – i.e. they can function as subject complement or as object complement.

Literature review 11 (c) They can be premodified by the intensifier “very.” (d) They can take comparative and superlative forms. However, Quirk and his colleagues state, “Not all words that are traditionally regarded as adjectives possess all of these four features” (Quirk et al., 1985: 402– 403). “Words that can satisfy both criterion (a) and criterion (b) are called central adjectives and those that can satisfy at least one of these first two criteria (either criterion a. or b.), are called peripheral adjectives.” This research covers both central and peripheral adjectives. One thing worth mentioning is how to decide whether a participle (-ing or -ed) is an adjective or not. Two conditions need to be taken into account to determine whether a participle reaches the full adjective status. When a participle is used as an attributive, it can be regarded as an adjective in accordance with the criteria set by Bäcklund (1973: 250ff) and Sinclair (1990: 77) (in Lorenz, 1999: 42–46). But when it is used in the predicative position, as in the structure of “copular be/get +ved,” semantic factors have to be taken into consideration to decide whether it is a present particle/passive in the given context. In this research, if a past participle in a copular structure (be/get -ed) shows a state rather than an action or process, it will be treated as an adjective functioning as an objective in the sentence. When a present participle in a progressive tense shows the meaning of mental and emotional status, or, as Sinclair (1990: 77) put it, “describes the way someone is affected by something,” it is regarded as an adjective. The following are examples illustrating this point: (1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

The whole concept, is rather misleading (LOCNESS). My mind is fully occupied by another business (CLEC). . . . if the murder is really scared of the death penalty . . . (LOCNESS). Your attention will be very much appreciated (CLEC). . . . that you are really enjoying a happy life (CLEC).

In the previous sentences, misleading, occupied and scared in sentences one through three are regarded as adjectives in that they express a relative state, while appreciated, enjoying in examples four through five are taken as participles because they rather denote the meaning of an action. There are several aspects of factors regarding adjectives. They are gradable and ungradable adjectives (Sapir, 1944; Gnutzmann, 1975; Lyons, 1977), stative and non-stative adjectives (Dowty, 1979), open-scale and closed-scale adjectives (Kennedy & McNally, 2005) and intersective and non-intersective adjectives (Sproat & Shih, 1991; Larson, 1998, etc.). However, arguments concerning these category generalizations have continued and no consensus has been reached. Two typical practices of categorizing adjectives are from Biber et al. (1999) and Lorenz (1999). Lorenz (1999) functionally groups adjectives into four categories, adjectives of “relevance,” adjectives of “basic dimension,” adjectives of “feasibility” and adjectives of “human trait.” Adjectives of relevance are all associated with relevance,

12

Literature review

with topics that are novel, unusual and hence worth noting or writing about. Adjectives of relevance specified by Lorenz include applicable, linked, significant, interesting, different, new, special, strange, exciting, important, necessary, needed, valuable, boring and dated, etc. Basic dimension adjectives depict rather than set basic qualities, mostly on opposing ends of a scale, such as good-bad, long-short, big-small, high-low, close-far, great-outrageous, positive-negative. Adjectives of feasibility are those with a more restricted scope of reference, conveying as it does the concept of feasibility. The very obvious examples are difficult, easy, hard, dangerous and impossible. Human trait adjectives have a (+human) meaning component, which ranges from basic human traits (intelligent, lazy, nice, good-looking) to a more temporary state of mind (happy, pleased, sad, surprised). Human trait adjectives are almost exclusively used with human referents. Biber et al. (1999: 508–509) classify adjectives into two semantic groups: descriptors and classifiers. Descriptors are prototypical adjectives denoting such features as color, size, weight, chronology, age, emotion and a wide range of other characteristics. They are typically gradable. In contrast, the primary function of classifiers is to delimit or restrict a noun’s referent, by placing it in a category in relation to other referents. They are typically non-gradable. Classifiers can be grouped into subclasses, including relational, affiliative and miscellaneous topical class. Classifiers can be more-or-less descriptive in meaning: relational classifiers (such as additional, final, similar) have little descriptive content, and many topical classifiers (such as chemical, medical, political) provide descriptive content. Biber et al. (1999: 509) list some selected examples for each category. Descriptors are subdivided into the following groups: color (denoting words including color and brightness) – e.g. black, white, dark, bright; size/quantity/extent (denoting size, weight, extent) – e.g. big, deep, heavy, huge, thin and wide; time (denoting chronology, age, frequency) – e.g. annual, late, new, old; evaluative/emotive (denoting judgments, effect, emphasis) – e.g. bad, b good, great, lovely, poor; miscellaneous descriptive – e.g. appropriate, cold, complex, and sudden. Classifiers cover the following groups: relational/classification/restrictive (delimiting the referent of a noun, particularly in relation to other referents) – e.g. additional, average, chief, complete, different, various and same (same can alternatively be regarded as a semi-determiner); affiliative (designation of the national or religious group to which a referent belongs) – e.g. American, Chinese, Christian, English, French, Irish and United; topical/other (showing the subject area or showing a relationship with a noun) – e.g. chemical, commercial, medical, mental, official, ventral, visual. Biber et al. (1999) explain that some adjectives can serve as either classifier or descriptor. For example, modern is a classifier in modern algebra, but a descriptor in some modern authorities; criminal is a classifier in criminal law, but a descriptor in criminal and activity. Compared with Lorenz’s classifications of adjectives, Biber’s method is more clear, reasonable and easy to handle. Therefore, this research adopts the classification method by Biber et al. (2000).

Literature review 13

2.2

Relevant theories

2.2.1

Collocation and colligation

Studies of linguistic patterns in English tend to involve two distinct concepts: collocation and colligation. The study of collocation mainly deals with lexical realizations of a linguistic pattern, and the study of colligation focuses on syntactic elements of utterances and texts. In collocation studies, Firth (1957) is the first linguist to introduce the term “collocation” and states, “You shall know a word by the company it keeps.” According to Firth, the collocation of a given word, rather than a mere juxtaposition, is an order of mutual expectancy (Firth, 1957: 181). Firth regards collocation as a mode of meaning: meaning by collocation is an abstraction at the syntagmatic level and is not directly concerned with the conceptual or idea approach to the meaning of words (Firth, 1957: 196). The Firthian theory on collocation has had profound influence on his followers such as Sinclair, McIntosh, Halliday and Strevens (Wei, 2002a: 4). McIntosh puts forward the concept of “collocational range,” and Sinclair develops collocation studies into a systematic theory by giving a precise definition of collocational range, the node, collocate, span, semantic preference and semantic prosody. Firth and the neo-Firthian linguists hold that collocations are syntagmatic associations of words in contexts. With the aid of computer technology, they also develop specific programs and techniques for extracting and computing collocations, which have contributed greatly to the study of collocation. Colligation is a grammatical pattern or framework in which particular lexical items are realized. It is “the grammatical company a word keeps and the positions it prefers” (Hoey, 2000: 234). Sinclair (1996: 85), who takes over the term from Firth, defines colligation as “the occurrence of grammatical choices.” In general, colligation is at a higher level of abstraction than collocation. Collocational and colligational patterns are entwined to demonstrate the systematicity of linguistic patterning. One cannot study one patterning without referring to the other. In communication, syntactic generalities and lexical particularities are coselected and collocations have to be treated with reference to colligations (Wei, 2002a). There are various approaches to collocation and colligation studies – for example, Firthian and new-Firthian theory on phraseology study; the integrated approach by Greenbaum, Mitchell, Cowie, Kjellmer, Aisenstadt and others; collocational cohesion research by Halliday and Hasan; semantic study on collocation by Robins, Katz and Fordor, Lyons and Cruse (From Wei, 2002a: 2–25), to name a few. However, the aforementioned collocational and colligational studies vary greatly in methods and notions. Each method focuses on a particular aspect of collocation. In China, Wei (1999, 2002a) is the first researcher to study collocation systematically. His definition for collocation has been widely used: A collocation is a conventional syntagmatic association of a string of lexical items which co-occur in a grammatical construct with mutual expectancy greater than chance as realization of non-idiomatic meaning in texts. (Wei, 2002a: 100)

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Literature review

Wei’s definition on collocation and collocational theories delimit the co-selection relationship between syntactic generalities and lexical particularities, indicate the relationship of collocation and colligation with discourse functions and identify the leading role of the semantic prosody within the EUM model. In view of these, the present study will adopt the definition of collocation and the interpretation of colligation from Wei (2002). 2.2.2

Semantic prosody and semantic preference

Semantic prosody is an essential property of collocation. Semantic prosody is a particular phenomenon of collocation, showing the associations and connotations they have and therefore the assumptions which they embody (Stubbs, 1996: 172). Semantic prosody and semantic preference are two distinct yet interdependent notions. While semantic preference identifies the semantic field within which an item operates, semantic prosody identifies the attitude and communicative purpose (Partington, 2004). Though he is not the first to use the term “semantic prosody,” Sinclair (1971: 74; 1987: 155–156, 1991: 112) has already noticed this phenomenon and states, “Many uses of words and phrases show a tendency to occur in a certain semantic environment.” Louw terms this phenomenon as “semantic prosody” and introduces it in his article “Irony in the Text or Insincerity in the Writer? – The Diagnostic Potential of Semantic Prosodies.” Louw (1993: 157) states that semantic prosody is “a consistent aura of meaning with which a form is imbued by its collocates.” The primary function of semantic prosody is to express speaker/writer attitude or evaluation (Louw, 2000: 58). Sinclair develops the concept of semantic prosody in his later works (Sinclair, 1996, 2004) and points out that semantic prosody is the functional choice which links meaning to purpose (Sinclair, 1996: 88). Semantic prosodies “are attitudinal and on the pragmatic side of the semantics-pragmatics continuum” (Sinclair, 1996: 88). These notions are illustrated in the following statements from Sinclair (2003). A corpus enables us to see words grouping together to make special meanings that relate not so much to their dictionary meanings as to the reasons why they were chosen together. This kind of meaning is called semantic prosody, it has been recognized as connotation; pragmatic meaning and attitudinal meaning, but it rarely appears in reference words that do not derive their evidence from corpora. The notion of prosody is taken from phonology. A prosody is a meaningful event that is not necessarily located in a particular unit of expression, but may spread over several. (Sinclair, 2003: 178) Though there are different views (Whitsitt, 2005) and studies on semantic prosody, the attitudinal meaning of semantic prosody is agreed on by most linguists such as Sinclair (1987, 1991, 1996, 2004), Louw (1993), Stubbs (1996, 2001, 2009), Partington (1998, 2004) and Hunston (2007). Sinclair elaborates that

Literature review 15 semantic prosody is an important concept which is the highest level of abstraction of semantic relations of the key word. Sinclair (2004) claims that the recognition that semantic prosody as a constant feature of text is one of the most important contributions of corpus work so far. Louw (1993) holds that semantic prosodies are typically negative, with relatively few of them bearing an affectively positive meaning. Stubbs (1996: 176) argues that there are three types of semantic prosodies: some words tend to have a predominantly negative prosody, a few have a positive prosody and many words are neutral. Partington (1998) classifies semantic prosody into favorable, unfavorable or neutral corresponding to Stubbs’s positive, negative and neutral semantic prosodies. In China, Wei is the first linguist who employs the corpus methodology to study semantic prosody systematically. He follows Stubbs’s way of classifying semantic prosody into three types: positive, negative and neutral. The present study adopts Wei’s (2002a, 2002c) method and roughly classifies them into negative, positive and neutral semantic prosody. An alternative theory concerning semantic study is the Contextual Prosodic Theory (CPT) by Louw (2000), which reflects the extended context linguistic theory held by Firth and new-Firthian followers (Louw, 2000). The CPT theory is defined as follows: A Contextual Prosodic Theory (CPT) would seek to elucidate through semantic prosodies the Firthian view that situational and linguistic contexts are coextensive. The work of John Sinclair, arguably more than that of any other Neo-Firthian linguist, is demonstrably underpinned by this view. The move towards CPT follows logically upon Sinclair’s assertion that having arrived at the semantic prosody, we have probably come close to the boundary of the lexical item (Sinclair, 1996: 88). Tognini-Bonelli (2001: 106–110) demonstrates how semantic prosody can be described in functional terms which go beyond the general negative and positive dichotomy. Stubbs (2001: 65) renames the phenomenon “discourse prosody” in order to highlight how it plays a central role both in maintaining relations between speakers/writer and hearers/reader and in constructing discourse coherence. He states that discourse prosodies express speaker/writer attitudes, characterize units of meaning with an identifiable pragmatic function (Stubbs, 2001: 65) and contribute extensively to text cohesion (Stubbs, 2001: 100). 2.2.3

Pattern

Hunston and Francis (2000) have built on Sinclair’s work to propose a description of language in terms of patterns. Pattern is “a phraseology frequently associated with (a sense of) a word, particularly in terms of the prepositions, groups and clauses that follow the word” (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 3). A pattern can be identified “if a combination of words occurs relatively frequently, if it is dependent on a particular word choice, and if there is a clear meaning associated with it”

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Literature review

(Hunston & Francis, 2000: 37). The relationship between pattern and meaning is stated as follows: Patterns and lexis are mutually dependent, in that each pattern occurs with a restricted set of lexical items, and each lexical item occurs with a restricted set of patterns. In addition, patterns are closely associated with a meaning, firstly because in many cases different senses of words are distinguished by their typical occurrence in different patterns; and secondly because words which share a given pattern tend also to share an aspect of meaning. (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 3) Sinclair focuses on the way in which different words and different senses of a word can be distinguished by different patterns in which they appear, whereas Hunston and Francis concentrate on how particular patterns select words with particular meanings. Hunston and Francis claim that patterns occur with restricted a lexis (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 96). By this they mean that patterns and meanings are not one-to-one relationships. Three points regarding pattern and meaning are proposed by Hunston and Francis: the weak view, the strong view and the medium view. The weak statement is that the association between pattern and meaning is not a random one, the strong statement is that a word has a particular pattern because it has a particular meaning and the medium is that given a list of words occurring with a particular pattern, the majority will be divisible by most observers into reasonably coherent meaning groups. Hunston and Francis (2000) claim that they have found no counter-examples to this medium view (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 86). There is, however, no one-to-one correspondence between pattern and meaning. Alongside the ‘core’ words, which appear very frequently in a particular pattern, are a small number of infrequently occurring ‘non-core’ items. These are described as existing in “an area of flux” in which patterns may be creatively associated with non-standard lexis (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 99). Such creativity is in many cases based on a process of analogy: if a pattern is characteristically associated with a set of words belonging to a particular meaning group, other words of similar meaning may also come to be used in that pattern. 2.2.4

Collocation and language learning

Linguists and language teachers have long observed the conventionality features of language and the function of collocation in language production. Various attempts have been made to investigate lexical chunks in language production. Much consensus has been reached that states prefabricated chunks should be the basis for the development of creative language in first language and second language acquisition, and the fixed chunks are essential for fluency in both spoken and written language. Different technical terms have been employed in the literature, which include “prefabs,” “chunks,” “stereotyping” by Bolinger (1976); “lexicalized sentence stems” by Pawley and Syder (1983); “composites” and “formulae”

Literature review 17 by Cowie (1998); “pre-assembled lexical phrases” by Nattinger and Decarrico (1992); “lexical chunks” by Lewis (1993); “formulaic sequence” by Wray (2002), etc. Bolinger is among the first who have found the conventionality feature of language and treats collocation in language as “linguistic prefabrications.” As Bolinger (1975) argues, “The vocabulary is stored redundantly, not only as individual morphemes, but also as parts or phrases, or even as longer memorized chunks of speech, and that it is often times retrieved from memory as these preassembled chunks” (cited in Hunston & Francis, 2000: 12). He believes that “our language does not expect us to build everything starting with lumber, nails, and blueprint, but provides us with an incredibly large number of prefabs” (Bolinger, 1976: 9). Different words in a language attract with either a semantic relation or a collocational link to form multi-word units, which are learned as a whole and retrieved from memory as the pre-stored prefabricated chunks on particular occasions. Nattinger (1986: 3) regards chunks as “conventionalized structures that occur more frequently and have more idiomatically determined meaning than language that is put together each time.” When learners have more opportunities to be exposed to the conventionalized structures and idiomatic expressions, they are more likely to internalize and utilize those structures and expressions in their language production. With chunks already memorized in mind, learners will find it much easier to catch others’ words and use less effort to organize words for utterance. Most linguists and researchers agree that such pre-stored formulaic expressions are helpful for investigating and further improving language processing and use, as has been mentioned by Nattinger and DeCarrico (1992: 1): “. . . routinized formulas and other sorts of prefabricated language chunks, which are products of this ritualization, seem to play a large part in both acquiring and performing language.” Pawley and Syder (1983) have discussed two capacities of native speakers: native-like selection and native-like fluency. Native-like selection means the ability of the native speaker to convey routinely his or her meaning by an expression that is not only grammatical but also native like, and native-like fluency refers to the native speakers’ ability to produce fluent stretches of spontaneous discourse. Pawley and Syder (1983) argue that fluent and idiomatic control of a language rests to a considerable extent on knowledge of a body of “sentence stems,” which are “institutionalized” or “lexicalized.” A lexicalized sentence stem is a unit of clause length or longer whose grammatical form and lexical content is wholly or largely fixed; its fixed elements form a standard label for a culturally recognized concept – a term in the language (Pawley & Syder, 1983: 191). Most of such units are not true idioms but rather are regular form-meaning pairings, and the ordinary mature speaker of English knows them. Thus Pawley and Syder argue (Pawley & Syder, 1983: 192), In the store of familiar collocations there are expressions for a wide range of familiar concepts and speech acts, and the speaker is able to retrieve these as wholes or as automatic chains from the long term memory; by doing this he

18

Literature review minimizes the amount of clause-internal encoding work to be done and frees himself to attend to other tasks in talk-exchange, including the planning of larger units of discourse.

For native-like fluency, they state, “An utterance will be native like to the extent that it consists of a lexicalized sentence stem plus permissible expansions or substitutions.” When language learners endeavor to gain native-like control of the language, they must possess the store of those lexicalized sentence stems in memory, or have those “memorized sentences” in advance. Another key theory concerning collocation and language study is from Sinclair (1991), who makes a distinction between the open-choice principle and the idiom principle in interpreting texts from corpora. The open-choice principle is often called a “slot-and-filler” model. In this model, texts are treated as a series of slots which have to be filled from a lexicon which satisfies local restraints. At each slot, virtually any word can occur. All grammars are constructed on the open-choice principle (Sinclair, 1991: 109–110). However, it is clear that words do not occur at random in a text, and the possible slot choices are massively reduced. The idiom principle, or the collocational principle (Partington, 1998: 19), states that the openness of choices is not available to the same extent at every point along the syntagmatic progression of an utterance, but the language user has available to him a large number of preconstructed or semi-preconstructed phrases that constitute single choices, even though they appear to be analyzable into segments (Sinclair, 1991: 110). Sinclair (1991: 114) suggests that the idiom principle is the first to be applied in the use of language and that the user switches to the mode of openchoice only “when there is a good reason.” Sinclair’s view on language operation sheds some light on the phenomenon in which non-native speakers can speak or write L2 fluently, but they are still perceived by native speakers to be operating a different system because of their nonstandard choice of language. The learners may have acquired a good command of grammar in L2 to satisfy the needs of open-choice processing mode, but they lack the collection of prefabricated phrases, which accounts for the failure in idiomaticity and naturalness of their language use. Wray (2002) regards formulaic language as a sequence, continuous, or discontinuous, of words or other elements, which is, or appears to be, prefabricated: that is, stored and retrieved whole form memory at the time of use, rather than being subject to generation or analysis by the language grammar. He agrees with many other linguists with regard to the great power of the human mind’s processing of information by using prefabricated chunks in memory rather than by complex processes of calculation (Wray, 2002: 10). Wray (1992) also proposes a dual-system regarding the handling of linguistic material: analytic processing and holistic processing. He holds that analytic processing entails the interaction of words and morphemes with grammatical rules to

Literature review 19 create and decode novel, or potentially novel, linguistic material. Holistic processing relies on prefabricated strings stored in memory. The strategy preferred at any given moment depends on the demands of the material and on the communicative situation, and holistic processing is not restricted to only those strings which cannot be created or understood by rule, such as idioms. It can also deal with linguistic material for which grammatical processing would have rendered exactly the same result (Wray, 2002: 15). By the holistic processing strategy, speakers do not have to go through the labor of generating an utterance, they just need to resort to the ready-made frameworks and thus be very efficient and fluent. Based on the idea that language-use ability is the ability to comprehend and produce lexical phrases as unanalyzed wholes, these chunks should become the raw data that learners perceive as patterns of language. Lewis (1993) coined the term lexical approach and suggests the following: lexis is the basis of language; the key principle of a lexical approach is that language consists of grammaticalized lexis, not lexicalized grammar. The lexical approach makes a distinction between vocabulary – traditionally understood as a stock of individual words with fixed meanings – and lexis, which includes not only the single words but also the word combinations that we store in our mental lexicons. Lexical approach advocates argue that language consists of meaningful chunks. The lexical approach regards communication of meaning as the heart of language learning and teaching, which leads to an emphasis on vocabulary. Different from the traditional view that grammar is the focus of language teaching and learning, the lexical approach focuses on multi-word prefabricated chunks or word combinations in language teaching and learning. Within the lexical approach, special attention is directed to collocations and expressions that include institutionalized utterances and sentence frames and heads. As Lewis maintains, “instead of words, we consciously try to think of collocations, and to present these in expressions. Rather than trying to break things into ever smaller pieces, there is a conscious effort to see things in larger, more holistic ways” (Lewis, 1997: 204).

2.3

Corpus-based studies

The corpus-based collocational studies in western academia and China, as well as the intensifier collocation studies in native English and learner English outside and inside China, are reviewed in this section. 2.3.1 2.3.1.1

Collocational studies Studies in western academia

Theoretical and descriptive studies on English collocation have been carried out by many researchers (Blum & Levenston, 1978; Kellerman, 1979; Channell, 1981; Dechert & Lennon, 1989; Ghadessy, 1989; Fayez-Hussein, 1990; Biskup, 1992; Bahns & Eldaw, 1993; Zhang, 1993; Farghal & Obidedat, 1995; Howarth, 1996;

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Literature review

Lennon, 1996; Elyildirim, 1997; Lombard, 1997; Caroli, 1998; Granger, 1998a; Gitsaki, 1999; Kaszubski, 2000; Nesselhauf, 2003). However, most studies are based on questionnaires, cloze tests, translation tests, fill-in-the-blank tests or case studies. Typical studies on English learner collocation by using a corpus method include Zhang (1993), Howarth (1996), Lombard (1997), Granger (1998b), Kaszubski (2000) and Nesselhauf (2003). Zhang (1993) collects the writing tasks from a writing test of thirty native and thirty non-native speakers of English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and employs a blank-filling collocation test used to measure the students’ collocational knowledge. Zhang finds that native writers perform significantly better than nonnative writers on the collocation test and also outperform the non-native writers in terms of the use of accurate collocations in writing. Zhang concludes that collocational knowledge is a source of fluency in written communication among college freshmen and that the quality of collocations in terms of variety and accuracy is indicative of the quality of college freshmen writing (Nesselhauf, 2003; Hsu, 2007). Howarth (1996) manually investigates verb-noun combinations in a corpus of ten essays (about 22,000 words) written by non-native speakers with different L1s and compares them to combinations in native speaker writing. No correlation has been found between the general proficiency test score of the learner and ranked collocational score, which is contrary to the findings of Zhang (1993). He gives the following explanation: Perhaps this language test is a wrong measure to choose and that another more global test might correlate better. Alternatively, it could be better that appropriate collocational performance, in the sense of approximating to NS norms of conventionality, is a highly individual matter of style, which follows a quite separate path of development from measurable levels of general language proficiency. (Howarth, 1998: 36) Lombard (1997) examines idiosyncratic English collocations produced by Mandarin native speakers in written assignments for an MBA English preparation course. The collocations are identified, categorized and examined in a series of qualitative and quantitative analyses. Aiming to synthesize a characterization of learner collocation, the preliminary qualitative analysis identifies four categories of idiosyncrasy in learner collocations: lexical transfer, phonological influences, grammatical influences and semantic influences. Further analyses reveal that learner collocations tend to involve an idiosyncrasy in either form or meaning, but rarely both. Learner collocations involving semantic idiosyncrasy are further analyzed in terms of two parts: a headword and a functor, which refers to an entry word (or a node word) and its collocate. She finds that the site of the idiosyncrasy is most often the functor and rarely occurs on both parts of the same collocation. Her study provides insights into the nature of learners’ difficulties in production problems with collocation and supports the creation of effective teaching materials and reference works correspondingly.

Literature review 21 Granger (1998b) investigates the use of adverbs ending in -1y and functioning as amplifiers of adjectives in the French sub-corpus of the International Corpus of Learner English (ICLE) and in a native speaker corpus. The comparison indicates a statistically significant underuse of amplifiers in the non-native corpus, both in terms of the tokens and types. Granger observes that one of the possible reasons for the overuse of some amplifiers is that the few overused collocations by the learners typically have a direct translation equivalent in French. Thus learners’ overuse of amplifiers is traced to the L1 transfer (1998b: 150). Kaszubski (2000) studies the idiomaticity degree and the expressions of six core verbs (be, have, do, take, make, give) in learner English as a foreign language (EFL), especially advanced Polish learner English compared to that of native speakers. Seven corpora, stratified into five groups according to the proficiency level are used in his research. Kaszubski draws a number of conclusions from his research. The six verbs vary among themselves in frequency and idiomatic behavior in text: the more frequent verbs appear to be those which are more flexible, or ‘open’ collocationally (Kaszubski, 2000: 240); EFL writers rely on the open-choice principle substantially more than on the idiom principle (Sinclair, 1991) compared with native English users; learners’ overuse of the core verbs is explained intralingually and interlingually; core English phrases are frequent and neutral in register and over-applied by learners; the Polish educational system insists on accuracy, which also encourages Polish learners to employ those expressions and patterns which they regard as “right” (Kaszubski, 2000: 241). This tendency also reflects the learners’ application of lexical simplification strategies in expressing themselves, which can be attributed to L1. In the end, he also suggests two paths, which lead to skewed/faulty application of core-verb expressions. Nesselhauf (2003) focuses on verb-noun combinations of thirty-two essays from the German sub-corpus of ICLE, written by third or fourth grade English major German university students. The average length of an essay is about 500 words. All verb-noun combinations from each essay are manually extracted and categorized into F (free combination), RC (restricted collocation) and I (idioms) groups based on two dictionaries and the judgments of the native speakers. A five-stage scale acceptability is developed: clearly acceptable, largely acceptable, unclear, largely unacceptable and clearly unacceptable. It is found that though collocations with a low degree of restriction are the most difficult type of combination for learners, the magnitude of mistakes does not have a major impact on the types and amount of mistakes learners make; the L1 influence on the production of collocations is rather strong. The less congruent combinations in the target language to the L1 are, the more difficult it is for the learner to command. Nesselhauf points out that “even advanced learners have considerable difficulties in the production of collocations, so collocations do deserve a place in language teaching” (Nesselhauf, 2003: 239). Therefore, she suggests that when collocations are taught, it is insufficient to merely teach the lexical elements that go together, but it is also necessary to teach entire combinations including prepositions, articles, etc. In addition, it is also important to make learners aware of Ll-L2 differences, and verbs should be emphasized since they are the most difficult parts for learners.

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Literature review

The aforementioned studies on learners’ collocational knowledge have revealed learners’ idiosyncratic features in using EFL and provided pedagogical implications. However, most of the research concentrates on either the verb collocations or verb-noun collocations (Howarth, 1996; Kaszubski, 2000; Nesselhauf, 2003). Some studies use only small-sized corpus (Lombard, 1997; Zhang, 1999), and some just concentrate on a limited range of word groups (Granger, 1998b). To sum up, there is still room for improvement of collocational study and more large-scale and systematic studies on learners’ collocational behaviors are expected. 2.3.1.2

Studies in China

Corpus-based collocational study in China has witnessed a surge in recent years (Wei, 1999, 2001, 2002a, 2002b, 2002c, 2006, 2007, 2011; Wang, 2005; Sun, 2006). Wei (2002a) has systematically studied collocation by presenting and comparing the research theories and systems of different schools. Wei examines the distinctive characteristics of lexical combinations on the syntagmatic axis in terms of semantic transparency and structural mutability. A distinction has been made among free combinations, restricted combinations and idioms in his research. He specifies six defining features of collocation (conventionality, meaning-form restraints, recurrent syntagmatic association, statistical measurement of collocability, relevance of register and considerations of length) and introduces a corpusdriven research method by examining collocations on the dimensions of syntactic restraints, semantic interactions and discourse functions. Wei finds that syntactic generalities and lexical particularities are co-selected in communication, and collocations have to be analyzed with reference to colligations. There exists a semantic prosodic structure in relation to the collocational behaviors of words; the EAP (English for Academic Purpose) text is basically composed of phrases and various collocations. All those findings provide insights into language use and text construction, and they have practical value for pedagogy and research. Wang (2005) observes six types of collocational errors in Chinese learners’ writing. A close examination of the error types indicates that the main collocational errors of the learners are back-translation, synonymous errors, substitution, simplification, redundancy and misuse. Most errors could be clearly traced back to L1 interference. Chinese learners’ collocational developmental features are also discussed by comparing the competence of different proficiency learners in using a group of intensifiers. It shows a U-shaped development of the collocational knowledge of groups of Chinese learners. Sun (2006) explores the developmental features of Chinese learners’ use of noun collocations and clusters across three proficiency levels. Chinese Learner English Corpus (CLEC) and Louvain Corpus of Native English Essays (LOCNESS) are used. Her research indicates that there is a clear developmental continuum among Chinese EFL learners across three proficiency levels as far as colligation, collocation and clusters are concerned. Unsurprisingly, the evidence points clearly to the fact that there is a lack of nativeness, accuracy, complexity and variety in learners’ output. Regarding the sources of problems, many factors are entangled with one

Literature review 23 another. It is argued that L1 transfer is prevalent in learners’ use of both colligations and collocations, whereby influencing the syntactic complexity and semantic accuracy of their language production. Other factors such as the strategy of approximation or transfer of training are also recognized. 2.3.2 2.3.2.1

Intensification studies Intensifiers in native English

Intensification covers a wide range: from the typical diachronical study to social linguistic, as well as the stylistic studies. The research of intensification has always been the interest of many diachronical linguistic studies. Researchers (e.g. Bolinger, 1972; Quirk et al., 1985; Partington, 1993; Peters, 1994; Nevalainen, 2002; Ito, 2003) have conducted studies concerning the change of intensifiers. Those research findings provide insights into the mechanisms of linguistic change. Two studies worth noting are Bauer and Bauer (2002) and Xiao and Tao (2007). Bauer and Bauer (2002) concentrate on regionalization. They investigate constructions such as so cool, really cool, cool as and very cool used by young New Zealanders, which aims to find out whether the English of young New Zealanders shows any sign of regionalization. They conclude that there may be changes in the frequency of use of some common adjective boosters in the English of young New Zealanders. Data in their research show that one pattern, sweet as, does appear to show signs of regionalization. Due to limitations of the research methodology, it is acknowledged that further research is required to draw more compelling conclusions. Xiao and Tao (2007) carry out a sociolinguistic study of amplifiers in British English based on the native speaker corpus – the British National Corpus (BNC). They explore variations in the use of amplifiers entailing a wide range of sociolinguistic variables. Specifically, thirty-three amplifiers across the following dimensions are analyzed: discourse mode and register, gender, age, education level and audience gender and age, as well as publication date. The research shows some clear tendency, although no firm conclusion has been drawn on any of them – e.g. amplifiers are more common in speech than in writing, higher levels of education correlate positively with higher frequencies of use, and there is an overall decrease in the use of amplifiers over an intervening thirty-year period. Interestingly, they raise issues pertaining to both traditional sociolinguistic concerns and emerging concerns in corpus linguistics. Stylistics studies about intensification mainly center on the differences of intensifiers used in different registers (Greenbaum, 1969; Bolinger, 1972; Quirk et al., 1985; Stenström, 1999; Stenström et al., 2002; Conrad & Biber, 2000, Biber et al. 2004; Paradis, 2003; Diani, 2008). Biber et al. (1999: 545) detect that conversation (in both dialects) has higher frequencies of adjectives with modifying adverb combinations than academic prose does. Academic prose, in contrast, has more diversity. Kennedy and McNally (2005) examine intensification at the syntactical and semantic levels. They claim that degree modification is syntactically and

24

Literature review

semantically diverse: the class of degree expressions is subdivided according to both the semantic effects of its members and the extent that they permit multiple layers of modification. The set of degree modifiers are subdivided into three subclasses: true degree morphemes, intensifiers and scale modifiers. Diani (2008) studies the case of really as an emphasizer in spoken and written academic discourse. She states that emphasizer is the term for the subcategory of “intensifier.” The same conclusion has been drawn by Biber et al. (1999) and Swales and Burke (2003) that really is more frequent in speech than in writing. The written corpora seldom have really as a pre-modifier, whereas in the lecture sample the cluster really adjective dominates. Different usage has also been found among different registers in terms of frequency and lexico-grammatical patterns. In addition to the studies of intensifiers from the aforementioned perspectives, intensification studies from a collocational perspective have been conducted extensively, including Bäcklund (1973), Alternberg (1991), Piqué-Angordans et al. (1998), Kennedy (2003), etc. Bäcklund (1973) discusses the collocation of adverbs of degree in English. Her research uses data from two British newspapers and one American magazine. Bäcklund has established the ranges of adverbs of degree such as what different elements they can collocate with. A semantically based subcategorization of the greatest possible delicacy has been set up for highly frequent adverbs. Collocations are grouped into six categories in terms of the “collocates” for intensifiers, “heads” in her term. The distribution of the observed adverbs in the three stylistic strata (prose in newspapers and magazines, conversational prose and narrative prose) has been examined. The inventory of all adverbs of degree and the comparison of their occurrence has been made. Alternberg (1991) investigates amplifier collocations in spoken English in the London Lund Corpus of Spoken English. He has found that speakers make very limited use of the practically open-ended repertoire of boosters available to them. There is strong predominance of a few frequent items such as “quite, absolutely, perfectly, entirely, completely,” which account for 95% of the examples. Boosters predominate over the observed amplifiers, and they are both more “versatile” and more “productive” than maximizers. Alternberg states his findings as follows: of the large repertoire of amplifiers available for expressing a high degree of intensity, speakers rely on a rather limited set of items, and only a few of these are used with great frequency. The high-frequency amplifiers quite, very much and so tend to serve as general-purpose items that can replace almost all other alternatives in most functions. The predominance of the boosters reflects a prevalence of the scalar words. For some particularly frequent amplifiers, their semantic frequencies (maximizer competition and booster competition in his words) have been described. For example, quite is common in nonassertive contexts; deeply and badly tend to collocate with “emotive” and “unfavorable” words, respectively (Alternberg, 1991: 132–134). The findings of Alternberg are challenged by some questions raised by him: is this an effect of lexical “stereotyping” that is typical of speech, or is the corpus too small to give a fair picture of the range of amplifiers used in speech? Or does it simply reflect the fact that the material is restricted to recurrent expressions in the first place? These are questions that merit an investigation in future studies.

Literature review 25 Piqué-Angordans et al. (1998) study the use of adverb-adjective combinations in written texts from the perspectives of both the formal application and the collocational use. The samples used in the research are drawn from two corpora: texts from sciences and those from literary criticism. Comparison between the two registers has been made in terms of collocation and semantic differences. It is suggested that expressions that sound correct in terms of syntax but inaccurate in semantics should be concerned. Kennedy (2003) examines how adverbs of degree tend to collocate with particular words in the one-hundred-million-word BNC and suggests some possible implications for English language teaching. Twenty-four amplifiers are included in his research, in which he found that each amplifier collocates most strongly with particular words and carries particular grammatical and semantic characteristics. Kennedy suggests that the teaching of collocations might be expected to have a more explicit and prominent place in a language teaching curriculum. In class, teachers can draw attention to collocations not only through direct teaching but also by maximizing opportunities to acquire them through an emphasis on autonomous implicit learning activities such as reading. Intensifier collocation studies have become a crucial component of collocational research. It sheds important light on linguistic theory and contributes considerably to the teaching of collocations. 2.3.2.2

Intensifiers in learner English

Research on English intensifier collocation of EFL learners has received a substantial and ever-growing attention among the corpus-based and corpus-driven studies. Noticeable studies include Lorenz (1998, 1999), Granger (1998b), Recski (2004), Louw (2005) and Klerk (2006) in western academia and Chen (2003), Liang (2003), Ding and He (2006) and Wei and Lei (2011) in China. As mentioned previously, Granger (1998b) investigates the use of adverbs ending in -ly and functioning as amplifiers of adjectives in the French sub-corpus of ICLE and in a native corpus. Her research finds a significant underuse of amplifiers in the non-native corpus, both in terms of the number of tokens and types. Further observation finds that learners overuse maximizers and underuse boosters, which explains the learners’ general underuse of amplifiers. Granger (1998b: 148) explains the overuse of certain amplifiers as their “safe belts” by directly translating from the equivalents in L1, which reveals L1 interference in L2 acquisition. Lorenz (1999) studies adjective intensification in German learner corpora and native corpora. The learner corpora in his research are BWF (writings of German teenagers) and UNI (writings of German undergraduates), whereas the native corpora are GCE (writings of British teenagers) and LOC (writings of British undergraduates). He classifies adjective intensifiers into six groups and adjectives into four groups in terms of their semantic meanings. How native and non-native writers modify adjectives is studied (Lorenz, 1999: 34). The research finds that nonnative speakers appear to make far more use of adjective intensification than native speakers do. The explanation for the learners’ overuse of adjective intensification

26

Literature review

is that in a number of cases, native speakers can simply afford to “do without” intensification, and their productive vocabulary is much larger and much more varied. An alternative explanation is that non-native (German) learners tend to use hyperbolic expression, while the (British) native speakers favor understatement (Lorenz, 1999: 216). Another noticeable finding in Lorenz’s research is that German learners use markedly more adjectives in the first place, which is explained by the information structure knowledge that learners have the tendency of “information overcharge.” The author expresses concerns that this tendency is even greater for university students than for younger learners. Lorenz (1999) has contributed much to the study of intensifiers linguistically, pedagogically and methodologically. But he focuses on limited-sized corpora, despite the justification that “it is felt that the corpus, despite its limitations, is sufficient for that purpose” (Lorenz, 1999: 17). He defines his research as functional – e.g. “how native and non-native writers modify adjectival qualities in degree is studied,” and the collocational consideration is not covered (Lorenz, 1999: 33). Recski (2004: 232) investigates recurrent intensifier collocations across two corpora, the corpus ICLE of non-native learner written English and the corpus of MICASE (Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English) of the native English. Recski argues that the recurrent collocations are an important part of writers’ and speakers’ repertoires and that they may provide a window of their lexicon. The study shows that there is a great predominance of boosters over maximizers. It is also found that boosters display a great collocational freedom. For example, different boosters are used to intensify the same lexical items; there is a strong association of some maximizers with certain semantic types of collocates. To summarize the reasons EFL writers overuse intensifiers, Recski points out that this appears to be associated with colloquial style and an exaggerated tone that is often considered inappropriate in formal academic texts. Louw (2005) studies adverbial intensifiers in Black South African English. His conclusion is that Tswana learners (a group of South African English) use relatively fewer adverbs in their writing than native speakers. In fact, they use fewer types of adverbs overall and underuse hedging expressions. His findings are different from those of Milton (1998) and Kaszubski (2000), which state that learners overuse intensifiers to a great extent. The underuse of intensifying adverbs by the Black South African learners can be traced to a lack of assertiveness. Adverbs are more frequently used in spoken English than in written English for the Black African English learners. He traces this to the fact that learners seem to fulfill a linking function by using adverbs and many swear words in spoken English. Klerk (2006) compares the usage of a predetermined list of intensifiers in Xhosa English corpus with the New Zealand English corpus, the files in the Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English. Xhosa English corpus, composed of half a million running words, is the corpus of the spontaneous conversation in English by Xhosa speakers in South Africa, all of whom are long-term residents of the Eastern Cape Province of the country. The Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English has one million words of spoken New Zealand English, including different proportions of formal, semi-formal and informal speech. It is found that

Literature review 27 the usage of intensifiers varies enormously between Xhosa English speakers and New Zealand speakers, which are different from Lorenz’s findings in 1998. Not only do they vary in overall frequency of use in all categories, but the Xhosa English speakers also draw from a smaller lexical range. It appears likely that Xhosa English speakers tend to focus on one or two “favorite” lexical items, which serve the intensifying function sufficiently well, resulting in the neglect of other lexical options. Klerk’s study reveals differences in naturalness and markedness across Xhosa English and New Zealand English. Not only are Xhosa English speakers far less likely to use boosters than New Zealand English speakers, but they are also less likely to use downtoners in order to reduce the level of speaker certainty or emotion in an utterance. Klerk thinks that this is somewhat surprising, given that such words can be very useful in spontaneous discourse for indicting vagueness and saving face. Therefore, Klerk concludes that it is important that differences such as these are investigated in order to ensure minimal miscommunication across cultures (Klerk, 2006: 201). Klerk points out that the restricted range of expressions available to these speakers suggests a heavy dependence on spoken input (which relies on formulaic utterances and high-frequency words) and less exposure to written texts, where the richness of the language is revealed in far greater variety. So he suggests that emphasis should be given to reading, both inside and outside classroom, which may go some way towards expanding the lexical range of the Xhosa English speakers. Chen (2003) compares the uses of adjective intensifiers in both Chinese EFL undergraduate essay corpus (Non-English Major EFL Undergraduate English Essay Corpus) and native English student essay corpus (LOCNESS). His findings are that Chinese EFL learners overuse adjective intensifiers, which fall into only a few types and underuse downtoners generally; EFL learners excessively rely on closed-class intensifiers for adjective intensification while at the same time failing to use open-class intensifiers actively. As far as the information structure is concerned, no significant problem has been found in the learner corpus, which is different from Lorenz’s finding. Liang (2003) explores the use of twenty-two intensifiers in Chinese EFL learners’ speech production. The learner corpus SECCL (Spoken English Corpus of Chinese Learners) and the native speaker corpus SEU (the Survey of English Usage) are used in his research. He argues that Chinese EFL learners tend to overuse intensifiers in their speech production, and this overuse is primarily attributed to the overuse of boosters (at the same time underusing most other intensifiers), leading to a tendency of overstatement and a lack of accuracy and idiomaticity in the language production. Ding and He (2006) analyze common collocation patterns of intensifies and provide reasons why Chinese learners have overused certain intensifiers. Wei and Lei (2011) probe into the use of amplifier collocations in the doctoral dissertations of Chinese EFL learners. Their findings indicate that the overall number of amplifiers used by Chinese students and native speaker students are

28

Literature review

comparable. Chinese learners tend to use more amplifier collocations than their native counterparts. The findings may indicate a non-native style within Chinese learners’ writing. They argue that Chinese learners overuse amplifiers and amplifier collocations in order to focus the reader’s attention as well as to enhance the meaning of general adjectives. L1 transfer is assumed to exert a clear influence on the use of amplifiers and amplifier collocations. Chen (2003), Liang (2003), Ding and He (2006) and Wei and Lei (2011) deal with the phenomena of overuse, underuse of intensifier collocations in learner English and analyze the underlying factors. However, learners’ detailed collocational behaviors and developmental features have been neglected in all the aforementioned studies, and the semantic aspect of intensifiers has also been neglected in their research.

2.4

Summary

This chapter has delimited the definition of intensifiers and adjectives in this study based on the presentation of the traditional definition and classification of intensifiers. In the present research, intensifier refers to adverbial devices that scale a quality, whether up or down, or somewhere between the two, within the adjacency principle. Adjectives in this study cover both central and peripheral adjectives. Intensifier classification in this study follows Quirk’s definition with some changes based on the research data. Relevant theories to this research have been reviewed. Concepts of collocation and colligation, semantic prosody, semantic preference and patterns and meanings, as well as their relationship with language teaching, have been addressed. Finally, practical studies concerning collocation and intensification in west academia and China have been introduced.

3

Research design and methodology

This chapter deals with the research design and methodology. We will address the issues of the analytical framework of this study, intensifiers to be analyzed and research instruments, as well as research procedures.

3.1 Analytical framework This study is conducted within a multidimensional analytical framework, which is composed of the Firthian and new-Firthian theory of meaning, Sinclair’s EUM model and Hunston’s pattern grammar. (1) Firthian and new-Firthian theory of meaning Firthian and new-Firthian theory of meaning is the fundamental thought and method for investigating meaning in this research. The basic framework involves the following points: meanings are realized at different linguistic levels; meanings are all contextualized; meaning and form cannot be separated. Firth (1957: 190–192) states that the study of meaning is a permanent interest of scholars. Meaning should be analyzed at different levels. To make statements of meaning in terms of linguistics, we may accept the language as a whole and then deal with it at various levels, sometimes in a descending order, beginning with social context and proceeding through syntax and vocabulary to phonology and even phonetics, and at other times in the opposite order. (Firth, 1957: 192) Meaning should be observed in the context. Firth argues, “. . . the complete meaning of a word is always contextual, and no study of meaning apart from a complete context can be taken seriously” (Firth, 1957: 7). Firthian contextual theory of meaning is the central tenet of Firthian linguistics. By this tenet, every linguistic item occurs in a context, and that context is highly relevant for the determination of the meaning of the item, whether it be a word or a sentence (Tognini-Bonelli, 2001: 4). Teubert (2004) goes further and argues that meaning is to be identified only in text, and it often makes no sense to talk about the meaning of a word independent of its co-text.

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Research design and methodology

Meaning and form (or grammar and lexis) can’t be separated. They are two aspects of the same phenomenon. In mentioning the relation of form and meaning, Sinclair (1991: 6–7) states that each meaning can be associated with a distinctive formal patterning. Form could be a determiner of meaning, and he believes that there is ultimately no distinction between form and meaning. Form and meaning are compared as the two sides of one coin and inseparable (Wei, 2008: 28). Guided by the Firthian theory, this research will investigate the meanings of intensifiers from the collocational, colligational and pragmatic levels. All the node words will be displayed in the centre with the collocates on the two sides – i.e. KWIC format. For some particular node words, wider contexts of their concordance lines will be retrieved in order to settle on the meanings and functions of the intensifier collocations. (2) Sinclair’s model of extended units of meaning (EUM) Sinclair (1996, 2004) explains the theory of co-selection in his series of articles. He identifies that the unit of meaning is not an individual word alone but the phrase in which the word lies in. The model of “the unit of meaning” consists of four types of co-occurrence relations in extended lexico-semantic units: collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody (Stubbs, 2009). The relations of lexis, syntax, semantics and pragmatics hold the model of EUM together. The internal structure of the EUM has four categories, which take different values and go from concrete to abstract and from observed word-forms to hypothesized communicative functions: collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. Following Sinclair’s EUM model, intensifiers will be analyzed in terms of the four categories: collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. Drawing on the native data in this research, co-selections at different levels will be described. Typical intensifier patterns in the learner English are investigated in terms of collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. In this study, INT-adj (intensifier-adjective) collocations are the focused type of investigated collocations for intensifiers. Therefore, the colligation for the studied intensifiers falls into one main type: ADV ADJ. As a result of this, colligation will not be discussed in this research as much as collocation, semantic preference and semantic prosody within Sinclair’s EUM model. Intensifiers are attitudinal and are the crucial means of expressing the speakers’ attitude. Consequently, semantic prosody, as the function of the whole extended unit, will receive the main attention in discussion in the present research. Semantic prosody relates to the theme of the text as a whole and the communicative function of the longer extended unit. Semantic prosody shows the pragmatic purpose of the social act (Stubbs, 2009: 11). The semantic preference and semantic prosody of the chosen intensifiers in learner English are described in depth to reveal learners’ idiosyncrasies in using intensifiers semantically and pragmatically. (3) Hunston’s pattern grammar

Research design and methodology 31 The work of Sinclair and other corpus linguists suggests that all language is patterned, there is no such thing as a free phrase and, ultimately, the study of lexical phrases is a more general description of language contrasted with the treatment of language in pattern grammar held by Hunston and Francis (2000). Grammar patterns as a new approach to language description, on the other hand, constitute an attempt to describe the whole of language (or rather, all the frequently occurring items in the language) in a principled way, and the lists of words collected in a given pattern are not random (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 14). The approach is based on phraseology and avoids the distinction between lexis and grammar. It represents a meeting point between the concerns of pedagogy – what it is that learners need to know – and those of theory–how the English language can most satisfactorily be described (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 36). In view of the theoretical and pedagogical goals that pattern grammar can reach, the present research will describe the intensifier patterns in learner English within this paradigm. The definition and labeling of patterns go in accordance with the notions and methods of Hunston’s pattern grammar (Hunston & Francis, 2000). A pattern refers to all the words and structures associated with a word and contributing to its meaning (Hunston & Francis, 2000: 37). It is represented by the combination of both lexical words and grammatical labels of a given node word, realizing certain functional meaning. Typical intensifier patterns in the learner corpora in this research are described in terms of their form, collocates, meaning and function in comparison with those in the native corpora. Patterning features of learner English will be summarized based on the description of the patterns.

3.2

Selected intensifiers

In order to get an overall view of the data distribution of intensifiers in Chinese learner English, all the INT-adj collocations are retrieved from the learner corpus and the native corpus. Therefore, a full picture of intensifier distribution in learner English can be obtained. The most frequently used intensifiers in each of the functional categories (Quirk et al., 1985) are chosen as the node words, which are investigated in depth regarding their patterning and meaning features. The chosen intensifiers whose patterning features are to be studied in detail are the maximizers totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully; the boosters quite, very, so, too and more and more; the approximator almost; the compromiser more or less; the diminisher a little; and the minimizer hardly. The focused intensifiers whose semantic and pragmatic features are to be studied in depth are three groups of synonymous intensifiers: maximizers totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully; boosters very, so and too; and diminishers a little, a bit and a little bit.

3.3 Tools and resources 3.3.1

Corpora

There are altogether six corpora employed in this research. In different research sections and with different research purposes, different corpora are employed.

32

Research design and methodology

To have an overall data description of INT-adj collocation in the learner English and the native English, the learner corpus employed is the CLEC and the native corpus used is the LOCNESS. CLEC is constructed by the Guangdong Foreign Studies University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University, with a total of 1.1 million running words. It is composed of five sub-corpora of learner essays: ST2 (writings of senior high school students), ST3 (writings of college non-English majors at Band 4), ST4 (writings of college non-English majors at Band 6), ST5 (writings of Year 1–2 English majors) and ST6 (writings of Year 3–4 English majors). The five sub-corpora of CLEC represent learners across five proficiency levels. The learners in each sub-corpus are homogeneous in terms of L1 background, age and learning experience (Gui & Yang, 2003). LOCNESS is a corpus of native English essays made up of British pupils’ A-level essays, British university students’ essays and American university students’ essays. The British pupils’ A-level essays in LOCNESS are excluded in this research because of proficiency-level considerations. In the following part, when we say LOCNESS, we refer to LOCNESS that includes only the British university students’ essays and American university students’ essays. CLEC and LOCNESS have a high degree of comparability because of their great similarities in population, genre, topic and size. The main writings from the two corpora are from university students at around twenty years old. LOCNESS contains around 260,000 running words – a size comparable to that of each subcorpus of CLEC, which contain around 200,000 tokens. The exact size of the aforementioned corpora is shown in Table 3.1. Another reason for using LOCNESS as the reference corpus is that it is available to the researcher who can tag it, retrieve all the data from it and check the retrieved data manually in order to guarantee the reliability of the research. The overall data distribution of INT-adj in each sub-corpus of CLEC and LOCNESS can be available for investigating the developmental features of Chinese English learners’ use of intensifiers. However, in the in-depth study of the patterning and meaning features of INTadj, data in LOCNESS are too limited to provide adequate evidence. The scarcity of data is solved through employing larger-size corpora. Thus in the in-depth study section in this research, Freiburg-Brown Corpus of American English (FROWN) Table 3.1 Sizes of the corpora used in this research (1) Corpora

Tokens

Types

CLEC_ST2 CLEC_ST3 CLEC_ST4 CLEC_ST5 CLEC_ST6 CLEC_ALL LOCNESS

200,347 202,790 214,576 219,302 229,919 1,066,934 265,245

7,813 7,704 8,649 10,537 11,737 24,682 14,751

Research design and methodology 33 and Freiburg-LOB Corpus of British English (FLOB) are also used as the reference corpora. FROWN and FLOB corpora are American English and British English, respectively, sampled after Brown Corpus (BROWN) and Lancaster\Oslo Bergen Corpus (LOB). Both of them have a wide coverage of topics including politics, economics, history, life, culture, etc. FROWN and FLOB are similarly structured in terms of texts and topic types. This research will ignore the differences between British English and American English. The features of INT-adj in the two native corpora can help measure the difference between Chinese learners’ English and native speakers’ English. For some analysis, intensifiers from different registers are needed. In these cases, the BNC, which is accessible at http://corpus.byu.edu/bnc, is employed. BNC is a one-hundred-million-word collection of samples of written and spoken language from a wide range of sources designed to represent a wide cross section of spoken and written British English from the late twentieth century. In some rare cases in the in-depth study, the INT-adj collocation is not used frequently in CLEC, thus data in WECCL are referred to in order to testify the patterning and meaning features in Chinese learner English. The full name of WECCL is Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners (1.0) which is the subcorpus of SWECCL (Spoken and Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners). This research only adopts the 3,059 argumentative writings in WECCL and excludes its narrative and expository essays. The sizes of WECCL, FROWN and FLOB are listed in Table 3.2. 3.3.2

Corpus tools

In this research, several software tools are used to retrieve, sort and calculate data. The pos-tagging tool used in this research is CLAWS7 (Constituent Likelihood Automatic Word-tagging system). It is a suite of computer programs designed by Lancaster University for automatically assigning an appropriate grammatical tag to each word in a body of continuous text. At present, the rate of accuracy for the CLAWS tagging system is between 95%–98%, depending on the type of text. To guarantee the reliability of the research, all the retrieved data are checked manually. The concordance tools used in this research are PowerGREP 2.2.0 and Wordsmith 4.0. PowerGREP is a tool for searching through a number of texts, files and folders. It has the functions of searching, replacing, file finding and collecting, etc. It supports not only raw data searching but also the regex formula, which facilitates search for grammatical items. The Wordsmith tool developed by Mike Scott is Table 3.2 Sizes of the corpora used in this research (2) Corpora

Tokens

Types

FROWN FLOB WECCL

1,473,048 1,465,670 1,009,928

45,905 45,543 16,276

34

Research design and methodology

another main tool used to retrieve concordance lines in texts. The three main functions of concordance, wordlist and keywordlist in Wordsmith can fulfill the task of searching for concordance lines and getting the wordlist and keywordlist. 3.3.3

Statistical tools

The statistical tool employed in this research is Statistical Program for Social Science (SPSS) 11.5, whose fundamental function is to check whether the differences between two groups are significant. It is a necessary tool for data treatment. Though there are advanced editions of SPSS, its basic functions remain the same. SPSS 11.5 is enough for the present research.

3.4

Research procedures

The research will be carried out in the following steps: Firstly, both CLEC and LOCNESS corpora will be pos-tagged using tagging software CLAWS for the purpose of retrieving all the INT-adj combinations in them. For the concordance software, PowerGREP can retrieve a certain type of colligation by the regex formula. After many trial-and-error tests, the final formula (\w+_R\w+\s)([\w,]+_([R,]|CC)+\w*\s)*\w+_J\w+ is settled for PowerGREP to search all the INT-adj combinations, which include the combination of one adverb and one adjective, and the combination of one (or more than one) adverb and one (or more than one) adjective connected by nothing (or by a comma or by other conjunctions). Part of the results can be seen in Diagram 3-1.

Diagram 3-1 Partial retrieved results by PowerGREP

Research design and methodology 35 The originally retrieved results contain many pseudo-INT-adj collocations in which adverbs do not function as intensifiers for the adjectives. Based on the working definitions of intensifiers and adjectives in the present research, all the results are checked manually. Pseudo-INT-adj collocations are removed and only INT-adj combinations are left. Despite the assistance of PowerGREP, the data-sorting process involves much manual labor and calculation. To guarantee the reliability of the research, phrasal intensifiers, such as more and more and by far, and all other intensifiers are retrieved by the software Wordsmith 4.0, an integrated suite of program tools for lexical analysis. All the retrieved results are again checked manually. After the data sorting and calculating, the overall data distribution of intensifiers and the adjectives they intensify are worked out. The developing features of using INT-adj. in the learner corpora are examined. Secondly, frequently used INT-adj collocations are studied in detail in terms of their patterning features. INT-adj collocational patterns in learner corpora and the reference corpora are analyzed and categorized. Consequently, the general pattern distribution of INT-adj in CLEC and LOCNESS are obtained. Whether learners can use INT-adj collocational patterns in comparison with the native speakers is investigated. Thirdly, patterning features of the frequently used intensifiers in CLEC are discussed one by one in terms of collocation, colligation and the meaning expressed in reference to the native speaker corpora FROWN and FLOB. The underlying factors for the typical patterning features in the learner corpora are analyzed. Fourthly, the semantic preference and prosody of the frequently used intensifiers in CLEC will be discussed in detail in terms of their semantic preference and semantic prosody. Whether Chinese learners use intensifiers with similar semantic preference and semantic prosody compared with native speakers is probed into. The main manifestations of non-nativeness in using INT-adj in the learner corpus and the possible reasons are postulated and analyzed. Fifthly, major findings from this research are summarized. Implications of the present research are drawn for the research methodology, linguistic theory and future language learning and teaching. Further research suggestions are also made at the end of the book.

3.5

Summary

This chapter has elaborated on the analytical framework of this study, intensifiers to be analyzed, employed corpora and research instruments. At the end of the chapter, the research procedures are specified.

4

Data distribution

In this chapter, the overall data distribution of intensifiers used in the CL (Chinese learner) corpus CLEC and the NS (native speaker) corpus LOCNESS is described. The detailed data distribution of intensifiers and their intensified adjective collocates are specified in the CL corpus in comparison with those in the NS corpus. The developing trend in using intensifiers in learner English is discussed. The relationship between the use of intensifiers and the learners’ proficiency level is observed and analyzed.

4.1

INT-adj collocations

INT-adj collocations in each sub-corpus of CLEC and LOCNESS are retrieved and sorted manually (see Appendix I to Appendix VI). Table 4.1 presents the detailed frequency of INT-adj collocations in each of the studied corpora. Data in Table 4.1 indicate that learners of different English proficiency levels all overuse INT-adj collocations in terms of tokens. Apart from ST4, INT-adj collocations in the other sub-corpora of CLEC are all overused significantly more than those in LOCNESS. As for the types of INT-adj collocations, non-English major learners of English underuse INT-adj collocations significantly; however, English major learners overuse them significantly. Chinese learners with lower English proficiency tend to use fewer types of INT-adj collocations than the native speakers; Chinese learners of high English level tend to use more types of INT-adj collocations than the native speakers. The general trend displayed by the learners is a lying S-shaped line rather than a linear one as shown in Diagram 4-1. The top-twenty, most-frequent INT-adj collocations and their corresponding standard frequencies in each corpus are presented in Table 4.2. It shows that the most-frequent INT-adj collocations in each sub-corpus of CLEC all outnumber that in LOCNESS, indicating that learners overuse the most-frequent INT-adj collocations. Also, the repeatedly overused INT-adj collocations are mostly congruent with Chinese collocations in the learners’ mother tongue. For example, 很高兴， 很好，很重要，很坏，很忙，很难 and太多, which are all common INT-adj collocations in Chinese, directly translatable into very happy, very good, very

Data distribution

37

Table 4.1 Frequency distribution of INT-adj collocations1 INT-adj

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF) Types (F) Types (SF)

1,745** 871 524 262

902** 444 327** 162

761 355 382** 178

1,289** 588 691** 316

1,146** 498 693** 301

930 351 682 257

1 * Indicates significance level at 0.05. ** Indicates significance level at 0.01. F refers to “raw frequency”; SF refers to “standardized frequency” – i.e. “x per 100,000 words.” The aforementioned symbols and abbreviations have the same meaning hereafter in this text.

1000 800 600 400

Token (SF)

200

Type (SF)

LO

C

N

ES

S

ST 6

ST 5

ST 4

ST 3

ST 2

0

Diagram 4-1 Frequency distribution of INT-adj

important, very bad, very busy, very hard and so many (so much) in English. Thus L1 transfer is deduced to be one of the reasons of overusing the top frequently used INT-adj collocations.

4.2 4.2.1

Intensifiers Overall data

Based on the retrieved INT-adj collocations, the frequency of intensifiers in each corpus can be calculated. The number of tokens and types of intensifiers in each corpus is shown in Table 4.3. Table 4.3 shows that Chinese learners of English generally overuse intensifiers significantly in terms of tokens, and they underuse intensifiers in terms of types in comparison with native speakers. Chi-square tests indicate that intensifiers are significantly overused in terms of tokens in ST2, ST3, ST5 and ST6, and significantly underused in terms of types in ST2, ST3, ST4 and ST5, in comparison with those in LOCNESS.

very happy very good very beautiful so many very important very interesting very excited

very busy so happy very tired too much very hot very angry

very big very bad very cold very useful very friendly very nice very well

8 9 10 11 12 13

14 15 16 17 18 19 20

9.5 9.0 8.0 8.0 7.5 7.5 7.5

14.5 14.0 13.0 12.5 10.0 9.5

87.3 40.9 30.4 23.0 21.5 17.5 16.0

very important so many very short too much so much very serious more and more serious very good very difficult too many very necessary very poor more and more important very limited very useful very harmful very careful very different very happy very high

Int-Adj

Int-Adj

SF

ST3

ST2

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

N

5.4 5.4 4.9 3.5 3.5 3.5 3.5

9.9 8.9 7.4 6.9 6.9 5.4

47.3 30.6 22.7 21.2 14.8 12.3 9.9

SF

very simple too eager very harmful so anxious very interesting very low very reasonable

very short even worse too many very bad very easy very high

so many very important so much too much very difficult very poor very good

Int-Adj

ST4

Table 4.2 Top-twenty, most-frequent INT-adj collocations in each corpus

3.7 3.3 3.3 2.8 2.8 2.8 2.8

5.1 4.7 4.7 4.7 3.7 3.7

26.1 17.7 8.4 6.5 6.5 6.1 5.1

SF

very serious quite good very difficult good enough so happy very angry very exciting

very sorry so good very hard very interesting very popular so serious

so many very important very glad so much quite different very good very happy

Int-Adj

ST5

4.6 3.6 3.6 3.2 3.2 3.2 3.2

7.3 5.5 5.0 5.0 5.0 4.6

28.7 16.0 15.0 10.0 9.1 7.8 7.8

SF

quite different too old too weak very old very serious highly developed much lower

very difficult seriously ill too many even worse totally different very poor

terminally ill so many hopelessly ill incurably ill very important so much too much

Int-Adj

ST6

3.0 2.6 2.6 2.6 2.6 2.2 2.2

6.1 3.9 3.9 3.5 3.5 3.5

30.9 25.2 11.7 10.9 10.4 9.1 6.5

SF

very competitive very significant very low very popular virtually impossible educated enough especially important

strong enough terminally ill very difficult much easier old enough smart enough

so many very important so much very strong too much too many very good

Int-Adj

LOCNESS

1.9 1.9 1.5 1.5 1.5 1.1 1.1

2.6 2.6 2.3 1.9 1.9 1.9

10.6 8.3 4.5 4.1 4.1 3.8 3.4

SF

Data distribution

39

Table 4.3 Frequency of intensifiers in each corpus Intensifier

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF) Types (F) Types (SF)

1,745** 871 25** 12

902** 444 37** 19

761 355 41** 19

1,289** 588 66* 30

1,146** 498 98 46

930 351 116 44

Token (SF)

Type (SF)

1000

50

800

40 Token (SF)

30 20

200

10

0

0 ST2 ST3 ST4 ST5 ST6 LOCNESS

400

Type (SF)

ST2 ST3 ST4 ST5 ST6 LOCNESS

600

Diagram 4-2 Observed frequency of intensifiers in each corpus

Intensifier data in ST2 show a sharp contrast between the overused intensifiers in terms of tokens and the underused intensifiers in terms of types. Table 4.3 indicates that the frequency of intensifiers in ST2 is more than twice as high as that in the native corpus LOCNESS in terms of tokens, which evidences that Chinese senior high school learners overuse intensifiers significantly. On the other hand, the frequency of intensifiers used in ST2 is three times lower than that in the native corpus in terms of types, which indicates that Chinese high school learners underuse the intensifier types significantly. Diagram 4-2 displays a clear picture of the frequency trend of different English proficiency level learners’ use of intensifiers. It shows that the token number of intensifiers is not positively correlated with the increase of the English proficiency level. Tokens from ST2 to ST4 display a falling trend, as well as from ST5 to ST6; however, tokens from ST4 to ST5 suggest a growing trend. But the number of types is increasing steadily with the improvement of the learners’ proficiency level. The advanced learners of English can use more types of intensifiers to express their attitudinal meaning than the lower English proficiency learners. The number of types of intensifiers in ST6 is even larger than that in the native corpus LOCNESS.

40 4.2.2

Data distribution Different frequency-group intensifiers

The overuse of intensifiers in terms of tokens and the underuse of intensifiers in terms of types in learner corpora reflect the learners’ poor vocabulary skills. Data of the different frequency-group intensifiers in each of the corpora are given in order to provide more information about the learners’ idiosyncrasies in using intensifiers. Intensifiers retrieved from each corpus are divided into three groups: high-frequency intensifiers, medium-frequency intensifiers and low-frequency intensifiers. Based on the data in this research, intensifiers that appear more than ten times in the corpus are regarded as high-frequency intensifiers; those that are used more than once and less than ten times are regarded as medium-frequency intensifiers; those that appear only once are grouped into low-frequency intensifiers. Statistical data of the high-frequency intensifiers, medium-frequency intensifiers and low-frequency intensifiers are shown in Table 4.4. Data in Table 4.4 show that both native speakers and non-native learners mainly depend on the high-frequency words to achieve the intensifying function. However, the degree of dependence on the high-frequency intensifiers varies from native speakers to non-native learners. The general trend is that native speakers tend to rely less on the high-frequency group intensifiers and more on the mediumand low-frequency group intensifiers than the learners. The degree of dependence on the high-frequency group intensifiers decreases with the improvement of the English proficiency level from high school learners to university English major learners, as clearly indicated in Diagram 4-3. In order to gain a clear view of the distributing pattern of the different intensifiers groups, the types of high-frequency intensifiers, medium-frequency intensifiers and low-frequency intensifiers in each corpus are calculated and shown in Table 4.5. Table 4.5 shows that the type number of the high-frequency intensifiers is generally smaller than that in the medium-frequency group and low-frequency group in the native corpus and most sub-corpora of CLEC. The percentage of the highfrequency group intensifier types in the native corpus LOCNESS is lower than those sub-corpora of CLEC, which means that native speakers tend to use more types of intensifiers to realize attitudinal meanings. The percentage of the highfrequency intensifier types decreases with the improvement of the learners’ English proficiency level, which implies that higher English proficiency learners tend to use more types of intensifiers from meaning to function. Table 4.4 Token number and percentage of intensifier groups ST2

ST3

High 1,711(98%) 862(95.5%) frequency Medium 30(1.7%) 16(1.8%) frequency Low 4(0.3%) 24(2.7%) frequency in all 1,745(100%) 902(100%)

ST4

ST5

687(90%) 1,174(91%) 58(8%)

84(7%)

16(2%)

31(2%)

ST6

LOCNESS

953(83%) 686(74%) 155(14%) 192(21%) 38(3%)

52(5%)

761(100%) 1,289(100%) 1,146(100%) 930(100%)

Data distribution

1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0

41

high-frequency group(%) medium-frequency group(%)

LO

C

N

ES

S

ST 6

ST 5

ST 4

ST 3

ST 2

low-frequency group(%)

Diagram 4-3 Token percentage of different frequency intensifier groups Table 4.5 Type number and percentage of intensifier groups

High frequency Medium frequency Low frequency

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

11(44%) 10(40%) 4(16%)

8(21%) 7(18%) 22(61%)

8(20%) 17(41%) 16(39%)

13(20%) 22(33%) 31(47%)

18(18%) 38(39%) 42(43%)

17(15%) 47(40%) 52(45%)

1.5 1

low-frequency group(%) medium-frequency group(%)

0.5

high-frequency group(%)

LO

C

N

ES

S

ST 6

ST 5

ST 4

ST 3

ST 2

0

Diagram 4-4 Type percentage of different frequency intensifiers groups

Data in ST2 provide a strong indication that low English proficiency level learners have the highest percentage of high-frequency-group intensifier types in their expression, which means that learners over-rely on high-frequency intensifiers, and they have a limited command of the low-frequency group intensifiers. Diagram 4-4 shows the relationship and developing trend of using different frequency-group intensifiers.

42

Data distribution

The data seem to suggest that learners have a strong desire to express an attitude; however, the limited language skills cause them to over-rely on the high-frequency group intensifiers, which lead to the overuse of these intensifier items and the underuse of the medium-frequency and low-frequency intensifier items. 4.2.3

Double intensifiers

Double-intensifier phenomena are found to be a common feature in the learner corpus. It refers to the case in which more than one (usually two) intensifiers are used to modify an adjective to strengthen (such as far too important, really very necessary) or attenuate (such as a little less important) attitude. Table 4.6 shows the frequency of double intensifiers in each corpus. Chi-square tests show that there is no significant difference between each sub-corpus of CLEC and LOCNESS in terms of tokens and types. Diagram 4-5 displays the trend of doubleintensifier usage in the studied corpora. The frequency trend of double intensifiers in the corpora goes more or less the same as the frequency trends in both the INT-adj collocations and the intensifiers in terms of tokens and types. There is not a proportional relationship between the frequency of double intensifiers and the development of the learners’ English proficiency level. However, the type number of the double intensifiers in the learner corpora is roughly increasing with the development of the learners’ English Table 4.6 Frequency of double intensifiers in each corpus Double Intensifier

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF) Types (F) Types (SF)

11 5.5 2 1.0

4 2.0 2 1.0

4 1.9 4 1.9

7 2.7 6 3.2

5 2.2 5 2.2

Token (SF)

Diagram 4-5 Double intensifiers in each corpus

ST6

ST6

LOCNESS

ST5

ST4

0

LOCNESS

1

Type (SF)

ST5

Token (SF)

2

ST4

3

ST3

4

3.5 3 2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0 ST2

5

ST3

11 4.1 7 2.6

Type (SF)

6

ST2

LOCNESS

Data distribution

43

proficiency level, with the exception of the type number in ST5 being much higher than that in ST6. Data distribution of INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and double intensifiers in CL and NS corpora suggest that the token number is not indicative of learners’ English proficiency level, whereas to a certain extent the type number can be indicative of proficiency level: the more types of INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and double intensifiers, the higher the English proficiency level. 4.2.4

Different sub-type intensifiers

Previous studies (Lorenz, 1999; Zhang, 2009; Wu, 2010) show that amplifiers are employed more and downtoners are used less in learner English. But it still remains unclear as to what degree the amplifiers are used more and the downtoners are used less in the learner English. Data in this research reveal how amplifiers and downtoners are distributed in the learner corpus and the native corpus. The delimitation of amplifiers and downtoners are based on the definition of Quirk et al. (1985: 486). Amplifiers scale upwards from an assumed norm; downtoners have a lowering effect, usually scaling downwards from an assumed norm (Quirk et al., 1985: 590). Whether an intensifier is scaling upwards or downwards is judged in its context in this study. We calculated intensifiers in terms of the two broad categories by Quirk et al. (1985). The statistical results are listed in Table 4.7. Data in Table 4.7 show that amplifiers outnumber downtoners in the native corpus LOCNESS. Amplifiers account for 83%, whereas downtoners occupy 17% in the native corpus. In all the five sub-corpora of CLEC, amplifiers outnumber downtoners to a great degree. With the improvement of the learners’ English proficiency level, learners tend to use more downtoners. This tendency can be observed through Diagram 4-6. Table 4.7 Statistics of amplifiers and downtoners Corpora

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens of 1,684(97%) 874(97%) 718(94%) 1,155(90%) 1,031(90%) 770(83%) amplifiers Tokens of 61(3%) 28(3%) 43(6%) 134(10%) 115(10%) 160(17%) downtoners

100% 80%

Token number of downtoners

60% 40%

Token number of amplifiers

20%

S

LO

C

N

ES

ST 6

ST 5

ST 4

ST 3

ST 2

0%

Diagram 4-6 The percentage of amplifiers and downtoners in each corpus

44 4.2.5

Data distribution Top-twenty intensifiers in each corpus

The top-twenty, most-frequent intensifiers in each of the corpora are listed in Table 4.8. In each column of Table 4.8, words above the thick black line are high-frequency intensifiers. Data in Table 4.8 show that ten intensifiers, including very, so, too, much, enough, quite, rather, even, really and almost are shared intensifiers in each sub-corpus of CLEC as well as LOCNESS. Six out of the ten shared intensifiers are high-frequency intensifiers, including very, so, too, much, enough and quite. Phrasal intensifiers a little and more and more appear in each of the subcorpora of CLEC with a high frequency, but they are not found among the top-twenty, most-frequent intensifi ers in LOCNESS. Further investigation shows that phrasal intensifier more and more ranks twenty-ninth and a little ranks forty-first in LOCNESS. One phenomenon worth noting is that the intensifier increasingly, as the synonym of more and more, is a high-frequency intensifier in the native corpus. And intensifier somewhat, as the synonym word of a little, ranks at the very top among the high-frequency group intensifiers in the native corpus. However, neither of the two intensifiers, increasing and somewhat, can be found among the top-twenty intensifiers in each of the subcorpora of CLEC. In addition to the shared close-class intensifiers in all corpora, open-class intensifiers, such as extremely, highly, completely, particularly, especially, relatively and fairly, can be found in the native corpus; whereas very few open-class intensifier types can be observed in the learner corpus. In ST6, two open-class intensifiers, terminally and incurably, are among the top-twenty, most-frequent intensifiers, and they all belong to the high-frequency intensifiers group. The reason for the frequent appearance of the two intensifiers in ST6 can be attributed to the specific writing topics in ST6. One topic in ST6 is “Euthanasia should be legalized in China,” in which the concept of deadly disease is described as “terminally ill” or “incurably ill” by the learners. The distribution of the top-twenty, most-frequent intensifiers in each of the corpora suggests that learners over-rely on the familiar close-class intensifiers. The overuse of general vocabulary and the focus on the small vocabulary range in the learner English can be interpreted in terms of the “teddy bear principle,” which is explicitly illustrated in Hasselgren’s study into the English of Norwegian learners (Hasselgren, 1994, 2002) and used later on by many other linguists (Ringbom, 1994; Louw, 2005; Ishikawa, 2009). The “teddy bear principle” refers to the linguistic phenomenon that learners over-rely on the easy set of vocabulary items they are familiar with and stick to them constantly, just as small children rely on their favorite teddy bears before going to sleep. Findings in this research reflect that learners have their idiosyncratic intensifiers, such as a little and more and more, as their “teddy bears,” which are not common native expression. The widely overused intensifiers as well as the learners’ idiosyncratic habits in using certain intensifiers will be further discussed in Chapters 5 and Chapter 6.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

N

very so too much quite enough a little very very really rather more a bit even widely almost deeply fairly greatly hardly indeed

568.0 147.7 64.4 20.0 12.0 11.5 7.0 6.5 6.5 5.5 5.0 3.0 2.0 2.0 1.5 1.5 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0

very so more too enough even quite much rather really far fully obviously seriously totally a_little a_bit almost astonishingly badly

Intensifier

Intensifier

SF

ST3

ST2

251.0 29.6 25.1 15.8 6.4 5.9 5.9 5.4 2.0 2.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5

SF very so too more much even enough quite really rather highly a little just relatively almost greatly widely absolutely completely considerably

Intensifier

ST4

Table 4.8 Top-twenty, most-frequent intensifiers in each corpus

145.4 80.6 47.5 11.7 11.2 9.3 7.9 6.5 4.2 3.3 2.3 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.4 1.4 1.4 0.9 0.9 0.9

SF very so quite too much more and more enough really a little rather a bit extremely even especially completely terribly almost totally comparatively highly

Intensifier

ST5

211.6 137.7 36.0 35.6 22.8 21.4 17.3 16.4 10.5 10.0 5.9 5.5 4.6 4.1 3.2 3.2 2.7 2.7 2.3 1.8

SF very so terminally too more quite much really even hopelessly incurably enough rather totally extremely seriously absolutely highly a little almost

Intensifier

SI6

80.5 8.0 31.3 40.4 24.8 22.6 19.6 13.9 13.5 12.6 12.6 12.2 11.7 9.1 7.4 5.7 5.2 4.8 3.9 3.9

SF

very so too much enough quite even rather extremely highly really completely particularly somewhat especially far increasingly almost relatively fairly

Intensifier

LOCNESS

87.8 36.2 25.3 18.9 18.5 10.6 8.3 8.3 7.5 6.0 6.0 5.3 4.5 4.1 3.8 3.8 3.8 3.4 3.0 3.0

SF

46

Data distribution

4.3

Data distribution of intensified adjectives

4.3.1 Adjectives and intensified adjectives Many other linguists have also studied the phenomenon of overusing intensifiers in learner English. The phenomenon of overusing intensifiers has different interpretations (Granger, 1998a; Lorenz, 1999). Lorenz (1999) claims that learners overuse intensifiers largely because they overuse adjectives. To test whether Chinese learners of English have the same tendency, adjectives and intensified adjectives used in each sub-corpus of CLEC are retrieved. The results are shown in Table 4.9 and Table 4.10, respectively. The standardized frequency of adjectives and the standardized frequency of intensifiers in each corpus are displayed in Diagram 4-7, through which the relationship between the use of intensifiers and the use of adjectives can be observed. The curved line on the left in Diagram 4-7 indicates the standardized frequency of Table 4.9 Frequency of adjectives in each corpus Adjectives

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF) Types(F) Types (SF)

12,513** 6,246 1,187** 592

14,114 6,960 1,248** 615

13,836** 6,448 1,547** 721

15,194 6,928 1,956** 896

18,229** 7,928 2,396 1,042

18,621 7,020 2,692 1,015

Table 4.10 Frequency of intensified adjectives in each corpus Intensified adjectives

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF) Types (F) Types (SF)

1,813** 905 281* 140

926** 457 216** 107

775 361 240** 112

1,359** 620 354 161

1,175** 511 379 165

960 362 444 167

Intensifiers/Token(SF)

ST5

ST 5 ST C N 6 ES S LO

ST

2 ST 3 ST 4

ST6 LOCNESS

ST3 ST4 ST5 ST6

5 ST C N 6 ES S

ST4

ST2

ST

ST3

LO

ST2

9000 8000 7000 6000 5000 4000 3000 2000 1000 0

ST 2 ST 3 ST 4

900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0

Adjectives/Token(SF)

Diagram 4-7 Frequency of intensifiers and adjectives in each corpus

LOCNESS

Data distribution

47

intensifiers and the curved line on the right shows the standardized frequency of adjectives. Table 4.9 shows that adjectives in most sub-corpora of CLEC are more underused (ST2, ST3, ST4 and ST5) than those in the native corpus LOCNESS. There is only one sub-corpus (ST6) in which adjectives are overused compared with those in LOCNESS in terms of types. Table 4.10 presents that more adjectives are intensified in most sub-corpora of CLEC (apart from ST4) than that in LOCNESS in terms of tokens. That is to say, more intensifiers are used in most sub-corpora of CLEC than in the native corpus. All the evidence contradicts with the findings of Lorenz (1999), which states that learners’ overuse of intensifiers is attributed to the overuse of adjectives in learner English. ST2 is a clear case in point. The token number of intensifiers in ST2 reaches the highest level among the corpora, whereas the token number of adjectives in ST2 stays the lowest among the corpora. This is strong evidence that the overuse of intensifiers cannot be traced to the overuse of adjectives in the learner corpora. 4.3.2

Intensified multi-adjective collocates

Analysis of the intensified adjective collocates indicates that there are many cases in which one intensifier has two or even three adjective collocates. INT-adj collocations like very useful and important, very wide and beautiful, too busy and nervous, etc. are cases in point. Table 4.11 shows the frequency of intensified multi-adjective collocates. The developing trends of the frequency of all the intensified adjective collocates and the frequency of the multi-adjective collocates are displayed in the graph in Diagram 4-8. Table 4.11 Frequency of multi-adjective collocates in each corpus Intensified multi-adjectives

ST2

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

LOCNESS

Tokens (F) Tokens (SF)

68** 34

24 12

13 6

68** 31

29 13

30 11

Intensified adjectives/Token (SF) 800 600

Intensified adjectives/ Token (SF)

400 200 ST2 ST3 ST4 ST5 ST6 LOCNESS

0

40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

Intensified multiadjectives/ Token (SF) ST2 ST3 ST4 ST5 ST6 LOCNESS

1000

Intensified multiadjectives/Token (SF)

Diagram 4-8 Frequency of intensified adjectives and intensified multi-adjective collocates

48

Data distribution

Diagram 4-8 shows that the curved line on the left and the curved line on the right is of a similar developing trend. This suggests that the frequency of multiadjectives has a proportional relationship with the frequency of the intensified adjectives. The frequency of the intensified adjectives is in proportional relationship with the frequency of the intensifiers. Thus it can be further concluded that the more intensifiers used by the learners, the more multi-adjectives are used. The overused intensifiers and multi-adjective collocates serves as devices to help the learners express their desires and attitude impressively. 4.3.3

Top-twenty intensified adjective collocates

The top-twenty, most-frequent intensified adjectives and its standardized frequency in each corpus can be seen in Table 4.12. Table 4.12 shows the top-twenty, most frequently intensified adjectives in both the learner corpus and the native corpus. The standardized frequencies of the top-twenty, most-frequent intensified adjectives show that learners over-depend on the core adjectives,1 in that the frequency of the top-twenty intensified adjectives in each of the sub-corpus of CLEC is much higher than the counterparts in the native corpus. The intensified adjective collocates, such as important, good, happy, many, much and different, are adjectives shared by all of the five sub-corpora of CLEC and the native corpus LOCNESS. However, bad, the frequently used adjective collocate in all the five sub-corpora of CLEC, is not found in LOCNESS. Adjectives difficult and different are commonly used collocates in CLEC, except for ST2. Adjective collocates which are exclusively used by the native speakers are impossible, greater, powerful, significant, weak, ambiguous, competitive and effective. The distribution of the top-twenty, most-frequent intensified adjectives indicates that learners and native speakers share some common core intensified adjectives. However, there are many intensified adjectives which are exclusively used by native speakers but not used at all by the learners. For instance, adjective collocate bad ranks in the top list of the intensified adjectives in learner English, but it is not among the top-twenty in native English.

4.4

Discussion

In this chapter, overall data distribution of INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and intensified adjectives have been described. Double-intensifier phenomenon and the distribution of amplifiers and downtoners have been explored. The top frequently used INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and intensified adjectives have been analyzed. The research data show the following findings: (1) Chinese learners of English overuse intensifiers significantly in terms of tokens and underuse intensifiers significantly in terms of types. From this trend, learners’ great desire of expressing attitude can be seen. However, the type of intensifiers that are employed the least reflect their limited command of intensifiers.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

N

happy good beautiful interesting many important tired big busy much bad hot excited cold angry useful hard afraid kind small

108.8 51.4 41.9 27.5 25.5 25.0 21.0 19.5 19.5 19.0 18.5 18.5 18.0 12.0 11.0 11.0 10.5 9.5 9.0 9.0

important many much short serious good difficult necessary poor limited useful large strong bad different happy harmful busy easy hard

intensified adjective collocates

intensified adjective collocates

SF

ST3

ST2

57.7 38.0 36.0 24.2 23.7 13.8 11.3 9.9 8.4 6.9 6.9 5.9 5.9 5.4 5.4 5.4 5.4 4.9 4.9 4.4

SF

important much many good difficult bad harmful poor short easy high anxious different worse eager low simple interesting long tired

intensified adjective collocates

ST4

21.4 24.2 21.4 11.2 8.4 7.9 7.9 7.9 7.9 6.1 5.6 5.1 5.1 5.1 4.7 4.7 4.7 3.7 3.7 3.7

SF

important many good different glad much difficult happy sorry serious popular interesting hard beautiful big excited angry bright bad common

intensified adjective collocates

ST5

27.8 33.7 25.5 17.8 17.8 15.5 14.6 14.6 13.2 12.8 10.5 9.6 9.1 6.4 6.4 5.9 5.5 5.5 4.6 4.6

SF

Table 4.12 Top-twenty, most-frequent intensified adjectives with standardized frequency in each corpus

ill many important much different difficult old low poor equal serious necessary true high long easy good rich bad better

intensified adjective collocates

ST6

65.9 29.2 19.6 15.7 11.8 9.6 7.9 7.0 6.5 5.7 5.7 4.8 5.2 4.8 4.8 4.4 4.4 4.4 3.9 3.9

SF

important many strong much different good difficult impossible easy low true greater high ill powerful significant weak ambiguous competitive effective

intensified adjective collocates

LOCNESS

15.8 14.3 9.0 8.7 6.0 5.7 4.9 4.1 3.4 3.4 3.4 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.0 3.0 2.6 2.6 2.6

SF

50

Data distribution

(2) The tokens of INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and adjective collocates of intensifiers in the learner English all display no positive relationships with the learners’ English proficiency level. Compared with the non-English majors, English majors, a more advanced English learning group, overuse INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and the adjective collocates to a greater degree, which is a phenomenon worth noting. All the types of the investigated INT-adj collocations, intensifiers, double intensifiers and adjective collocates for intensifiers display the same trend: the type number increases steadily with the learners’ English proficiency level. This trend is especially typical of intensifiers. Thus it is possible to suggest that the type number of intensifiers is a good indicator of learners’ English proficiency level. (3) Learners over-rely on the high-frequency group intensifiers and underuse the medium- and low-frequency group intensifiers compared with the native speakers. The frequency of amplifiers outnumber the frequency of downtoners in both the learner and native corpus. However, learners are more likely to focus on using amplifiers than native speakers. The two trends both indicate that learners lack variation in expression, and they have limited command of intensifiers in expressing meaning. (4) The significant overuse of intensifiers by the Chinese learners of English leads to the significant overuse of intensified adjectives. The overuse of intensifiers in the learner English cannot be attributed to the overuse of adjectives because learners use fewer adjectives than the native speakers in general. (5) Learners are found to share common INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and intensified adjective collocates with native speakers. However, some INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and intensified adjective collocates are found to be used exclusively by Chinese learners of English and some others by native speakers. The most frequently used INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and intensified adjective collocates in Chinese learners’ English are congruent with their mother tongue, Chinese, which is an indication of L1 transfer in L2 acquisition.

4.5

Summary

In brief, Chinese learners demonstrate unique features in using intensifiers. For the most part, they overuse significantly a limited range of intensifiers in terms of tokens, as compared to native speakers. On the other hand, they underuse a large number of intensifiers commonly employed by native speakers in terms of types. The overuse and underuse are phenomena inseparably linked up, pointing to the limited language proficiency. We have suggested that to a certain extent, use of intensifiers is in proportion to their English proficiency and serves as an indicator of it.

Note 1 Core adjectives: adjectives being more central than others to the language system, Lyons (1977: 305) and Carter (1987: 179).

5

Patterning features of intensifiers in Chinese learner corpora

In this chapter, patterning features of intensifiers in the learner corpora are investigated in depth in comparison with those in the native corpora. We first describe the patterning features of intensifiers that have occurred most frequently in learner English. We then summarize the distinctive characteristic features of intensifiers in learner English. Finally, we discuss the underlying factors for those features.

5.1

Overall data description of intensifier patterns

5.1.1

Definition of pattern

Ways of defining and interpreting the concept of pattern vary from one researcher to another. The concept of pattern is used as a synonym of the grammatical form of a word in many cases. In this research, a PATTERN refers to the combination of both grammar and lexis of a given node word, which carries a specific meaning, and to realize certain function. It is based on the definition by Hunston and Francis (2000). Therefore, the description of patterning features of intensifiers is conducted in terms of both the collocational patterns and colligational patterns of the node word. However, in some cases, more attention is paid to colligational patterns and in other cases to collocational patterns, as need arises. 5.1.2

Pattern labeling and notation

The pattern labeling method in the present research takes the “simplest” and “most superficial” word-class labels adopted in Francis et al. (1996, 1998) and Hunston and Francis (2000: 45). However, some adjustments are made in light of the corpus data in this research. The major labels used are as follows: v: verb group v-link: link verb group v-ed: verb group of past participle form vt: transitive verb group n: noun group n (pl.): plural form noun group

52

Patterning features of intensifiers n (s): single form noun group pron: pronoun group pron-possess: possessive pronoun group pron-indef: indefinite pronoun group prep: preposition adj: adjective group adv: adverb group art: article -ing: clause introduced by an “-ing” form to-inf: clause introduced by a to-infinitive form that: clause introduced by that with quote: used with direct speech

Where a preposition, adverb or other lexical items are part of the pattern, they are given in italics to indicate that it is a lexical item rather than a code; for example, the pattern V n on n, in which on is a preposition itself rather than representing a label. The upper case of V indicates that this is the word class whose patterns we are focused on. In referring to a pattern in a context in the thesis, the pattern is written in bold form. In this research, the intensifier is always the item we are focused on; consequently, it is the node word that is capitalized and abbreviated in the pattern expression. The intensifier plus adjective combination is expressed as “INT-adj.” Six main types of extended patterns for INT-adj are listed as follows, in which intensifiers are used to modify an adjective: 1) v-link INT-adj . . . So it is very important for us to adjust our behaviors (ST6). 2) INT-adj n Dreaming and imagination are playing very important roles in our modern world (ST6). 3) vt something/somebody INT-adj I have something very important to tell you (ST5). 4) v INT-adj . . . it must be made completely clear to the donor. . .(LOCNESS). 5) v n /pron INT-adj . . . Though it is small, I find it very beautiful. . .(ST2). 6) INT-adj used independently . . . Even severe, Tai baozhi street was covered by water. . .(ST2). Among the listed patterns of intensifiers, the INT-adj collocation in pattern 1 functions as a predicative in the sentence. In both the second and third patterns, the INT-adj collocation serves as an attributive modifying the noun preceding or after it. In the fourth and fifth patterns, the INT-adj collocation is a complement for either the subject or the object. The INT-adj collocation in the sixth pattern acts

Patterning features of intensifiers

53

as an adverbial. It is observed that patterns v-link INT-adj and INT-adj n are most frequently used among the six types. 5.1.3

Intensifier patterns

All cases of INT-adj collocations are retrieved from both CLEC and LOCNESS. How the data are retrieved is explained in Chapter 3. The overall frequencies of different patterns for INT-adj combinations are listed in Table 5.1. The second and third patterns are grouped into one broad category in that in both cases they serve as attributives modifying the noun preceding it or after it in the sentence. Patterns of the fourth, fifth and sixth types are classified into one broad category named “other patterns” because the three types added together account for a very low percentage of the whole. From the statistics in Table 5.1, we can see that pattern 1 accounts for 60%, pattern 2 and 3 together occupy 32% and the other patterns make up 8% of all the INT-adj collocations in LOCNESS. The overall data distribution of the three broad patterns of INT-adj in the learner corpus is much similar to that in the native corpus. That is, pattern 1 is the dominant pattern in each of the sub-corpora of CLEC and in LOCNESS, which indicates that INT-adj collocation serves more as a predicate than as an attributive, a complement or an adverbial in both the learner English and native English. However, differences do exist concerning the proportion of each of the three broad patterns. First, learners rely much more on pattern 1 than native speakers do. Second, learners tend to rely less on pattern 1 and use other patterns more as their English proficiency level increases. The data in ST6 (writings from the most advanced English learners in CLEC) appear almost the same as that of LOCNESS, while the situation in ST2 (writings from the lowest English proficiency level learners in CLEC) is the most different. Therefore, it is concluded that the lower English proficiency the learners have, the more likely they tend to rely on one certain pattern and the less likely they will use various patterns to express themselves. Diagram 5-1 provides a bar display of the overall percentage of typical pattern types in CLEC and LOCNESS to reflect this trend more conspicuously. To sum up, similar tendency has been observed about the frequencies of various patterns in the learner corpus and the native corpus. However, there also exist some Table 5.1 Overall frequency and percentage of typical patterns in CLEC and LOCNESS Intensifier

ST2

ST3

In all 1,745 (100%) 902 (100%) Pattern 1 1,434 (82%) 659 (73%) Pattern 2 &3 205 (12%) 208 (23%) Other 106 (6%) 35 (4%) patterns

ST4

ST5

ST6

761 (100%) 1,289 (100%) 1,146 (100%) 528 (69%) 966 (75%) 665 (58%) 179 (24%) 268 (21%) 433 (38%) 54 (7%) 55 (4%) 48 (4%)

LOCNESS 930 (100%) 555 (60%) 302 (32%) 73 (8%)

54

Patterning features of intensifiers

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10%

Other patterns Pattern 2 & 3

S

LO

C

N

ES

ST 6

ST 5

ST 4

ST 3

ST 2

Pattern 1

Diagram 5-1 Overall percentage of typical pattern types in CLEC and LOCNESS Table 5.2 The investigated intensifiers in each functional category Intensifier Category Amplifiers

Downtoners

Intensifiers Maximizers: Boosters:

totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully quite, very, so, too, more and more

Approximator: Compromiser: Diminisher: Minimizer:

almost more or less a little hardly

slight differences. The data of intensifier patterns indicate that learner English is over-simple and lacks variation. To investigate the patterning features of intensifiers, several intensifiers such as the node words are focused on. Intensifiers chosen to be studied in depth are the most frequently used in the leaner English from each of the functional categories defined by Quirk et al. (1985). The node words to be investigated in depth are listed in Table 5.2.

5.2 Typical patterning features 5.2.1

Maximizers

The five most frequently used open-class maximizers, totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully, in CLEC are analyzed in terms of their patterning features. To make up for the inadequate data in CLEC, WECCL is also employed to compensate for the data shortage. To guarantee the adequacy of data for native English, BROWN and FLOB are both used as the reference corpora.

Patterning features of intensifiers

55

One typical pattern of the maximizers in both CL and NS corpora is neg MAX adj (negative MAXIMIZER adjective). Pragmatically, maximizers in negative statements function as hedges, which mitigate and lessen the impact of an utterance rather than strengthen the speech act (Horn & Kecskes, 2006). Hedges are intentionally or unintentionally employed to help speakers and writers communicate more precisely the degree of accuracy and truth assessments. When maximizers are used in negative statements, the attitude expressed shifts from an absolute statement to a euphemistic expression aimed at making the attitude more easily accepted. The following main patterns of maximizers in negative statements are found in learner English: (1) v-link not MAX adj . . . a computer is not completely new for every one. (2) not do MAX adj n . . . our school can not offer so many completely new course s. . . (3) there v-link not MAX adj . . . there is no absolutely correct answer for such a question . . . (4) do not n being MAX adj We do not learn things being fully aware of. . . ...... The umbrella pattern for the aforementioned core maximizer patterns can be summarized as pattern neg MAX adj. The pattern neg MAX adj for the node words totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully in both the NS corpora and the CL corpora is retrieved. Table 5.3 shows the retrieved frequency of the pattern neg MAX adj with the node words of maximizers totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully, respectively. The frequency of pattern neg MAX adj indicates that Chinese learners of low English proficiency level use fewer, and the advanced learners use more, neg MAX adj in comparison with native speakers. Diagram 5-2 displays a graphic representation of the data in Table 5.3. This diagram shows the difference between learners and native speakers when they use neg MAX adj. It shows that node words for pattern neg MAX adj are entirely and totally rather than absolutely and fully in the native English, which are supported by the data in both FROWN and FLOB. As a sharp contrast, node words for pattern neg MAX adj in learner English are completely, absolutely and fully, which are absent or rarely found in the native English. Table 5.3 Frequency of the pattern neg MAX adj

FROWN(SF) FLOB(SF) CLEC(SF) WECCL(SF)

Totally

Completely

Absolutely

Entirely

Fully

in all

0.07 0.14 0.09 0.40

0 0.14 0.19 0.79

0 0 0.09 0.79

0.68 0.41 0 0

0 0 0 0.59

0.74 0.68 0.37 2.57

56

Patterning features of intensifiers

0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6

FROWN (SF) FLOB (SF) CLEC (SF) WECCLE (SF)

0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0

totally

completely absolutely

entirely

fully

Diagram 5-2 Frequency of the pattern neg MAX adj pattern Table 5.4 Concordance lines for neg MAX adj in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

40 Willy.” L05 41 “Actually, that’s not well. E28 121 Hung Parliament is not an the phone.” F15 162 Somehow, she is not “Luke.” P07 154 “Yes?” P07 155 “I am not y the Categories. J51 107 But it was not xclusively clonal species, but never any 3 one and the same person. “They are not 6 54 power, of course. The income wasn’t d we seem to believe that the dog is not 20 103 “Not in the least.” Which was not scepticism. True, the G50 96 idea is not California, to F38 138 this day, are not ricia, on the other hand, was not R02 37 itself. Ms. Andrews had R02 36 not been aims upon us, although we J27 18 are not - N28 22 “much loved mother” - were not it. However I would not say that this is

entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely entirely

accurate,” he L05 42 said, smi believable E28 122 representat believable. “Mary,” F15 163 sa certain why you have come here clear why logicians, concerned clonal J10 141 genera or highe different G03 34 at all,” she discretionary, though. J56 55 J27 9 responsible for its acti N20 104 true. The thought of s new (as they imply) - Professo rational, despite the veracity ready for a rematch in the hot ready for it. Tricia, on the o sure what those claims are. Bu true. She N28 23 had been fond true and so in some ways I wou

The co-selection theory and the idiom principle (Sinclair, 2004) are evidenced by the native speakers’ use of the neg MAX adj pattern. The five maximizers totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully share similar denotational meaning, but they contain different connotational meaning. Lexis and patterns do not randomly combine but co-select with each other to express certain pragmatic meaning. The co-selection principle of language restrains lexical choices in neg MAX adj state fixed combination of lexis, and the pattern is what Sinclair called “idiom principle.” Idiom principle is at work, and the meaning arises from “words in particular combinations” (Sinclair, 2004: 148). Concordance lines for the neg MAX adj pattern in FROWN are shown in Table 5.4.

Patterning features of intensifiers

57

The concordance lines show the typical colligation, collocation and functions of this pattern, summarized in Table 5.5. The same procedures are conducted for pattern neg MAX adj in learner English. Node words in this pattern are completely, absolutely and fully. Their concordance lines are retrieved from WECCL and shown in Table 5.6.1, Table 5.6.2 and Table 5.6.3. Table 5.7 summarizes the typical colligation, collocation and functions of pattern neg MAX adj in learner English. Table 5.5 Pattern neg MAX adj in native English Pattern

Neg MAX adj

Typical colligation Pattern varieties

v-link not adv. adj. v-link not MAX adj. v-link not MAX adj. for pron-indef entirely expressing certainty: certain, sure, clear indicating judgments: true, new, believable, rational, discretionary showing personal quality: responsible describing a state: clonal, ready mitigating an extreme attitude: not entirely sure, not entirely certain expressing a more accurate judgment: not entirely accurate, not entirely new specifying a more accurate situation: not entirely ready, not entirely clonal

Typical node word Typical adjective collocates of the node word

Functions

Table 5.6.1 Concordance lines for neg COMPLETELY adj in WECCL 1 ually. The world is not totally write or 2 considered in conflict. But they are not 3 r successful career, This opinion is not 4 r respective superiority, and neither is 5 t mean that the ways our parents use are 6 n this sense, we can not say Internet is 7 eal. What a pity! What I said may not be 8 em. I think this kind of opinions is not

completely black. It is just gray. The completely contradictory, as far as I c completely correct, I admit that one’s completely excellent or neither is rath completely false. But I think it is not completely good or bad to our life. In completely right. But I think there mus completely true. In my opinion, children

Table 5.6.2 Concordance lines for neg ABSOLUTELY adj in WECCL 1 omas are related to marks, which are not 2 is perfectly good as well as nothing is 3 To be frank, it’s correct, but it isn’t 4 , as children are different, there is no 5 an’t say something is absolutely true or 6 thin sheet of paper. ????But nothing is 7 e that internet is not something that is

absolutely authoritative for some. We w Absolutely bad. The same as we live on absolutely correct, because “the scienc absolutely correct answer for such a qu absolutely false. So like traditions an absolutely good. The electronic cards a absolutely good or bad. But we people c

58

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.6.3 Concordance lines for neg FULLY adj in WECCL 1 may be that we don’t learn things being 2 ree. Their abilities of creation are not 3 secret. But as the technology is not so 4 wever, the kids’ critical faculty is not 5 dernization is forward-looking, it’s not 6 But it doesn’t mean that traditions are

fully fully fully fully fully fully

aware of it; sometimes we acquire developed. Certificates are consi developed, the secret codes can b developed. Sometimes it may be a true, though traditions and moder useless. We can consult the speci

Table 5.7 Pattern neg MAX adj in learner English Pattern

Neg MAX adj

Pattern varieties

it doesn’t mean that v-link MAX adj. I don’t think that v-link MAX adj. Nothing is MAX adj. v-link MAX adj. there v-link MAX adj. n

Typical node words

completely, absolutely, fully

Typical adjective collocates of the node word

completely absolutely fully

Functions

judgment: good, bad, correct, false, right, excellent, black judgment: good, bad, correct, false, authoritative judgment: useless, true, developed

expressing a more accurate judgment: not completely right, not absolutely good, not fully bad stating a more accurate situation: not completely black, not fully developed,

A comparison of the uses of the pattern neg MAX adj in the learner and in the native English reveals that learners use different maximizers from the native speakers. More pattern varieties can be found in learner English than in native English. Native speakers have a wider range of adjective collocates than learners do. Learners use their early acquired evaluative adjective collocates – e.g. good, bad, true, right and correct – to show judgments, while native speakers use a wider range of adjective collocates, including adjectives making judgments, expressing certainty and indicating a person’s quality. The non-nativeness of learner English in using the neg MAX adj pattern can be attributed to the following reasons. First, using synonyms interchangeably is a key strategy accounting for the learners’ improper uses. Learners are unaware of the connotations of synonymous words and regard synonyms as interchangeable items. Consequently, they produce grammatically correct but unacceptable combinations. Words do not simply fall in the slots of syntax. Lexis and patterns co-select in order to realize meaning. The traditional way of regarding grammar and lexis as separate causes the unidiomatic, odd expression or foreignisms in the learner English (Pawley & Syder, 1983: 193). Second, learners’ poor collocational skill causes the

Patterning features of intensifiers

59

non-nativeness in their expression. A native speaker has available to him a large number of preconstructed or semi-preconstructed phrases as well as single words, while learners’ efforts to use the English language is hampered for the lack of collocational knowledge and a severe shortage of the preconstructed and semi-preconstructed phrases. More often than not, learners temporarily retrieve and assemble those memorized single words in expressing themselves rather than retrieve the fixed or semifixed constructions, or lexical items from the memory (Sinclair, 1996). Thus the non-native expressions, such as the patterns neg FULLY adj and neg ABSOLUTELY adj, occur in learner English. Third, learners are unaware of this register difference. Data in native corpora show that the maximizer absolutely is not used in the pattern neg MAX adj in written text. However, it collocates with negative expression in oral English as pointed out by Alternberg (1991: 137): “Absolutely is the only maximizer that can intensify negative items like not, no and nothing in the London Lund Corpus of spoken English.” In these cases, absolutely is often used as a turn-taking device to intensify negative items corresponding to the previous utterance. Learners have no awareness of the register difference. As a consequence, they produce utterances and expression that sound foreign and non-native. 5.2.2

Boosters

The five most frequently used boosters in learner English were chosen as the node words and will be discussed in detail in this section. They include quite, very, so, too and more and more. 5.2.2.1 5.2.2.1.1

The node word quite MULTIPLE MEANINGS OF QUITE

The intensifier quite is a very complicated and widely used intensifier in both the learner corpora and the native corpora. As an intensifier, quite can be a minimizer, compromiser or diminisher in different cases according to Quirk et al. (1985). The following examples are listed in Quirk et al. (1985: 598ff) to illustrate that quite can be a maximizer and a booster. (1) I quite forgot about her birthday (maximizer: quite is close to the meaning of completely). (2) I quite enjoyed the party, but I’ve been to better ones (booster: quite is close to the meaning of kind of or rather). Quirk et al. (1985: 599) explain, “As a compromiser, it is usually stressed only lightly; as a diminisher, it is heavily stressed or actually made nuclear; with verbs, esp. with BrE.” This means that intonations play a critical role in oral conversation in determining the function of the modifiers. Quirk et al. note, “There is a considerable variation idiolectically.” Bäcklund (1973: 73ff) makes this same point by marking contour marks in a sentence that shows “quite” as a maximizer.

60

Patterning features of intensifiers

Corpora in this research are written texts, therefore usages of quite as a compromiser and a diminisher are ruled out. In written texts, the intensifier quite is used to scale the degree of the modified adjectives up in most cases. However, in many cases, quite is not necessarily a maximizer, especially in many contexts in the learner corpus in which learners usually regard quite as booster very. Therefore, in this study, quite is not classified as a maximizer category but as a booster which strengthens the attitude by scaling the degree of the modified adjectives up. 5.2.2.1.2

PATTERNING FEATURES OF THE BOOSTER QUITE

Table 5.8 shows the frequency of quite in CLEC, FROWN and FLOB. Data in Table 5.8 show that Chinese learners of English overuse QUITE adj in comparison with native speakers. Since Chinese learners favor using intensifier quite, its typical patterning features are worth a study. Concordance lines for the pattern QUITE adj in the NS corpora are retrieved. Table 5.9 displays that collocates in the N-1 and N-2 position of the node word quite tend to be devices to modify the attitude expressed by the booster quite. The devices include modal verbs (will, would, could, might, may), link verbs (become, prove, look, seem, get), intensifiers (really, indeed, surely, simply, actually, in fact), negative devices (nevertheless, no longer, not) and adverbs (sometimes), etc. Some of the devices are used to emphasize the attitude, such as really quite extraordinary, surely quite evil, indeed quite exquisite and always been quite cool, and some other devices are used to mitigate the attitude, such as not quite certain, nevertheless quite avant, probably quite normal and seem quite durable. All the devices contribute to a more reasonable and acceptable statement and not being so rigid and absolute, as shown in Table 5.9. Concordance lines for QUITE adj in the CL corpus CLEC are retrieved. Among the 196 (SF = 18.3) concordance lines for quite, there are 27 (SF = 2.5) cases in which the aforementioned emphasizing and mitigating devices are used. Part of the concordance lines for quite in CLEC are shown in Table 5.10. But learners’ moderating devices appear to be much different from those of the native speakers. The moderating devices used by learners exaggerate the statements and make the negative expression too harsh to accept. Modal words for quite in native English are would, could, might, may, while the modal words favored by learners are will and must, which manifest a stronger attitude rather than mitigating it. However, when native speakers are to emphasize a strong attitude, in most cases, they use intensifiers, including indeed, really, surely, simply, actually, in fact, instead of using modal words – for example, must and will. Learners seldom use another Table 5.8 Frequency of quite in CL corpus and NS corpora Intensifier quite

CLEC

FROWN

FLOB

F SF

196 18.3

107 7.2

184 12.6

Table 5.9 Concordance lines for QUITE adj in FROWN 1 r win a major war; but sometimes J80 174 2 J76 141 the shell temperature is already 3 and in planetary J02 135 atmospheres are 4 J35 153 (1987), so that it appears to be 5 9 18 of business and she has always been 6 t my tent,” the K15 81 General said, not 7 Andrews. R02 208 “Oh,” said Tricia, not 8 esponses to these questions were overall 9 witches, J78 15 since the new PMT proved 10 83 The range of such portraits is really 11 the last decade, but they have remained 12 ut the G17 83 people who greet them seem 13 ined as an E05 146 attack dog, he seemed 14 linear transformations. This model seems 15 either workers or the public, is simply 16 erely P09 124 an honorable, which sounds 17 omething about her that was K19 18 still 18 n of a certain age, she L13 45 was still 19 l all the P09 37 supernatural and surely 20 ible, their mechanical parts are usually

quite small groups can prevent it being quite low, and never without J76 142 pr quite different from ambient values in quite spurious, and given the lack J35 quite cool to them in the past. E09 19 quite able to detach himself from the g quite certain what to make of R02 209 t quite similar G20 194 to the data from quite sensitive to the wavelength of J7 quite extraordinary, from J68 84 Gilmor quite D13 139 inexpensive, since no one quite poor. They are not dressed in fin quite confident that he could do a much quite mysterious J18 58 to most mathema quite small. J79 200 The type of analys quite ridiculous really, particularly i quite childlike. She had a lopsided tom quite attractive; she had held on to he quite evil happenings going on at Kimbe quite similar. These E34 52 include a r

Table 5.10 Concordance lines for quite in CLEC 1 of fat, sugar, western diets are always quite unhealthy, we should ear less. 2 the TV programmes in deep night must be quite interesting and I hear your laugh 3 or studying, the above-mentioned will be quite enough if we can abide by them. 4 pium of the masses. Most Chinese must be quite aware of the terrifying power of 5 ust do as this. First of all, we must be quite aware of the limition of fresh wa 6 ks were not very old, and some were even quite new. We were so active that a num 7 violates human rights, China is in fact quite successful in its prison system. 8 g. This holiday was so short, but I feel quite happy. Some Strange Tree There is 9 e Mid-autumn festival. In a word we fell quite happy and enjoy our time in the m 10 il my tougue was tied. After that I felt quite comfortable and to a certain exte 11 uld be an exam the next day, then I felt quite nervous. Because I did not learn 12 ing business as well as men and some get quite rich. It is no longer true that m 13 see her. She’s a pretty baby, She looks quite small. and hands short. She has b 14 parts of china, road conditions are not quite satisfactory. Faulty graffic ligh 15 f activities. As for wearing , it is not quite different from other days. People 16 n many other aspects, the proverb proves quite right, it is the same when we lea 17 on. In short words, computers are really quite helpful to human beings. With the 18 floating in a waterful bucket. It seemed quite nice. When I looking at the dripp 19 y. But when I read this, it still sounds quite true to me. Never will I forget a 20 serving the society and so on. It’s very quite clear that it’s necessary to get

62

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.11 Patterns of QUITE adj in CL and NS corpora NS

CL

Typical colligations

v-link adv adj v-link adv adj n v adv adj v n/pron adv adj

v-link adv adj v-link adv adj n

Typical pattern varieties

v-link QUITE adj v-link QUITE adj for n/pron v-link something/somebody QUITE adj v QUITE adj v n /pron QUITE adj

v-link QUITE adj v-link QUITE adj n

Typical collocates modal verbs: would, could, might, may on the left link verbs: become, prove, look, seem, get intensifiers: really, indeed, surely, simply, actually, in fact negatives: nevertheless, no longer, not time adverbs: sometimes, no longer Functions

modal verbs: will, must link verbs: get, be intensifiers: very, really negatives: not time adverbs: always

mitigating or strengthening extreme attitudes exaggerating or negating expressing a more accurate judgment

intensifier before QUITE adj. But it is surprising that very, the all-purpose intensifier, is found to modify QUITE adj in learner English to realize a strong attitude. In native English, the sequence very QUITE adj is not found. The different usage of QUITE adj in the NS and the CL corpora can be seen in Table 5.11. Data indicate that Chinese learners of English tend to go to extremes in expressing their attitude. Even when a strong attitude is necessary, native speakers are likely to express it in a reasonable and more acceptable manner. Chinese learners have not mastered this communicative strategy and have poor pragmatic awareness, which explains the rigidity and absoluteness in learners’ expressions. 5.2.2.1.3 THE PATTERNS QUITE A ADJ N AND A QUITE ADJ N

QUITE a adj n and a QUITE adj n are two frequent patterns which occur in the learner corpus. Which one is a more native-like expression needs an examination. Lorenz (1999: 144) quoted the explanation of quite from the COBUILD English Usage (Sinclair, 1992: 566): Note that in sentences like these you put quite in front of “a,” not after it. You do not say, for example, “It was a quite cold day.” Lorenz (1999) argues that the sentences containing a QUITE adj are awkward, though he also mentions, “It is doubtful whether all these instances should really be considered incorrect.” According to him, sentences like “this is a quite wellknown and widespread prejudice” and “by June 1938 the Ovaltine image seems to have taken a quite dramatic change” are unacceptable and not authentic (Lorenz, 1999: 145).

Patterning features of intensifiers

63

However, native corpora data evidence that a QUITE adj n does exist. Concordance lines for a QUITE adj n in the NS corpora are listed in Table 5.12. Table 5.12 provides counterevidence for the suggestion that a QUITE adj n is not acceptable (Lorenz, 1999), for native speakers do have such usage. The pattern QUITE a adj n is also retrieved from native corpora FROWN and FLOB. Three concordance lines are found in FROWN and eleven in FLOB. Table 5.13 conveys those in FLOB. Concordance lines indicate that both patterns are employed in native English, serving the function of intensification. Native speakers use the two patterns with similar frequency. How the two patterns are used by Chinese learners of English is examined and sixteen cases of the pattern QUITE a adj n and six of the pattern a QUITE adj n are retrieved. Concordance lines are shown in Table 5.14 and Table 5.15. The more uses of pattern QUITE a adj n and the fewer uses of pattern a QUITE adj n in learner English do not necessarily indicate that learners can produce native-like expressions. The fact is that Chinese learners are more familiar with the pattern QUITE a adj n than with the pattern a QUITE adj n under the influence of dictionaries, textbooks and classroom teaching activities. Dictionaries such as The New Oxford Dictionary of English (Pearsall, 2001: 1522), The EnglishChinese Dictionary (2nd edition) (Lu, 2007: 1609) and COBUILD English Usage Table 5.12 Concordance lines for the pattern a QUITE adj n in FLOB 1 8 135 Europe have ‘shared’ security in a 2 of reduced extent. Similarly, but for a 3 utton-down collars, and other items of a 4 nt we J33 74 must make is that this is a 5 hen, with Erikson, Anderson has J30 63 a 6 deliberate D14 102 positive meaning in a 7 ich they were attached to it possessed a 8 of a lawyer, and I eventually went to a 9 tive artists certainly shared, towards a

quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite

unique way; indeed they G68 136 h J25 77 different reason, large sa novel or show-biz G17 25 characte separate attribute from J33 75 Kn clear rationale for turning to hi undialectical way. This may or ma G53 17 remarkable elasticity. And small shop G17 20 called Austin’s new type of G43 185 drama, more i

Table 5.13 Concordance lines for the pattern QUITE a adj n in FLOB 1 ed in the original equation. It’s L20 15 2 done it many times before. L01 121 After 3 s like them. They were actually aimed at 4 ck the ice: N21 96 “Well, you seem to be 5 6.1 shows the completed dam, which bears 6 silky texture. The shiitake variety have 7 t in advance and ‘painted in’ G77 171 in 8 170 “Not here,” he heard himself say in 9 ome K13 36 time in the New Year, leaving 10 . K04 145 There was a ship sailing past, 11 oking in his collecting receptacle I saw

quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite quite

a frivolous little object otherwi a long wait he said, “Out? No mes a G52 112 narrow application to p a bright girl, don’t N21 97 you?” a good J73 113 resemblance to an a strong, almost H30 120 musky, t a calculated way. Weinberger’s is a L20 171 loud voice. “Gone to Pa a large fortune. (The other two K a long way out, in the K04 146 es a good sum of B23 232 money. I am

64

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.14 Concordance lines for the pattern QUITE a adj n in CLEC 1 rocess of degeneration. So this issue is 2 ond, rapidly advancing industry takes up 3 not highly developed and there are still 4 an easy study. Generally speaking, it is 5 x rate in China is quite high. There are 6 status is concerned, nowadays there are 7 , it is still unacceptable in ethics for 8 ghting capacity will not be weakened for 9 h people have struggled for equality for 10 time. They are forced to be in jail for 11 e leavers have to go around the city for 12 ing for their favorite books. It took us 13 e from the cradle to the grave, which is 14 anasia, or mercy killing, which is still 15 it a little cheaper!” “sorry . but it’s 16 as worthy. To fight against Japanese was

quite a complicated one. It would be an quite a considerable proportion of fres quite a few patients who are not curabl quite a good grammar handbook small, us quite a great umber of people who are o quite a large number of female politici quite a large number of people. Neverth quite a long time. So there is no neces quite a long time and have made some pr quite a long time, suffering from the l quite a long time and find his job with quite a long time to be close to the co quite a natural principle. And Chinese quite a new term for many Chinese, mean quite a nice book, isn’t it?” at last h quite a simple choice just like people

Table 5.15 Concordance lines for the pattern a QUITE adj n in CLEC 1 ject matter. At last, class is over in a 2 as soon as possible. In China there is a 3 s of joy . We are very happy. There is a 4 wish. We hope all of us could live in a 5 his family, the land he has lived for a 6 ming because they can stay in army for a

quite quite quite quite quite quite

relaxing atmosphere.Boredom In th different situation in the job ma beautiful blue sky. green trees a beautiful great space to earn kno long time. It also means that he long time to make full use of the

(Sinclair, 1992: 566) were investigated, and it was found that all three of the dictionaries have treated the pattern QUITE a as an entry, but not the pattern a QUITE adj. The whole set of textbooks for junior learners of English, Junior English for China (1996) (People’s Education Press) are examined and seven cases of the pattern QUITE a adj n are detected and no case of a QUITE adj n is found. The dictionaries and textbooks offer input on the pattern QUITE a adj n; therefore, there follows the emphasis of this pattern in teaching. The frequent and strong input in classroom teaching can greatly affect language acquisition efficiency (Bardovi-Harling, 1987). The richness of the pattern QUITE a adj n and the absence of a QUITE adj n in input explain the more use of the pattern QUITE a adj n and the less use of the pattern a QUITE adj n. And it is also possible that it is because learners are slipping away from the correct use of QUITE a adj n that they produce instances of a QUITE adj n. 5.2.2.2

The node word very

The intensifier very is a frequently used booster and highly delexicalized in both NS corpora and NNS corpora (Partington, 1993). Very is highly versatile in its collocability and combines almost freely with all adjectives (Lorenz, 1999: 64).

Patterning features of intensifiers

65

Table 5.16 Concordance lines for the pattern VERY VERY adj in CLEC 1 ittle paragraph from an article which is very very interesting. What is your ide 2 A busy week This week I was very very busy. Everyday I must payed a 3 . She take me go to have a dinner. I was very very glad. Because at night, outsi 4 are big. They come from Japan. They are very very delicious, but they aren’t de 5 hou . I like it very much. because it is very very beautiful. it has hills and r 6 . In the past I was a lively girl. I was very very happy. Now I changed a seriou 7 and the policeman shot it. The cow is a very very kind animal, so the policeman 8 the or a plane or a train disappear in a very very short time --about 30 seconds 9 d crystal-clear , and it makes this world very very pretty. . . The Story Of Willia 10 Sunny When the Emperor came back, he was very very angry. He caught the cheats a 11 eatiful . Dairy June, 14. Fine. Today is very very hot. It is about thirty centi 12 minal examination. Because my result was very very badly. I’m afraid every text, 13 o much rain. But in fact, fresh water is very very scarce. Population in our wor 14 ht it oughted to rain, because there was very very dry and never rained. If it w 15 ial part of our modern daily life. It is very very important for us. For example 16 , anything is different from what it was very very short time ago. Surely , so i 17 t usually use “fascination” “wonderful” “very very beautiful” “be of ability” et 18 that of the house. By the way, I have a very very important exam next week and 19 as the same building as we do enjoyed a very very happy night. we layed lantern

The most-frequent pattern of very is VERY VERY adj observed in CLEC. Eight cases of this pattern in WECCL and nineteen in CLEC are retrieved but none in FROWN nor in FLOB. Concordance lines for pattern VERY VERY adj in CLEC are listed in Table 5.16. Concordance lines show that learners use VERY VERY adj to express a strong attitude. The reason the pattern VERY VERY adj becomes a favorite expression for Chinese learners is summarized as follows: learners possibly think that repeating intensifiers can further strengthen an attitude, which originates from their mother tongue. Repeating intensifiers may be an effective way for learners to express a stronger attitudinal meaning when they have a poor command of vocabulary and fail to find a proper word. The fact that the pattern VERY VERY adj does not appear in the native corpora FROWN and FLOB is worth noting. Whether native speakers use the pattern VERY VERY adj and how it is distributed in different registers1 is investigated. The pattern VERY VERY adj is searched in the one-hundred-million word BNC, which can be accessed online (http://corpus.byu.edu/bnc/). The frequency of VERY VERY adj in each register in BNC is listed in Diagram 5-3. Data show that the pattern VERY VERY adj is mainly used in spoken registers. In every million words in BNC, VERY VERY adj appears sixty-two times in the spoken register, whereas this pattern appears no more than once in each of the written registers. Evidence in BNC proves that the repetition of very is an acceptable way to intensify the speakers’ attitude. However, this usage is a rather informal expression because it is largely used in the spoken register and rarely found in the written text.

66

Patterning features of intensifiers

The frequency of pattern VERY VERY adj in BNC 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 c is

em Ac

ad

M

ic

d ca -a on N

sp ew N

M

ag

az

ap

in

er

e

n io ct Fi

Sp

ok

en

F Per Mil

Diagram 5-3 The pattern VERY VERY adj in different registers of BNC

The frequent use of VERY VERY adj in CLEC shows that Chinese learners of English lack the awareness of register variation. When they fail to find a proper intensifier, they will repeat the available intensifier to show a strong attitude without considering its appropriateness. The Chinese learners’ overuse of VERY VERY adj results from the use of a communicative strategy when they face a problem of vocabulary shortage. This communicative strategy helps them remedy their vocabulary inadequacy and reach the communicative goal (Fearch & Kasper, 1983; Paribakht, 1985). Repeating intensifiers is just one way to express their strong emotion. 5.2.2.3

The node word so

The intensifier so is the second most frequently used item just next to very in both the CL corpus and the NS corpus. Statistics (see Chapter 4) have shown that Chinese learners overuse it significantly in comparison with the native speakers. The top-ten adjective collocates of intensifier so in each sub-corpus of CLEC are collected and shown in Table 5.17. Table 5.17 shows that the top adjective collocates of the intensifier so are many, much, good, bad, important, serious, etc. The common feature of the collocates of so shared by all of the five sub-corpora of CLEC is that the top-two collocates are exactly the same. So many and so much are two favorite collocations by Chinese learners of English. Therefore, the two collocations are further discussed to reveal their typical features. Some dictionaries (e.g. Quirk et al., 1985; Biber et al., 2000) set many and much as quantifiers or determiners in patterns v-link so much and v-link too much. But in this study, many and much are regarded as adjectives based on the criterion set by the dictionary of English-Chinese Dictionary (second edition; Lu, 2007), which is a widely used dictionary by Chinese learners.

Patterning features of intensifiers

67

Table 5.17 Collocates of so in each sub-corpus of CLEC N

ST2 Collocates

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

F

ST3

ST4

ST5

ST6

Collocates F

Collocates F

Collocates F

Collocates F

many much anxious harmful bad good short great apt dangerous

many much good serious happy difficult important beautiful excited glad

many much important good tired civilized high lazy powerful simple

many 46 many much 13 much great 3 important easy 2 bad important 2 easy simple 2 large advanced 1 big ambiguous 1 difficult complicated 1 expensive concerned 1 glad

62 30 5 4 3 2 2 2 2 2

56 18 5 3 3 3 3 3 2 2

63 22 12 10 7 6 6 5 5 5

58 21 4 3 3 2 2 2 2 2

Table 5.18 Concordance lines for improper use of SO many in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

eer in the world. In fact, there are now so many beer that some are being sent t e. Then why should we let him still have so many freedom to misbehave and why sh ground . So, some people said, there are so many fresh water that we can use it e so many words you must know. There are so many grammar and idiom you should le ath. In the former statement, There are so many harms of the fake commodities, e want. But the unhappy thing is we have so many homework to do. every day I hav break. At last you read them all, but, so many knowledge in your mind only lea e are unhappy. I am ones, because I have so many many home work to do. I have no enefits in the gulf. The middle east had so many oil and in modern world, the pr ve to eat them so much. Though there are so many other food in Mid-Autumn day wh s been increased . Factories have earned so many profits in industry . Preseants esh water more appropriately. And, there so many water on the surface of the ear big cat. The cat was very fat and it has so many white fur. My neighbour always pend a lot of time to do it best. Change so many work is not good for us do thin

5.2.2.3.1 THE NODE PHRASE SO MANY

There are 285 (SF = 26.7) cases of SO many in CLEC, 45 (SF = 3.1) in FROWN and 50 (SF = 3.4) in FLOB, respectively. This shows that learners overuse SO many nearly eight times in comparison with the native speakers. Factors that account for the overuse of SO many are analyzed as follows: one reason is that SO many appears in the learner’s textbooks at an earlier period and has become a fixed phrase. Thus it has become a fixed expression in the learners’ memory. The other reason for the overuse of SO many is possibly that learners misuse SO many in a lot of cases. SO many intensifies the plural form of a countable noun. It is both grammatically and collocationally improper to use it to modify an uncountable noun. However, in CLEC, learners use SO many to modify uncountable nouns a lot. The following cases in Table 5.18 illustrate this point.

68

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.18 illustrates that learners use SO many to modify uncountable nouns – for example, water, beer, work, food, oil, knowledge, freedom, etc. The misuse can be traced to the following factors. One is that learners transfer L1 knowledge into L2 negatively (Ellis, 1981; Odlin, 1989). For Chinese learners, there are no plural forms for nouns in their mother language. So it is unavoidable for them to confuse the countable nouns with the uncountable nouns in the target language. There is a great possibility for learners to misuse SO many to intensify uncountable nouns. The possible reason is that learners have a low language proficiency level. Though they have been taught the grammatical rules that SO many should intensify countable nouns and SO much for uncountable nouns, learners’ low proficiency level of English causes improper expression in actual practice. In the retrieved collocations, errors such as so many time, so many work are quite frequent. Such errors reveal a disparity between Chinese learners’ English and the native English, which is an outstanding feature in interlanguage. 5.2.2.3.2 THE NODE PHRASE SO MUCH

In CLEC, there are 104 (SF = 9.7) occurrences of SO much, whereas there are 26 (SF = 1.70) and 25 (SF = 1.77) cases in the native corpora FROWN and FLOB, respectively. Chinese learners use SO much nearly eight times more frequently than the native speakers. From the concordance lines for SO much in CLEC, it is found that learners not only overuse SO much, but they also misuse it to a great extent. Table 5.19 shows that learners misuse SO much to intensify countable nouns such as people, difficulty, activities and words, and they misuse the part of speech of intensified nouns – e.g. they mistakenly use courageous, hurmles (misspelling in learner English) as courage and harmless. The major causes for the overuse of SO much are similar to those for SO many. The interchangeable use of SO many and SO much shows that learners violate the

Table 5.19 Concordance lines for improper use of SO much in CLEC 1 mile are always on my mind. They give me 2 In our everyday life, we will meet with 3 ourist guide, or you’ll regret!” Knowing 4 ent. Because at that time, there was not 5 country. Since the fake commodities have 6 fire. Because the fake commodities have 7 eat distroy.Since fake commodities have 8 and dignity. Since fake commodities have 9 s because they have experienced so much. 10 ll cause a lot of problems. if we attend 11 ll cause a lot of problems. if we attend 12 learning about society. Now that I have

so much courageous. My grandfather pas so much difficulty. It’s hard to avoid. so much disadvantages of the job, I alm so much highly educated people and even so much hurmles, how should we do to m so much dangerous. We must take some m so much harms. It is a curious problem so much disadvantage and harmness,we s So much failures have told them that “h so much activities what we can’t have p so much activities that we can’t have p so much ways to choose from. As for me

Patterning features of intensifiers

69

co-selection principle in English. The co-selection of SO many and countable nouns, SO much and uncountable nouns are not well mastered by the learners. Learners’ incomplete mastery of SO many and SO much is suggestive of the partial command of grammatical rules. Their language is on the continuum “from partial to precise” (Henriksen, 1999). One phenomenon worthy of noticing about SO much is that varieties of SO much2 found in the native English are absent in learner English. These expressions include SO much as (to) vt n, SO much as n, SO much so that, etc. Concordance lines for these patterns in native English are shown in Table 5.20. The three extended collocations of SO much are all absent in CLEC. The divergence between the native and learner English in employing different collocations of SO much indicates that learner English lacks a variety if of expressions. Learners can only make use of a small limited number of expressions, which leads to the rigidity and awkwardness of their language production. 5.2.2.4

The node word too

The intensifier too is among the top-five most frequently used intensifiers in both CL and NS corpus. Table 5.21 lists the frequency of too in each corpus. The overall frequency of too in CLEC is 537, about two times of that in FROWN and FLOB. In light of the concordance lines for the booster too, too collocations, TOO many, TOO much and the pattern v-link TOO adj to v are, the most frequent. They will be discussed in detail in the following sections.

Table 5.20 Concordance lines for SO much in the FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

ne’) does not conclude the G39 143 novel so much the chance, for P13 203 Tremaine didn’t so much who would’ve waylaid N03 168 you without so much and hadn’t touched each L15 6 other by so much notidentify a single J51 12 enterprise so much and mustache made him look like nothing so much t very strong. Certainly it is with me, so much She commanded a ton of G74 97 resp.ect, so much innumerable salads and F26 45 desserts so much

as make explicit the narrative as glance her way. P13 204 with as a second thought.” Langdon s as a finger. Yet they’d moved c as a confusing conglomeration o as a N20 70 surprised walrus re so that G71 153 autobiography i so that when she died in 1952, so that to most American cooks

Table 5.21 Frequency of too in CL and NS corpus Corpora

CLEC

FROWN

FLOB

Too (F) Too (SF)

537 50

366 25

358 24

70

Patterning features of intensifiers

5.2.2.4.1 THE NODE PHRASE SO MUCH

TOO much appears 108 (SF = 10.4) times in CLEC, 32 (SF = 2.1) in FROWN and 37 (SF = 2.5) in FLOB. It shows that learners use TOO much nearly five times more frequently than the native speakers. In addition to the overuse of TOO much, several other aspects are worth further investigation. One typical feature of learners’ use of TOO much is the misuse of noun collocates in its N + 1 position. Noun collocates of TOO much are uncountable nouns, and for TOO many they are countable nouns. However, learners appear to use TOO much in many cases to collocate with countable nouns, and they also use TOO many to collocate with uncountable nouns. Table 5.22 and Table 5.23 exhibit those improper usages. Table 5.22 and Table 5.23 demonstrate Chinese learners’ misuse of TOO much and TOO many. Evidenced together by the misapplication of SO many and Table 5.22 Improper usage of TOO much in CLEC 1 and practice through social activities. 2 can learn what we can’t from our books. 3 and practice through social activities. 4 ought to make good use of time study So 5 to make clear what we are studying for. 6 ford them. On the other hand, there are 7 smats. For another example, if there are 8 l the time while he doesn’t like it? But 9 ods. For example, the fruits. If you eat 10 ople and post offices a lot of trouble . 11 n of more than ten million. In China has 12 t too much wars and people can deal with 13 l have too much social matters to do and 14 early age from heart illness. Not to eat 15 us have no energy to study. We will have 16 time that we should spend studying. And 17 ot of problems. Students’ task is study. 18 ends and know the real world we live in. 19 They may be work. To hard that they bump 20 od medical care. Moreover, there are not

Too much Too much Too much too much Too much too much too much too much too much Too much too much too much too much too much too much Too much Too much Too much too much too much

activities on the other hand, activities, on the other hand, activities. on the other hand activities inevitably take up activities, on the other hand, cards to delivery so that the cars in a big city, it is bett changes can also bring disorde fruits, it’s bad for your stom greeting cards can make people mountains. Although the lands natural disasters themselves. parties to attend. Therefore, potato crisps, potato chips, b social matters to do and too m social activities will make us social activities will occupy social activities, on the othe things into my head and I feel wars and people can deal with

Table 5.23 Improper usage of TOO many in CLEC 1 s When I was still a child, I have heard 2 mline Administration. Our class cadre is 3 ey are fond of their jobs or didn’t like 4 rths.The reason leading to the result is 5 and many rob even happen every year and 6 he pressure from their country And those 7 water, and those factories also produce

too many too many. too many too many. too many too many too many

tstory about these kind men who When they have a meeting outs tchange in their usually daily The first one. After the worl tnoice. And I like peaceful and tdead and wounded solider will trubbish. The rubbish poluted m

Patterning features of intensifiers

71

SO much, it is confirmed that L1 transfer is happening when learners try to express themselves in English. The differences between Chinese and English cause the learners’ misuse of TOO much and TOO many. Another obvious aspect concerning TOO much in the learner English is the use of the pattern v-link TOO much to be v-ed, which cannot be found in the native corpora. However, seven similar sentences are found in CLEC: “The advantage(s) of two-day weekends are too much to be listed” (one of the seven words listed is wrongly spelt as listened). The concordance lines containing the pattern v-link TOO much to be v-ed in CLEC are shown in Table 5.24. The subject “advantages” in the expression “The advantages of two-day weekends are too much to be listed” is a countable noun. It should collocate with TOO many instead of TOO much. Also, the meaning expressed by “too much to be listed” is not exact. A better way of expressing the idea would be “too many to be listed exhaustively.” A third trait to be noticed about the learners’ use of TOO much is the absence of v-link intensifier TOO much (for/to do n), which is a natural expression in native English. In the pattern v-link intensifier TOO much (for/to do n), a second intensifier is spotted before TOO much to strengthen or mitigate the attitude (see Table 5.25). For example, intensifiers a little, just, almost, simply are devices to alleviate the strong attitude expressed, and the intensifier all is just functioning contrarily. However, this is unavailable to learners, which results in exaggerated and rigid expressions in learner English. Devices such as a little, just, almost before TOO much render the tough attitude in a euphemistic manner; on the other Table 5.24 The pattern v-link TOO much to be v-ed in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

ng th advantages of two-day weekends are have advantages of two-day weekends are ake p advantages of two-day weekends are In fa adventages of two-day weekends are l ma e advantage of two-day weekends are ill-e advantages of two-day weekends are he ri advantages of two-day weekends are

too much to be listed. too much to be listend. too much to be listed. too much to be listed. too much to be listed. too much to be listed. too much to be listed.

First of al e th during th adva Since we ha e jo As we have advan Firstly, pe tte Because of ve no In the two rd. W

Table 5.25 Concordance lines for the pattern v-link intensifier TOO much in NS corpora 1 corate this restaurant. C15 37 Is it all 2 B22 49 butts in Berkeley . . . it was all 3 48 crushed silk Bruce Oldfield was just 4 whole coachload of passengers was almost 5 k of it, the picture is perhaps a little 6 s its sheer E03 39 perfection was simply 7 ere. C15 49 C15 50 Scrawny voice is just 8 rest but after all these years it’s just

too much? In its intrinsic beauty, Bell too much for me! I snapped. I’m B22 50 too much. Alabama concentrated R08 49 a too much to P28 146 bear, and that by a too much even G45 114 for the bedroom: too much . . . a while later, my mother f too much these days C15 51 SINGLES C15 too much. C15 57 He dabbles unconvincin

72

Patterning features of intensifiers

hand, intensifiers all and really are used to strengthen the attitude. The extreme expression of the learner English embodied by the use of TOO much suggests the low pragmatic skill of Chinese learners. 5.2.2.4.2 THE NODE PHRASE TOO MANY

Fifty occurrences of TOO many are retrieved from CLEC (SF = 4.6), forty (SF = 2.7) from FROWN and seventeen (SF = 1.2) from FLOB, respectively. TOO many in CLEC is used nearly two times more frequently than that in FROWN and four times more frequently than that in FLOB. Twenty concordance lines for TOO many in CLEC are randomly chosen and shown in Table 5.26. Several patterns of TOO many in the learner corpus CLEC can be found. They are as follows: vt TOO many n v-link TOO many n TOO many n v there be TOO many n v-link TOO many The same research procedures have been adopted for the data in NS corpus. Twenty concordance lines in FROWN are extracted randomly and shown in Table 5.27. The patterns which are observed in CLEC can all be found in the NS corpora Table 5.26 Concordance lines for TOO many in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

ivory tower and into the real world. But too many social activities on the other ng and down to feet I became a girl with too many bad experiences. First, one da too many benifits . But, activities are too many and will affect our study. aft for usual people to sing, for there are too many skills. Third, the Pop Music s for. In modern society, one can’t master too many jobs. And one should do his sp speed. If we put too much our energy and too many resources on the speed, qualit rths.The reason leading to the result is too many. The first one. After the worl ey are fond of their jobs or didn’t like too many change in their usually daily , I often feel worse. Because I had got too many pieces of medicines!Now I know to do it. But one afternoon, there were too many people to wait. After I sold t se the trust of the people. If there are too many fake commodities in the societ will disturb the economy. When there are too many fake commodities, the factorie to the line to buy the ticket.There are too many people. I can’t find her. I on and many rob even happen every year and too many noice. And I like peaceful and larger industrialized city and there are too many motor vehicles on the streets. dge, some students complained that there too many new words. But I would say onc ne. Besides, during the peaceful period, too many professional soldiers will cau he pressure from their country And those too many dead and wounded solider will eavy burder on the goverment’s treasury. Too many unnessary idlers seriously baf e paradise of equality. History has seen too many tragedies in which devotees of

Patterning features of intensifiers

73

Table 5.27 Concordance lines for TOO many in FROWN 1 12 52 responsibility and social order in too many areas of our A12 53 society,” 2 76 rightfully so - about screen clutter. Too many credits. Too many A42 77 logos 3 be Dan Quayle is right. Maybe we do have too many lawyers. B17 27 The news spark 4 at will soon be B26 110 overwhelmed with too many people. Let us hope that the n 5 mewhat veiled. The result, of course, is too many phrases like C12 167 “many say 6 must F12 182 seek out new perspectives. Too many enterprises are currently base 7 4 216 too many facts, too many theories, too many subjects, too many F44 217 spe 8 only to suffer later by G60 40 taking on too many opponents in too few years. Hi 9 aring today. As H03 101 we all know, far too many women in our neighborhoods are 10 ssault, H03 108 and, as we all know, far too many women are denied justice. H03 11 3 66 parents’ urging. Farming simply has too many barriers to remain H13 67 attr 12 oubts “about whether H18 157 UNESCO uses too many supplementary staff or validly 13 ective program. J40 29 Unfortunately, in too many companies, including some of t 14 sion. There were K12 78 too many blanks, too many variables, too many things we 15 n working around K18 30 water. He’d seen too many cameras go into the water when 16 h palms and ficuses and L06 97 ferns and too many landscape lights to please him 17 t in Calusa, though L11 266 nowadays not too many people were going out to eat, 18 read my mind? L13 216 “You been reading too many detective stories, L13 217 Lie 19 on my N18 149 people. I know about that. Too many different speakers for the sam 20 aurant, for example, and we’d have a few too many glasses of R03 187 wine, and o

FROWN and FLOB. However, discrepancies of pattern TOO many are found between the native English and learner English. The first discrepancy between native English and learner English concerns the expression of the concept of existence. In the native corpora, the pattern have TOO many n is widely used to express the notion of existence, while in the learner corpus, the pattern there be TOO many n is used to convey this concept. The second divergence lies in the modifier before TOO many. In the NS corpus, native speakers usually use a second intensifier, far, to modify TOO many and to fortify the attitude of the speaker. Examples can be observed in the ninth and tenth concordance lines in Table 5.27. However, this usage has not been discovered in CLEC. Different usages of TOO many between native speakers and Chinese learners reveal the non-nativeness of learner English and learners’ inadequate pragmatic skill, which are manifested in the monotonous and unembellished expression. 5.2.2.4.3 THE PATTERN TOO ADJ TO V

The pattern TOO adj to v is also frequently used for intensifier too by Chinese learners of English. There are 120 (SF = 11.2) occurrences of the pattern TOO adj to v in CLEC, 73 (SF = 5.0) in FROWN and 65 (SF = 4.4) in FLOB. Learners not only overuse TOO adj to v, but they also use it in a more divergent way than native speakers do. They are found of using TOO adj to v in a similar way as TOO much. Native speakers usually use a second intensifier before the

74

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.28 Concordance lines for the pattern TOO adj to v in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

much great language. P03 47 “You’re all ecome a K07 2 trickster spirit, was much 9 81 operation of a nuclear plant is far 122 too tired to do anything, apparently ll his problems, G60 106 Kerouac was far direction - is G71 185 that one is never nimals? F48 42 America’s wildlife is far rtunity this presented was E11 24 almost curators decided that the table was just erences over his A07 195 case were still Spanish. Many officers A37 35 were only

too good to be bad,” he’d told P03 48 t too eager to hunt and kill what he coul too insignificant to have any J79 82 im too tired to go to bed and G51 123 make too gifted to let the experience lie fa too old to express resentment against o too precious to get caught or lost in a too good to be true. E11 25 La Tulipe w too beautiful to put into E35 197 stora too great to allow a conclusion before too glad to lose responsibility for aid

booster too in this pattern. These intensifiers include all, almost, only, far, never, still, etc., which can be found in Table 5.28. However, no such occurrence has ever been found in CLEC. The disparities of using TOO adj to v between the native speakers and the learners show again the learners’ poor collocational knowledge and weak pragmatic awareness in communication. The fact that learners frequently use the pattern TOO adj to v but are incompetent when applying the pattern adv TOO adj to v shows that they possess poor collocational knowledge and are not good at using prefabs of far too adj. to do, all too adj. to do, only too adj. to do, etc., to convey their attitude. 5.2.2.5

The node phrase more and more

Chinese learners of English favor the phrase more and more for strengthening an attitude. It occurs 192 (SF = 17.9) times in CLEC and only 8 times in FROWN (SF = 0.53) and FLOB (SF = 0.54), respectively. Obviously, Chinese learners use more and more over thirty times more frequently than native speakers. Twenty concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in CLEC were extracted and listed in Table 5.29.1. All the retrieved concordance lines for MORE AND MORE adj in FLOB are shown in Table 5.30. An examination of the larger context of MORE AND MORE adj reveals the following four main patterns: v-link MORE AND MORE adj vt MORE AND MORE adj n vt MORE AND MORE adj vt n/pron MORE AND MORE adj MORE AND MORE adj mainly functions as the predicative, attributive and complement in a sentence in learner English. The pattern play a MORE AND

Patterning features of intensifiers

75

Table 5.29.1 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in CLEC(1) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

this is only my one dream. There will be ives when their living conditions change me are poor. This difference is becoming x after a day’s work. Since we live in a ed at the mirror now and then and turned nowadays in China is graduates becoming more and more land, by making the water e outside world, the competition becomes ny kinds of sports, we’ll make ourselves Bicycle become n the past years, population have become . People should be blamed. People become on polluted the fresh water, and made it m of the shortage of fresh water becomes ies for development, this problem became on, for one thing, China now is becoming the problem of cigarette smoking become dition, the polution problem is becoming ndustry is rising; pollution of water is des the standards of morality. Recently,

more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more

beautiful dreams. I will better. Secondly, in old bigger So we have five st competitive society, we h dejected. Dad noticed tha difficult to find a job. dirty Her green gowtment fierce. It undermines men healthy. On the other han important in china . And b large and induristy has i lazy today. When the prog limmited . The global sho noticeable. What should w outstanding. Women should prosperous since he persu serious in society. Not o serious. And amount of fr serious. . . All these sh violent and obscene stori

MORE adj role is frequently found in learner English. Expressions of play a more and more important role, play a more and more harmful role, etc., are very commonly used by beginners and even by some advanced learners of English. However, the pattern MORE AND MORE adj is rarely used in the predicative position nor the complement position in native English because only two cases in FROWN and no such occurrence in FLOB have been found. Data in FROWN and FLOB show that native speakers are not likely to use the pattern MORE AND MORE adj to modify a noun or a verb as learners do. The most typical verb collocates of the pattern MORE AND MORE adj are link verbs such as be, become, get, grow and look in native English. However, learners employ different verb collocates in the N-1 position. The various verb collocates spotted in learner English are change, develop (misspelling), make, play, use, rebuild, etc. Some can be found in Table 5.29.2. Those patterns created by learners cause the non-nativeness in learner English. Adjective collocates in the N + 1 position of more and more are also investigated, and some awkward expressions are detected in learner English. Many of the adjective collocates in learner English are one-syllable adjectives such as big, small, bad, rich and strong. Collocations of more and more fast, more and more strong, more and more dirty, more and more bad and more and more busy, etc., can be frequently found in learner English. Concordance lines for such expressions are displayed in Table 5.31. This reveals that learners command partial grammatical knowledge of comparatives to express intensification. When learners are not

76

Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.29.2 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in CLEC(2) 1 the economy develops, money is playing a life is rising. Our country has played a 2 x after a day’s work. Since we live in a 3 ame time, fake commodities are playing a 4 themselves from hard work, so they begin 5 more and ore happy, we also will change 6 s since 1978, we feel the country change 7 ives when their living conditions change 8 9 on: Modernization has made today’s China 10 a new modern face and makes our country the Pop. Wish both of them will develope 11 , it also cause problems. People find it 12 on polluted the fresh water, and made it 13 sed his students and develop his lessons 14 ny kinds of sports, we’ll make ourselves 15 etty years. Our school have been rebuilt 16 17 f Computers Nowaday , computers are used more and more land, by making the water 18

more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more

important role in our liv important role in interna competitive society, we h harmful role. They are a strong. These resut in t friendly. strong rich. better. Secondly, in old powerful and prosperous i powerful -- all these are beautiful in the future. difficult to find a job, limmited. The global sho interesting and attacktiv healthy. On the other han beautiful since it formed ordinary . Not only in a dirty Her green gowtment

Table 5.30 Concordance lines for the pattern MORE AND MORE adj in FLOB 1 a G18 101 reflection which was looking 2 heir disastrous meal. L16 68 Ulla looked 3 cial F07 94 gatherings and Veronica grew 4 She F07 151 was frightened and getting 5 laughter. “Oh, my lord, this P02 36 gets 6 t the hands of a hostile system becoming 7 M04 172 burger cabins. Ron would become 8 G63 6 themselves which philosophers are

more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more

true as they stood G18 10 miserable. “What am I goi disgruntled. She felt F07 nervous which made her F0 unbelievable. I now under apparent as J61 147 the n irritable as the day M04 inclined to doubt. G63 7

sure whether to repeat the comparative forms of the adjective, or to use more and more before an adjective, they are more likely to choose the pattern MORE AND MORE adj than to repeat the comparative forms to express the strong attitude. The frequent employment of MORE AND MORE adj (a single syllable word) is an obvious indication of L1 transfer. Such expressions as more and more fast, more and more strong, more and more dirty, more and more bad and more and more busy are the translation equivalences of Chinese expressions. Since native speakers use the pattern MORE AND MORE adj less than learners, it is critical to probe the alternative expressions that native speakers use to express an increasing intensification. Corpus data show that the intensifier increasingly is an alternative expression. There are four (SF = 0.37) cases of pattern

Patterning features of intensifiers

77

Table 5.31 Concordance lines for MORE AND MORE in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

the fake medicine, His sick will become ives when their living conditions change me are poor. This difference is becoming nglish. April 19th Saturday Sunny We are more and more land, by making the water ground because the time of the match was yground because the time of the match is n the past years, population have become for me. Now, I’m growing up , but she is olicy. Since the our country have become n, maybe tired of talking, people became industry’s need, fresh water have become e pollution of river, fresh water become seases can be cured. The families become They are getting rid of poor and become t time, the other countries are becoming n the computer. I think computer will be common now, hence the world is becoming themselves from hard work, so they begin one to have a job. And the thing becomes

more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more more and more

bad or as bad as before.S better. Secondly, in old bigger So we have five st busy now. Because we are dirty Her green gowtment fast and they hoped that fast .Our class’s student large and induristy has i older . But she is still power . Either agricultur quiet. But that girl cont rare . In addtion , the p rare . Moreover, the indu rich . People haven’t to rich with the developing rich, but our country is small and cheaper and che smaller. They, as we know strong . These resut in t worse today. In some plac

Table 5.32 Concordance lines for the pattern INCREASINGLY adj in CLEC 1 equality of women. Women are playing an 2 the women’s liberation organization play 3 nowadays Chinese young people are facing 4 undoutedly live a longer life, body will

increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly

important role in society important role in western serious problem on job-see strong and healthy. Second

INCREASINGLY adj in CLEC, forty-three (SF = 2.92) in FROWN and fifty-four (SF = 3.68) in FLOB, respectively. Contrary to the thirtyfold overuse of more and more, learners use increasingly nearly ten times less than the native speakers do. Table 5.32 and Table 5.33 include the concordance lines of INCREASINGLY adj in CLEC and FROWN. The collocational behaviors of the phrasal intensifier more and more are listed in Table 5.34. The significant overuse and misuse of MORE AND MORE adj and the underuse of INCREASINGLY adj in learner English prove that learners tend to employ the very familiar and easily handled patterns. That is the reason why the learners are simply repeating certain expressions, which leads to the overuse of certain patterns and the underuse of others. Therefore, the non-native expressions in learner English will occur.

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Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.33 Concordance lines for the pattern INCREASINGLY adj in FROWN 1 otes, laws, codes, F45 171 and rules are increasingly available in electronic ve 2 mpromise on J55 109 reparations appeared increasingly bleak. J55 110 The negotia 3 Future H19 53 Money-launderers are using increasingly complex schemes to H19 54 4 05 Telephone & Telegraph Co. A35 206 The increasingly crowded market has slowed 5 t increases, E32 19 ladder logic becomes increasingly cumbersome - it struggles 6 vity. In reality, F27 138 agriculture is increasingly dependent on chemical and 7 ed E23 146 with pastel that marks become increasingly difficult to make; a E23 1 8 verted into the deadly cancer state, the increasingly efficient F31 6 immune sys 9 echniques to be used, they became G67 28 increasingly enthusiastic about the pos 10 quainted with the performer, his C10 167 increasingly famous character is a will 11 occasion. Eulalia, twice widowed, seemed increasingly frail to Tim, N16 210 alth 12 in most J14 28 series. In rank order of increasingly good prognosis, the J14 29 13 ill dominated schools G57 180 serving an increasingly heterogeneous people. But 14 ace of extreme G23 47 hardship and in an increasingly hostile environment. G23 4 15 Whites, Asians, and Latinos are A13 143 increasingly less likely to live near b 16 r ‘allies’. This reference is an B20 117 increasingly outdated relic of the cold 17 in for target shooting, a ‘sport’ G04 14 increasingly popular in New York City, 18 earing plastic fangs. He F01 163 becomes increasingly sadistic to a female emplo 19 wly rejected A04 120 in June, is growing increasingly unpopular throughout the 1 20 working lining, make that lining J76 133 increasingly vulnerable to corrosion. O

Table 5.34 Collocational behaviors of MORE AND MORE Phrasal intensifier more and more

NS corpus

CL corpus

Typical syntax

in the predicate position

in the predicate position, the attributive position and the predicate complement position

Typical collocates in the N-1 position

link verbs (be, become, get)

link verbs (be, become, get) and lexical verbs (make, play, change, develop )

Typical collocates in the N+1 position

multi-syllable adjectives: (complex, afraid, explosive)

multi-syllable adjectives (healthy, beautiful) & one-syllable adjectives (good, bad, rich)

Typical semantic meaning

expressing an increasing degree of attitude

exaggerating an increasing degree of attitude

Alternative expressions

using increasingly a lot

seldom using increasingly

5.2.3

Downtoners

The intensifiers almost, rather, a little and hardly are most frequently used in each of the functional categories of approximator, compromiser, diminisher and minimizer as evidenced by the CLEC data. Therefore, they are selected and explored

Patterning features of intensifiers

79

Table 5.35 Typical patterns of almost NS

CL

Different v-link ALMOST adj that clause: no typical patterns e.g. But she was not almost certain that wasn’t what he had different said (FLOB). patterns It is now almost certain that the party will not consider the issue . . . (FROWN). used as an independent nominative: e.g. . . . Almost unique on the earth, its Inuit inhabitants stretch. . . . (FROWN). . . . “Almost Artisanale?” I asked the co-operative’s . . . (FLOB). vt. n/pron ALMOST adj ( to v): e.g. . . . make it almost impossible to keep eyes open . . . (FLOB). I find it almost impossible to throw any cheering light (FROWN). vt. n/pron ALMOST adj of n: e.g. . . . tugged it almost free of her nightdress so that it hung like . . . (FLOB). Shared patterns

v-link ALMOST adj (prep(in/of/as) n): e.g. He was almost graceful at my words. (CLEC) The kind of separation has become almost axiomatic in Protestant theory . . . (FROWN) v-link ALMOST adj (for n) to v (n): e.g. It is almost impossible to study something very well if . . . (CLEC) It is almost impossible not to murmur. . . . (FLOB) vt pron-possess ALMOST adj n. e.g. . . . woman can obtain almost equal pay as men. (CLEC) . . . leading to almost certain doom for the tigers. (FROWN) prep pron-possess ALMOST adj n e.g. . . . with his almost insignificant income, he could hardly pay the fees. (CLEC) . . . with its almost whimsical refrain of love lost and . . . . (FLOB)

in depth. The learner corpus used in this section is CLEC, and the native corpora are FROWN and FLOB. Tables 5.35 to 5.38 display the typical patterns of almost, rather, a little and hardly used by learners and native speakers, respectively. Data in the tables show similarities and differences in the patterns of the four downtoners in the learner English and the native English. Table 5.35 lists the patterns of almost. Besides the patterns vt ALMOST adj that clause and vt. n/pron ALMOST adj of, etc., shared by native English and learner English, native speakers use some other patterns such as vt ALMOST adj that clause, vt. n/pron ALMOST adj (to v.), vt. n/pron ALMOST adj of n. and when ALMOST adj (used as an independent nominative). However, the aforementioned patterns in native English have not been detected in learner English, which indicates that the learners’ pattern knowledge of almost is partial and the learners’ expression is monotonous.

Table 5.36 Typical patterns of rather NS and CL Different patterns

no different patterns detected

Shared patterns

v-link RATHER adj: e.g. My approach is rather different. (FLOB) Although our society is rather industrialized and developed, I believe. . . . (CLEC) vt (art) RATHER adj n: e.g. . . . he had rather limited success practicing law . . . (FROWN) . . . which has a rather bad effect on me. (CLEC) vt n RATHER adj: e.g. This makes my listening rather weak. (CLEC) It would have made him rather ill or very ill . . . (FLOB) art RATHER adj vt: e.g. A rather popular saying may tell us something illusive . . . (CLEC) My rather poor joke seems to have backfire. (FLOB) prep (pron/art/) RATHER adj n: e.g. The resulting pressure are experienced in rather quick succession and . . . (FLOB) Singapore is a country with rather low criminal rate. (CLEC)

Table 5.37 Typical patterns of a little NS

CL

Different patterns

vt A LITTLE adj n: e.g. . . . then began a little harmless flirtation. (FROWN) . . . squeezing a little new life into the world. (FLOB) v-link adv A LITTLE adj: e.g. . . . the range of population densities is only a little wider. (FLOB) She was excited, and probably a little scared. (FLOB)

vt A LITTLE adj: e.g. I had a little unhappy today. (CLEC) When I caught the ring first, I had a little afraid. (CLEC)

Shared patterns

v-link A LITTLE adj: e.g. John is a little hard to get along with. (FROWN) He might be a little hard-headed. (CLEC) vt n/pron A LITTLE adj: e.g. . . . sweetmeats probably made him a little nauseous. (FROWN) . . . but I found it a little dirty because. . . (CLEC) A LITTLE adj (prep n) (functioning as companying adverbial): e.g. She replied, a little uncertain, but still smiling. (FROWN) She questioned, a little impatient with my soundless response. (CLEC)

Patterning features of intensifiers

81

Table 5.38 Typical patterns of hardly NS

CL

Different patterns

v-link HARDLY adj e.g. That is hardly free.(FLOB) v-link HARDLY adj of n: e.g. . . . be hardly aware of her presence. (FLOB) v-link HARDLY adj as clause: e.g. . . . hardly surprising really as their line-up packed in seven full internationals. (FLOB) v-link HARDLY adj that clause: e.g. . . . is hardly surprising that the headmaster of . . . (FLOB) v-link HARDLY adj to n. that clause: e.g. . . . is hardly noticeable to anyone else that you are . . . (FLOB)

v-link HARDLY adj n: e.g. . . . hardly curable disease . . . (CLEC) v-link HARDLY adj in n: e.g. . . . is hardly effective in presenting us a steady and prosperous society. (CLEC) v-link HARDLY adj in vt-ing: e.g. . . . is hardly effective in presenting us a steady and prosperous society. (CLEC)

Shared patterns

v-link HARDLY adj (for n) (to v. n): e.g. . . . were hardly sufficient to receive them. (FLOB) . . . is hardly possible for you to do . . . (CLEC)

Table 5.36 contains the patterns of rather in learner and native corpora. The five patterns listed in Table 5.36 are all shared by the learner and the native speakers. However, further investigation indicates that the basic pattern v-link RATHER adj accounts for 68% of all the patterns of rather in learner English. But it takes up only 32% and 35% in FROWN and FLOB, respectively. This is congruent with the general trend of intensifier patterns (see Table 5.1). Patterning features of rather shows that learners tend to depend on certain familiar patterns, and they lack variation in their English expression. Table 5.37 displays the patterns of a little. Contrary to most of the other downtoners, which are underused in this research, the learners use the diminisher a little more frequently than the native speakers. However, the overuse of a little is coupled with the underuse of its synonym diminisher somewhat. Discrepancies exist between the learner expression and native expression in using a little. The shared patterns by learners and native speakers are v-link A LITTLE adj, vt n/pron A LITTLE adj and A LITTLE adj (prep n).The different patterns used by native speakers are vt A LITTLE adj n and v-link adv A LITTLE adj. One pattern used exclusively by learners is vt A LITTLE adj. In conclusion, native speakers use A LITTLE adj both attributively and predicatively, whereas learners mainly use it predicatively. Native speakers use various patterns of A LITTLE adj. The lack of the pattern v-link adv A LITTLE adj in learner English indicates that learners are not good at alleviating an extreme attitude by adding another intensifier before the diminisher a little. The pattern vt A LITTLE adj in learner English indicates learners’ partial grammatical and vocabulary knowledge.

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Patterning features of intensifiers

Table 5.38 lists the patterns of hardly. One common pattern shared by learners and native speakers is v-link HARDLY adj (for n) (to v. n). Most patterns of hardly used by native speakers and learners are different. Native speakers use various kinds of patterns of hardly, while learners can only manage a few. Native speakers tend to use a clause after hardly, which is not found in learner English. In addition, the three patterns v-link HARDLY adj n, v-link HARDLY adj in n and v-link HARDLY adj in v-ing in learner English are not found in the native English. To summarize, downtoners are a group of intensifiers that are generally underused by learners as a whole. Investigation of the four downtoners shows that Chinese learners of English over-rely on certain patterns and lack variation in their expression. In learner English, some typical patterns used by native speakers are missing. This phenomenon is in line with the fact that learners create many new patterns which are not used by native speakers. Their idiosyncrasies in using downtoner patterns result in learners’ non-native expression.

5.3 5.3.1

Discussion Patterning features of intensifiers

(1) Native English manifests important co-selections, whereas learner English reveals all sorts of deviations. Native English data in the present research lend strong support to the co-selection theory proposed by Sinclair (1996, 2004). It is a theory that reconciles the paradigmatic and syntagmatic dimensions of choice at each choice point to explain the text meaning. This model covers five categories of co-selection as components of a lexical item: the node word, collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. Different levels of components co-occur within the meaning unit. As argued by Rudanko and Hunston, the co-occurrence of lexis and pattern is not random but is associated particularly with meaning (Rudanko, 1996; Hunston, 2002). The present research shows that lexis and patterns are co-selected. For example, native speakers employ the pattern neg MAX adj to mitigate an extreme attitude. It is an effective hedging device to comply with the politeness principle in communication (Leech, 1980; Leech & Leech, 1983; Levinson, 1983). Maximizers used in this pattern in native English are entirely, totally and completely, but neither fully nor absolutely. Such an alignment between the maximizer and the negative pattern is an example illustrating the co-selection between lexis and patterns. Lexis and patterns are integrated and form larger meaning units – prefabricated chunks (Tognini-Bonelli, 2001). The co-selection of patterns and registers evidenced by the data in this research is another embodiment of the co-selection theory. For example, the pattern VERY VERY adj is a pattern for exaggerating an attitude. Native data show that this pattern is used in the spoken register rather than in the written register. It is strong proof that patterns and registers are co-selected. Certain patterns appear in certain registers. Once the register is fixed, patterns are not randomly employed. Patterns are constrained by registers and vice versa.

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However, a large quantity of data in learner English indicates learners’ weak awareness of co-selection. Expressions of neg FULLY adj and neg ABSOLUTELY adj in learner English violate the co-selection principle that lexis and patterns co-select each other. The intensifiers fully and absolutely are not the right words for the MAX slot in neg MAX adj. In other words, the open-choice principle is not applied in most cases of language production, but idiom principle is. However, learners have the tendency to treat the pattern neg MAX adj as combinations of individual words rather than a fixed chunk, which leads to the open choice of fully and absolutely in the pattern neg MAX adj. The use of VERY VERY adj also illustrates learners’ weak knowledge in the co-selection of patterns and registers. Learner data show that learners often use this pattern in the written register. It proves that learners have no awareness of register differences and therefore they cannot match the patterns with the right registers in their English output. (2) The pattern distribution trend in learner English is similar to that in the native English with some slight differences. The overall data of patterns show that the general frequency distribution trend in learner English appears to be similar to that in native English. That is, the pattern INT-adj is more likely to be used as an attributive than as a predicative or a supplement, etc., in both native and learner English. However, patterns of INT-adj in learner English are simple, in that learners tend to use more patterns as attributives than native speakers do. The higher the learners’ English proficiency level, the more likely they have similar pattern distributions as the native speakers. Chinese learners’ over-reliance on the pattern INT-adj n indicates that their English is limited in pattern variety. (3) Learners over-rely on familiar patterns and avoid unfamiliar patterns. Chinese learners overuse certain patterns and underuse other patterns. This goes in line with the findings of Granger (1998b), Klerk (2006), Lu (2012), etc. Learners over-rely on those familiar intensifiers and their related patterns to realize their attitudinal meaning. They avoid using new and unfamiliar intensifiers and their related patterns. Patterns such as MORE AND MORE adj, TOO adj TO v, TOO MUCH n, TOO MANY n and A LITTLE adj are highly overused in learner English in comparison with those in the native English. On the contrary, some intensifiers and their related patterns, such as the pattern INCREASINGLY adj, and the pattern SOMEWHAT adj, are underused by Chinese learners. The overused familiar patterns are those which are learned at an early stage of their English study, or are introduced in the textbook at a high frequency. The learners have internalized the frequently used pattern as fixed chunks. They will spontaneously use these familiar chunks whenever they have a communicative need. Patterns that learners avoid provide as much information as those that are frequently used, in that these avoidances may show what competence learners lack or at least which areas learners have not sufficiently developed to permit spontaneous use.

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(4) The over-simplicity of patterns and rigidity of expressions are two main features of learner English. Research findings in this chapter indicate that learner English is very rigid and plain. Many typical patterns are observed in the native corpora, whereas they are absent in the learner corpus. For example, the pattern adv TOO adj to vt n is found to be a very frequent pattern in native English. Adverbs such as far, all, almost and a little are used in front of intensifier too as another intensifier to emphasize or mitigate an attitude. However, the pattern adv TOO adj to vt n has not been found in the learner corpus CLEC. On the other hand, learners do tend to overuse the pattern TOO adj to vt n. Other patterns of v-link intensifier TOO MUCH (for/to vt n), SO much as (to) vt n, SO much as n and SO much so that are rarely or never found in learner English. These all point to one linguistic phenomenon worth noting – i.e. learner English is over-simplified in pattern and rigid in expression. Thus learners’ linguistic output tends to be imprecise in meaning or improper in attitude (either harsh or impolite). For these reasons, communication barriers and misunderstandings are likely to occur. (5) Creative but problematic patterns exist in learner English. A noteworthy phenomenon concerning the intensifier patterns is that many creative but problematic patterns exist in learner English. Learners create many patterns which are not used by native speakers. These patterns include neg ABSOLUTELY adj, neg FULLY adj, SO MANY n(s), SO MUCH n(pl), v-link HARDLY adj n, vt A LITTLE adj, etc., which are questionable because of their non-native features. Some of these expressions are in register considerations; some of them are grammatically and collocationally unacceptable. The creativity of learner English tends to result in Chinese English, an unacceptable form of English (Li, 1993). Wang (2010) argues that learner linguistic creativity should not be regarded as Chinglish. She holds that learners are not passive learners but active producers who try to apply what they have been taught and what they have learned in real communicative activities. But in most cases, learners’ coined patterns are questionable, which just proves learners’ weak knowledge of prefabricated chunks. Learners do not have adequate patterns in command, thus they assemble pieces of words together based on grammatical rules to meet an instant communicative need. The temporarily assembled patterns by the learners are more likely to violate co-selections. 5.3.2

Factors accounting for the patterning features

Typical patterning features in learner English are summarized into the frequently used intensifiers based on the investigation. Factors accountable for typical patterning features are listed as follows: (1) The misuse of intensifier patterns in learner English can be traced to L1 transfer.

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The present research supports the argument that learners’ non-native-like expressions are, to a great extent, due to L1 transfer. Similarities and differences between the target language and the mother tongue exert influence on L2 (Odlin, 1989). Negative transfer leads to errors, over-production, underproduction, miscomprehension and other effects that constitute a divergence between the behavior of native and non-native speakers of a language (Odlin, 1989: 167). The present research shows that the problems of misuse in learner English are negatively transferred from learners’ Chinese. Pattern vt A LITTLE adj is a good illustration of this point. Examples like have a little afraid of plane and have a little unhappy are cases in which learners misuse adjective afraid and unhappy as nouns. The transfer from Chinese grammar causes learners’ confusion of nouns with pronouns in English. To express the meaning of “being afraid, being unhappy,” learners just translate Chinese “有些害怕” “有点不高兴” literally into English, ignoring differences in the parts of speech of words in the two languages. Another example of negative L1 transfer is the misuse of the pattern “TOO MANY adj n” in learner English, in which expressions of too many beer, so many oil, so many homework, so many food, etc., are found. Collocations of too much assignments and too much mountains are of the same problem. In English, too many collocates with countable nouns and too much with uncountable nouns. In Chinese, adjectives or adjectival phrases do not change in form when they modify countable or uncountable nouns. Therefore, it is very likely that learners will transfer their habitual way of using Chinese nouns into the way they use English nouns. They use too many and too much interchangeably to modify a noun. Knowledge in Chinese is transferred when learners use English. Thus we can find the collocations too much friends and too much assignments in learner English. Differences between learners’ native language (Chinese) and their target language (English) cause difficulties in learning the target language, especially when learners have partial command of the target language. (2) Teaching and learning materials are responsible for the overuse and underuse of certain patterns in learner English. A close relationship between the overuse and underuse of certain patterns and the textbook content has been detected in the present research. Learners tend to overuse some patterns and underuse others. The overused and underused patterns are closely related to the textbook input and dictionary inventories. When a pattern appears early and frequently in the textbooks, learners have a good chance of becoming familiar with it. Such patterns investigated in this research include MORE AND MORE adj, TOO adj to vt n, etc., which appear at the earlier period of Chinese learners’ English study and more frequently in their textbooks. Thus they consequently tend to become learners’ “teddy bears” in their daily expression and keep learners staying “safe,” especially in test conditions (Hasselgren, 1994). In contrast, some patterns – for example, INCREASINGLY adj and SOMEWHAT adj – are underused by learners because they are introduced in the textbooks with a relatively lower frequency and at a rather later period of the learners’ English study. Learners “play safe” by holding

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tight to those “teddy bears” and avoid using new and unfamiliar patterns. They often fall back on using the linguistic system that is more familiar to them, especially when they want to express a complex concept. Therefore, it is suggested that linguistic patterns should be carefully selected for textbook material with the aid of corpus data. The input of representative and authentic patterns in language learning can be of help for language learning and teaching. (3) Learners’ use of synonyms causes non-native expression. The present study and many others (Ren, 2008; Wang, 2009; Lu, 2012) have proved that “near synonyms are lexical pairs that have very similar cognitive or denotational meanings, but they differ in collocational or prosodic behaviours. As such, synonymous words are not collocationally interchangeable. . .” (Xiao & McEnery, 2006: 108). Synonyms share denotational meaning but have different connotational, syntactical and functional meanings in most cases. Therefore, more often than not, synonyms cannot substitute one another. Sun (2006) traces this type of error to learners’ communication-based errors of holistic strategy. The present study shows that synonymous maximizers totally, completely, absolutely, entirely and fully do not fill in the MAX slot in the pattern neg MAX adj with equal opportunities. Learners use the five synonymous maximizers interchangeably and therefore they produce the pattern neg ABSOLUTELY adj and the pattern neg COMPLETELY adj, which are not used by native speakers. Poor awareness of colligational and collocational restrictions of synonyms is found to be learners’ major difficulty. The non-native expressions need attention from language book publishers, teachers and the learners themselves. The collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody of synonyms should all be taken into account in the learning and teaching process of synonyms. Native corpora can provide authentic data to distinguish synonyms and should be taken advantage of in language learning and teaching. (4) Poor register-awareness results in awkward expressions in learner English. Different registers have different expressions in vocabulary and grammar (Halliday, 1978). Many previous studies have detected that lexis and patterns are register restrictive (Altenberg, 1991, 1997; Biber et al., 2000). The evidence from this study shows that learners have poor register awareness. For example, the pattern VERY VERY adj is a device employed to intensify an attitude in spoken rather than in written discourse. But learners overuse this pattern significantly in written texts. Another example is the usage of the pattern neg MAX adj. Native English speakers tend to use entirely in the pattern neg MAX adj in written texts. Learners, however, are likely to use the pattern neg ABSOLUTELY adj in oral registers. Learners’ poor register awareness leads to non-native expressions in learner English. Raising learners’ register awareness is necessary to guarantee the production of native-like English. (5) Weak pragmatic skill causes the over-simplification of patterns and rigid expression in learner English.

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Intensifiers may contribute to illocutionary force modification of certain speech acts, serving the function of either aggravation or mitigation (Merlini, 1997). The use of multi-intensifiers is found in native written English to aggravate an attitude, as in the uses of FAR TOO adj to vt n, ALL TOO adj to vt n and MUCH TOO adj to vt n. Intensifiers of far, all and much before the pattern TOO ADJ to vt n serve as an reinforcement of the expressed attitude. Mitigation devices are necessary in certain communicative situations, in which speakers can pass the primary message and express the desired attitude in polite manners. Because “. . .some acts are intrinsically threatening to face and thus require softening” (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Therefore, speakers will employ politeness strategies which are softening devices to make strong assertions more acceptable to boost smooth communication. Prefabs of a little too much, almost too much, almost too adj to vt n, just too adj to vt n, etc., found in this research are politeness devices to soften the face-threatening acts. In contrast, the aforementioned pragmatic devices cannot be found in learner English. To show a strong attitude, learners simply use the patterns TOO MUCH adj or TOO ADJ to vt n, etc., which reveals learners’ weak pragmatic competence. However, pragmatic capacity is critical in communication because it may ultimately determine whether or not a successful communicative interaction can take place. Therefore, raising learners’ pragmatic awareness and building up learners’ pragmatic competence are important tasks for language learning and teaching.

5.4

Summary

To summarize, an in-depth study of the frequently used intensifiers has been conducted in terms of their patterning features. Learner data demonstrate learners’ distinctive patterning features in using intensifiers. We have found that although the pattern distribution trend in learner English is similar to that in native English, learner English displays remarkable deviant patterning features from native English. For example, learners over-rely on familiar patterns and avoid unfamiliar patterns; they coin new patterns, which are problematic and never used by native speakers. For all the investigated cases, L1 transfer appears to be the main cause for the misuse of intensifiers patterns. In addition, the biased input of teaching and learning material, the using of synonymous intensifiers as interchangeable items, etc., are also causal factors for the learners’ errors in using intensifiers. As far as the learner knowledge is concerned, the over-simplification of intensifier patterns and rigid expression of learner English all point to learners’ inadequate pragmatic knowledge.

Notes 1 Register categories field, tenor, mode (Halliday & Hasan, 1985) and is configured with the three variables. In this research, the variation of register mainly refers to the variation of the mode – i.e. spoken versus written. 2 The word much is not an adjective in all the concordance lines, but they are worth mentioning since they are fixed expressions concerning the node word so.

6

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

The previous chapter discussed the typical patterning features of intensifiers in the CL corpora with reference to the NS corpora. In this section, Chinese learners’ use of intensifiers will be studied in depth. Within the framework of Sinclair’s EUM model, intensifiers will be analyzed in terms of the semantic preference and semantic prosody.

6.1

Intensifiers and corpora under scrutiny

Based on the data retrieved from CLEC, three groups of synonymous intensifiers are investigated – i.e. a group of synonymous maximizers (completely, entirely, totally, fully, and absolutely), a group of synonymous boosters (very, so, and too) and a group of synonymous diminishers (a little, a bit and a little bit). Reasons for choosing the three groups of synonymous intensifiers as the study objects are as follows: First, data in the corpora show that learners most frequently use the three groups of intensifier synonyms. Both the native corpora (FROWN and FLOB) and the learner corpora (CLEC and WECCL) in this research can provide adequate data for the research. Second, synonyms are more difficult to learn than non-synonyms (Laufer, 1990). Learning synonyms is always a difficult task for learners because few synonyms can be substituted in every context (Higa, 1963, 1965; Wang, 2009; Lu, 2012). The traditional way of teaching vocabulary via glosses or “synonyms” in the target language is a prime culprit in the production of unhappy lexical choices among advanced students (Martin, 1984). Therefore, further research needs to be carried out to examine how synonymous intensifiers are used in native English and if learners can use them in the way native speakers do. Third, the boosters very, so and too are selected for the reason that they share the common features of scaling the intensified adjectives up to a moderate but not extreme level. The three boosters are all-around intensifiers but their semantic features are seldom investigated. Therefore, they become the focus of the study in this section. To fulfill our research purposes, NS corpora FROWN and FLOB are employed in this section. As for the learner corpora, different corpora are used to meet the

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89

study purpose. Both CLEC and WECCL are employed to study the maximizer synonyms. Only CLEC is used to study the booster and diminisher synonyms in that CLEC itself can provide adequate learner data.

6.2

Maximizers

The frequencies of the five maximizers in the CL corpora (CLEC and WECCL) and the NS corpora (FROWN and FLOB) are listed in Table 6.1. Diagram 6-1 displays a bar graph of the frequencies of the five maximizers. This diagram shows that learners and native speakers have different tendencies in using the five maximizers: the more frequently used maximizers are entirely, totally and completely in the NS corpora, whereas the more frequently used maximizers are totally, completely and absolutely in the CL corpora.

Table 6.1 Frequency of the five maximizers in the CL corpora and the NS corpora

CLEC(F) CLEC(SF) WECCL(F) WECCL(SF) FROWN(F) FROWN(SF) FLOB(F) FLOB(SF)

Totally

Completely

Absolutely

Fully

Entirely

29 2.7 73 7.2 33 2.4 33 2.3

19 1.8 38 3.8 43 2.9 33 2.3

16 1.5 33 3.3 20 1.4 24 1.6

8 0.7 17 1.7 24 1.6 24 1.6

6 0.6 4 0.4 31 2.1 54 3.7

8 7 6

CLEC(SF)

5

WECC_(SF)

4

FROWN(SF)

3

FLOB(SF)

2 1

lly fu

y el tir en

ly te lu so

to

ta

lly ab

co

m

pl

et

el

y

0

Diagram 6-1 Frequency of the five maximizers in the CL corpora and NS corpora

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Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

6.2.1 6.2.1.1

Maximizers in the NS corpora The node word completely

Native speakers use the maximizer completely to intensify adjectives to show strong attitudinal meaning. Part of the concordance lines are randomly chosen from the native corpora and shown in Table 6.2. The concordance lines from the native corpus show that intensifier completely has a strong tendency to collocate with adjectives with negative prefixes. In FROWN, out of the forty-three concordances of maximizer completely, thirteen (30%) are used to modify an adjective with a negative prefix or suffix. In FLOB, eight out of thirty-three (24%) concordance lines show this tendency. Those negative prefixes include a-, ab-, anti-, im-, in-, ir-, un-, etc. Examples of the intensified adjective collocates with negative prefixes are asymptomatic, abhorrent, absent, antithetical, impartial, impossible, indifferent(2), inappropriate, invisible, incompatible, inexcusable, inactivated, irrelevant, unacceptable, unanimous, unaware, unconstrained, unexpected, unfeeling, unflappable, unfrightening, unnecessary, and unsexual-looking. Those negative prefixed adjectives express negative meaning, such as the meaning of absence, no relationship, not necessary, not accepting and the like. In addition to the adjective collocates with negative prefixes, others carry the meaning of negative comments or an inferior situation such as false, blind, white (with the meaning of pale), isolated and disastrous. Among the adjective collocates, a very limited number seem to show positive meanings – for instance, new, clear and open. However, larger contexts for the node words show that they express negative Table 6.2 Concordance lines for completely in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

his J06 33 intracluster ion chemistry is completely tabsent from the resonantly J gallery A42 126 installation and then a completely talternative performance piec to the Siamese, but Qwilleran was L01 6 completely tblind. Never had he experien F03 139 day and in the same location are completely tdifferent. F03 140 ASTRAL TW olarization of the photoreceptor cell is completely tdifferent. J11 186 In betwee results could be very profitable . . . or completely tdisastrous and N28 64 unknow lling the dog, which Edna Sarah knew was completely tfalse. R08 10 The house was he needs to get away from her demon to a completely tfemale G32 145 world, a worl until the vaccine virus has F13 25 been completely tinactivated or overwhelmed. s travel-creased and scratchy and P12 73 completely tinappropriate for Miami, eve y made that day in G37 114 the open air, completely tindifferent to gawking neigh Where was he during the trial?” L03 155 “ Completely invisible. Keep in mind, it he next logical R05 152 step; it invites completely tirrelevant ideas to “intrude P17 219 Mike shook his head. This was a completely tnew world to him. He P17 220 ing in love, mourning their dead - G17 7 completely tunaware of an Atlantic Ocean J42 98 discretionary power is therefore completely tunconstrained.” J42 99 Never ew years later was caught N09 62 up in a completely tunexpected fight with Preach r old identity a secret, her past P04 69 completely tunknown. And then this Otis f executive pay, A35 53 called the plan “ completely unnecessary.” A35 54 The spo arving and drugging myself into a G48 23 completely tunsexual-looking person. I’d

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attitudes rather than positive ones. The following are the contexts for those seemingly positive but essentially negative adjective collocates. Example one Mike shook his head. This was a completely new world to him. He had never been alone. (FROWN) In this sentence, new means not familiar with a certain environment. Mike is worrying about whether he can adapt to the new world. So new in this example shows a negative meaning instead of a positive one. Example two “We’re faced with playing our first game with a completely new coaching staff,” Walsh said. “That is a challenge in itself.”(FROWN) In the sentence, new means that “we do not understand the opponents,” so they are new to us, which indicates the difficulties of winning the game. Example three When such a sample is really needed, it must be made completely clear to the donor (preferably in writing) that the sample is being taken for the benefit of the relative and that no result is to be expected. (FLOB) Clear in the sentence indicates the strictness of the thing being arranged, which is not positive in meaning. Example four I was playing somebody completely open, energised, with a mission, not at all cynical, not at all laid-back, not at all any of those words and people said, “Gosh, I didn’t know you could do that.” (FLOB) Open in Example four explains a strict requirement. Based on what we have observed from the concordance lines of the intensifier completely, it is concluded that maximizer completely is used to intensify adjectives with negative prefixes. The intensified adjective collocates of completely tend to carry negative meanings: showing absence, no relationship, no necessity, no acceptance, etc. The maximizer completely and its collocates together show a strong negative semantic prosody. The detailed frequency and percentage of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of the maximizer completely in the NS corpora are shown in Table 6.3. Table 6.3 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of completely in NS corpora Collocates of completely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

5 (12%) 7 (21%)

29 (67%) 16 (49%)

9 (21%) 10 (30%)

43 (100%) 30 (100%)

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6.2.1.2

The node word totally

From FROWN and FLOB, thirty-three adjective collocates of totally are retrieved, respectively. Twenty of the retrieved concordance lines are randomly chosen from FROWN and shown in Table 6.4. In FROWN, out of the thirty-three intensified adjective collocates, twelve (36%) carry negative prefixes or suffixes. In FLOB, this number reaches fourteen, which accounts for 42% of the thirty-three occurrences. The negative prefixes and suffixes are as follows: a-, in-, ir-, im-, un-, il-, dis-, -less, etc. The adjectives with a negative prefix or suffix modified by the maximizer totally include the following words: amoral, incomprehensible, independent, ineffectual, impractical, improper, irrelevant, irresponsible, irretrievable, harmless, unknown, unrealistic, unaware, unacceptable, uncorrelated, uncompromising, unforgivable, uninteresting, unnecessary, unproductive, unstressed, ungrammatical, illogical, and disarming. Most intensified adjective collocates with a negative prefix or suffix express a negative meaning – for example, hatred in feeling – e.g. abhorrent, uninteresting; disagreement in value – e.g. amoral, improper, alien, unnecessary; impracticability – e.g. unpractical, unrealistic, ineffectual, unproductive; failure in cognition – e.g. unknown, unaware. In addition to adjectives with negative prefixes or suffixes, totally is also used to modify adjectives that express the meaning of a poor and an unfavorable situation. Among them are abandoned, evil, separate, blind, confusing, boring, sick, etc. Table 6.4 Concordance lines for totally in FROWN 1 l. This was her first young love L15 10 - totally abandoned, without caution or f 2 symbol, and I got a good feeling of how totally abstract their R09 21 notion of 3 ough C04 235 Martin’s intentions are not totally amoral, Everett is well aware C 4 he tutor. Even though he N22 78 had been totally blind for two years, he had spe 5 e, who is, after all, a parasite F01 137 totally dependent on his/her weak prey. 6 10 thing the week after next, and it’s a totally different K05 111 bag.” K05 112 7 is dreaded confrontation had E07 80 been totally disarming. The railroad ‘grapev 8 an option that sees D02 207 the world as totally evil and seeks to withdraw from 9 relative to the visitor, G17 161 spoke a totally foreign and incomprehensible la 10 B08 27 questions and then getting on to totally fresh stuff. It’s a B08 28 wond 11 my G06 85 communique-acute saying “It is totally illogical G06 86 that persons w 12 ts, called Mendoza’s G06 149 conviction “ totally incomprehensible factually and 13 omy suggests that the J11 92 origins are totally independent. The vertebrate eye 14 et Union and Eastern Europe. It has been totally ineffectual in B20 142 Yugoslav 15 minent figures in organized crime? Is it totally irrelevant that F39 85 the Reag 16 ecavallo. “They can’t do that!” N29 125 “ Totally unacceptable,” snapped the pins 17 When Hugo had proposed to Rosebay, Tim, totally unaware that N16 61 she was in 18 itted this monumentally embarrassing and totally unforgivable R03 159 blunder. R 19 ce of driftwood is aesthetic G19 200 but totally uninteresting. True, someone co 20 few lesser-known songs (and E36 102 one totally unknown) added to the mixture.

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Among all intensified adjectives of totally, a limited number carry neutral meaning – for example, different, absorbing, alone, arbitrary, candidate, familiar and foreign. A few adjective collocates possess positive meaning: free, fair, horny, fresh and relieved. However, a detailed analysis of the positive adjective collocates in a wider context discloses that some of those seemingly positive adjectives convey negative attitude. The following three examples illustrate this point. Example one And yet, he does have this peculiar ability to invest even his most likeable characters with a vaguely chilling quality. In “Close My Eyes,” for example, he plays a generous – and totally harmless – rich cuckold. But Rickman endows his character with such an intense inner life that you suspect that, at any moment, he might be about to commit some monstrous act of violence. (FLOB) In this example, the word cuckold means “a man whose wife has an affair with another man” (Collins COBUILD English Dictionary for Advanced Learners, 2003), and such a person is not someone who is lucky and admired. In this sentence, the word cuckold is modified by the adjective generous and rich, and supplemented by totally harmless. So we judge totally harmless is used ironically instead of expressing a positive meaning. Example two As ever in politics, the criticism was not totally fair. According to one senior Foreign Office source yesterday, after witnessing the harrowing scenes on television of the Kurds fleeing from President Saddam Hussein’s avenging army, the prime minister had been driving forward an international relief operation on behalf of the Kurds two days before Mrs. Thatcher dramatically raised the stakes. (FLOB) In this example, totally fair is in fact premodified by the negation word not. Judged from the wider context, the attitudinal meaning delivered by this sentence is negative. Example three One of literature’s first vampires appears in Coleridge’s weird, unfinished narrative poem, Christabel, published in. Camille Paglia, in an astute, erudite, and totally horny essay, describes Coleridge’s lesbian vampire Geraldine as nature’s own psycho slut from hell, “the chthonian mother who eats her children.” She’s not the only one. In the old movies, vampires hang out with swarms of insects, spiders, maggots, rats, and bats. . . . (FROWN) In Example three, the adjectives juxtaposed with the word horny are astute and erudite, which seem to show a positive meaning. But when we read on and know the main content of the essay, we know that it describes Coleridge’s lesbian vampire Geraldine as nature’s own psycho slut from hell, “the chthonian mother who eats her children.” Based on the content of the essay, we judge that the writing style of the essay is ironic, and it is more complicated than just praising.

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Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.5 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of totally in NS corpora Collocates of totally

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

2 (6%) 3 (9%)

25 (76%) 20 (61%)

6 (18%) 10 (30%)

33 (100%) 33 (100%)

The frequency and the percentage of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of the maximizer totally are shown in Table 6.5. In brief, the adjective collocates of totally which carry negative meanings predominate in native English. Most deliver meanings of hatred, disagreement, impracticability and failure. The semantic prosody conveyed by maximizer totally is obviously negative. 6.2.1.3

The node word absolutely

Many linguists have studied the maximizer absolutely. Bäcklund (1973: 225) points out that absolutely can be used dependently and independently. When used dependently, it tends to collocate with superlative adjectives, especially those having emotive forces (e.g. super and crucial) (Alternberg, 1991: 137). The semantic prosody of absolutely is analyzed by different linguists and different results have been achieved: Kennedy (2003) finds that absolutely appears to show an even balance between favorable and unfavorable items in the BNC. Tao (2007) studies American spoken English, and the researcher concluded that the number of positive cases of intensifiers more than doubles that of negative cases. The present research will examine the semantic preference and semantic prosody of absolutely and testify to which of the aforementioned conclusions is more convincing. In FROWN and FLOB, twenty and twenty-four cases of absolutely functioning as a maximizer intensifying an adjective are retrieved. Part of the concordance lines of absolutely are randomly chosen from FLOB and shown in Table 6.6. Among the retrieved adjective collocates of absolutely, most express the meaning of human emotive feelings or human traits: content, comfortable, convinced, frightful, excellent, delighted, appalling, critical, remarkable, wonderful, mad, maddening, sure, honest and conserved. Some denote the concept of necessity: necessary and essential. A few denote the meaning of evaluation – for example, right. No clear evidence shows that absolutely tends to collocate with superlative adjectives as Alternberg (1991) argued. The concordance lines of maximizer absolutely show evidence that the semantic prosody appears to be positive. The reasons are as follows: most adjective collocates of absolutely have positive connotations: honest, remarkable, right, comfortable, content, delicious, delighted, divine, enormous, excellent, fresh, lush, modern and wonderful. Some carry negative connotations – for example, ridiculous, appalling, corrosive, critical, evil, frightful, furious, imprudent, mad and maddening. A small number of the intensified adjectives are neutral as far as connotations

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

95

Table 6.6 Concordance lines for absolutely in FLOB 1 done. You actually leave your R04 177 DJ absolutely alone because he has his hea 2 icky instead of the local hunt, who were absolutely R09 46 furious, which at lea 3 7 “I should have thought your mother was absolutely sure P22 118 of success.” P2 4 ned face towards him. L09 129 “Something absolutely frightful has happened,” L09 5 moon, not a cloud in sight, K04 12 absolutely mad, but off we went. Well, 6 on K04 196 the whole thing. That, and an absolutely corrosive hatred of K04 197 7 ntless to worry her unless it K07 81 was absolutely necessary. He was displeased 8 ove. I think it was so wonderful, K19 93 absolutely divine, don’t you?” K19 94 “ 9 J65 194 Brazilian society to create an ‘ absolutely modern’ environment. J65 195 10 H18 115 provide the same services? It is absolutely ridiculous. H18 116 The Gove 11 tanding and support which we judge to be absolutely essential G62 29 to the pres 12 , it is that it holds that some acts are absolutely evil G74 178 in intent. If t 13 61 clearly prefer it to tap-water! It is absolutely delicious, and is F09 62 ful 14 ference to F13 41 someone, and then it’s absolutely wonderful.” F13 42 It is on 15 began, then the editor has got it E09 60 absolutely right. E09 61 Medi-Theme is 16 dful B02 191 old fudge and mudge, are an absolutely inescapable part of B02 192 17 scribed by insiders last A26 91 week as “ absolutely appalling.” A26 92 Isaacs ar 18 rs of the teaching A27 80 profession as “ absolutely ridiculous.” A27 81 A27 82 S 19 e home on two occasions. She was A42 205 absolutely delighted to meet the Duches 20 work has a strong pull. A44 224 “If I am absolutely honest, I would love to do t

Table 6.7 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of absolutely in the NS corpora Collocates of absolutely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

13 (65%) 13 (54%)

2 (10%) 8 (33%)

5 (25%) 3 (13%)

20 (100%) 24 (100%)

are concerned – for example, necessary, essential, sure, still, unique. The percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates is shown in Table 6.7. Therefore, it is concluded that the node word absolutely tends to intensify adjectives expressing the meaning of human emotive feelings and human traits. Evidence in this study shows that absolutely tends to express a positive semantic prosody, which is to some extent different from the findings of Kennedy (2003) and Tao (2007). However, there isn’t enough evidence in the present research to claim that absolutely tends to collocate with superlative adjectives as found by Alternberg (1991). 6.2.1.4

The node word entirely

The same procedures are carried out to explore the semantic preference and semantic prosody of maximizer entirely as has been done to maximizers completely, totally and absolutely. Twenty concordance lines for entirely are randomly chosen from FLOB and shown in Table 6.8.

96

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Data in FROWN and FLOB suggest that the adjective collocates of entirely tend to be adjectives ending in suffix -able (or -ible), showing the capability of doing something and suffix -al, showing the characteristic or the quality of an entity. Intensified adjective collocates of entirely ending in suffix -able include believable, predictable, preventable, separable, suitable and unformalisable. Those ending in the suffix -ible are credible, intelligible and possible. Intensified adjective collocates ending in suffix -al include natural, colonal, conventional, cultural, original, self-referential, theoretical, etc. Most adjectives express neutral meanings (e.g. American, female, cultural, possible, separable, separate, rural, random). A few carry positive connotations (e.g. active, benevolent, free, fresh, happy, satisfied and responsible), and some others carry negative connotations (e.g. separate, contradictory, specious, unaware, unknown). The frequency of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates are listed in Table 6.9. Table 6.8 Concordance lines for entirely in FLOB 1 J51 105 since God is here thought of as entirely tactive and free, and hence J51 2 y. On his G04 16 mother’s side he had an entirely tAmerican lineage; her father, 3 well. E28 121 Hung Parliament is not an entirely tbelievable E28 122 representat 4 lass exercise done at great speed, using entirely tconventional E30 196 methods. 5 and ‘Bohemian’ youth than his son finds entirely tcredible. G41 42 James remembe 6 med, although it is difficult to exclude entirely tcultural H02 185 biases. Alter 7 ned the practice of trying G40 202 to be entirely tfaithful to the original, whic 8 ion, and by 1 May the roads outside were entirely tfree of G25 114 ice. On 31 May 9 hen following traditional designs she is entirely thappy. Where her E13 45 imagin 10 d we seem to believe that the dog is not entirely tJ27 9 responsible for its acti 11 s for a moment consider the issues in an entirely tJ47 85 theoretical way, with t 12 ld him. After all, why not? It seemed an entirely tK04 227 suitable topic for Bed 13 nce between us, I felt them K28 76 to be entirely tnatural. How often does it hap 14 ert Adams Day thus finds J63 9 Oroonoko “ entirely original” in its narrative J63 15 ds. B16 78 Famine, on the other hand, is entirely tpreventable, and its B16 79 co 16 lopmental J23 101 product. This seems an entirely treasonable position. Evolution 17 via Tithe Barn Lane. The area G51 34 was entirely trural in character as can be s 18 52 78 Few readers of the Theaetetus feel entirely tsatisfied by J52 79 this. Prot 19 nce where the two productions C08 171 go entirely tseparate ways. At Glyndebourne 20 t for his son to go G01 144 through life entirely tunknown to the literary world.

Table 6.9 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of entirely in NS corpora Collocates of entirely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

13 (42%) 23 (43%)

1 (3%) 5 (9%)

17 (55%) 26 (48%)

31 (100%) 54 (100%)

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

97

To summarize, the maximizer entirely tends to intensify adjective collocates ending in suffixes -able/-ible and -al, denoting certain ability or quality. The maximizer entirely together with its adjective collocates tend to convey a mixed semantic prosody. 6.2.1.5

The node word fully

Twenty-four adjective collocates of fully are retrieved from FROWN and the same number is retrieved from FLOB. Twenty concordance lines of maximizer fully are randomly chosen from FROWN and shown in Table 6.10. The collocates of fully tend to end with -ed. Twelve such adjectives are found among all the adjective collocates of fully in FROWN and ten in FLOB. Those adjective collocates include developed(2), opened(2), articulated, authorized, automated, commercialized, fledged, funded, furnished, informed, integrated, loaded, occupied, populated, sealed, state-owned and taxed. Adjectives ending in -ed usually have the meaning of something having been done. Most adjectives that co-occur with fully are neutral in meaning, such as operational, open, furnished, sealed, automatic, aware, state-owned and furnished. Some other collocates tend to show positive meanings: developed, admirable, balanced, confident, democratic, fledged, functional, satisfied, etc. None of them has any negative flavor.

Table 6.10 Concordance lines for fully in FROWN 1 n creating his heroine. A44 115 The only fully admirable character in The Scarle 2 y designed control surfaces and a J71 49 fully automated control system that cou 3 -up needles. L20 161 Fear had gotten her fully awake, but it took the half-assed 4 be two weeks before the water system is fully B02 67 operational, delivering wa 5 model apply to modern relations between fully competent and equal F37 9 humans, 6 ewhere G41 14 in between. Although never fully confident, at the end, she G41 15 7 tion protection standards were not J79 7 fully developed at the outset, the impo 8 s. Siemens’ entry is its model ET200K, a fully E32 130 sealed and mountable modu 9 30 Other items needed to make the system fully functional include E33 231 textua 10 0 H23 145 billion of grant programs in a fully funded, consolidated block H23 14 11 s been far more than a play. Its G24 107 fully furnished stage, its music and mo 12 up, Shakespeare stood before his public fully G54 4 fledged. Though only thirty 13 predict J23 51 costly rules produced by fully informed, self-interested behavio 14 189 requires that one seek to achieve a fully integrated moral F37 190 personal 15 very that department heads were driving “ fully loaded, A25 8 top of the line lux 16 receivers) J80 105 to produce the first fully operational centimetric radar in 17 oal is for computerized allocation to be fully operational J72 74 soon. J72 75 S 18 d Data Inventory System). E33 199 With a fully populated database, TEXDIS enable 19 20 93 under an integrated tax system, so fully -taxed corporate profits H20 94 wo 20 h a cardboard one on G24 68 stage; it is fully visible in a sharply raked but na

98

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

The frequency of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully are listed in Table 6.11. In conclusion, the maximizer fully tends to intensify adjectives with the -ed suffix, referring to an already finished state. Corpora data show that the semantic prosody of fully is a neutral one in that an absolute number of adjective collocates are neutral and no negative collocates are found. 6.2.1.6

Interim summary

The maximizers completely, entirely, totally, absolutely and fully share similar denotational meaning. However, pragmatically, they have different semantic preference and semantic prosody. Their differences in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody are shown in Table 6.12, which shows that completely, entirely, totally, absolutely and fully each display their distinctive semantic features from the other four synonym maximizers, thus performing their specific pragmatic functions. They are not interchangeable in all contexts.

Table 6.11 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully in NS corpora Collocates of entirely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

7 (29%) 9 (38%)

0 (0%) 0 (0%)

17 (71%) 15 (62%)

24 (100%) 24 (100%)

Table 6.12 Semantic preference and semantic prosody of maximizers in NS corpora Maximizer

Semantic Preference

Semantic Prosody

completely

to intensify adjectives with a negative prefix, indicating the meaning of absence, no relationship, not necessary, not accepting to intensify adjective collocates with a negative prefix or suffix, showing the meaning of hatred, unacceptance, impracticability, ignorance to intensify adjective collocates expressing the meaning of human emotive feeling and human traits intensify adjective collocates ended with suffix -ble and -al, showing the meaning of capability or certain attributes of the stuff to intensify adjective collocates with prefix-ed, showing an already finished state

strongly negative

totally absolutely entirely fully

obviously negative positive mixed neutral

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers 6.2.2

99

Maximizers in the CL corpora

The five maximizers are retrieved from the CL corpora CLEC and WECCL and their frequencies can be seen in Table 6.13. 6.2.2.1

The node word completely

The maximizer completely occurs nineteen times in CLEC and thirty-eight times in WECCL. Twenty concordance lines are randomly chosen and shown in Table 6.15. Learner corpora data show that completely also collocates with adjectives with negative prefixes or suffixes. In five cases out of the nineteen occurrences (26%) in CLEC and nine out of the thirty-eight (24%) in WECCL, completely is used to intensify an adjective collocate with a negative prefix or suffix, compared to 30% in FROWN and 24% in FLOB. The negative prefixes or suffixes in the learner corpora are un-, as in uneducated, unnecessary and unknown; il-, as in illogical; im-, as in impossible; and –less, as in useless and powerless. Semantically these adjectives carry the meaning of bad evaluation, incapability, impracticality or some inferior situation. However, the semantic prosody of completely conveyed in the CL corpora display different features from that in the NS corpora. In the learner corpora, there are a certain number of cases in which completely intensifies adjective collocates of positive meaning. Adjectival collocations carrying positive meaning are completely new, completely good, completely fresh, completely excellent, completely honest, completely healthy, completely modernized, etc. The frequency and percentage of the positive, negative and the neutral adjective collocates of completely are shown in Table 6.14. Table 6.13 Frequency of the five maximizers in CL corpora

CLEC(F) CLEC(SF) WECCL(F) WECCL(SF)

Completely

Totally

Absolutely

Entirely

Fully

19 1.8 38 3.8

29 2.7 73 7.2

16 1.5 33 3.3

6 0.6 4 0.4

8 0.7 17 1.7

Table 6.14 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of completely in the CL corpora Collocates of completely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC WECCL

4 (21%) 12 (32%)

7 (37%) 20 (53%)

8 (42%) 6 (15%)

19 (100%) 38 (100%)

100

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.15 Concordance lines for completely in WECCL 1 ually. The world is not totally write or completely black. It is just gray. The 2 the young people born in 1970s, who were completely blind to the internet at the 3 considered in conflict. But they are not completely contradictory, as far as I c 4 r successful career, This opinion is not completely correct, I admit that one’s 5 r respective superiority, and neither is completely excellent or neither is rath 6 ase by telling her that she is ok, he is completely false. He has taken the last 7 n this sense, we can not say Internet is completely good or bad to our life. In 8 undings while being forced to be so call completely honest. We’re permitted to h 9 o harm to others is an urge before being completely independent. ????As a matter 10 itional lifestyle have to be replaced by completely modernized one. As for me, I 11 lish reading lessons on Internet. It was completely new to me. On class we could 12 s in the first place. But, my opinion is completely opposite to it. Today, By th 13 t, I think each side should yield to our completely personal wishes. We should r 14 mple, in saving the rare species, we are completely powerless. In treating the e 15 eal. What a pity! What I said may not be completely right. But I think there mus 16 em. I think this kind of opinions is not completely true. In my opinion, childre 17 employment of stuff. For example, it is completely unesseray to engage a master 18 tart a job, you will face so many things completely unknown to you. According to 19 ot to tell the truth. But I think, it is completely unnecessary to cover it. ??? 20 e, marriage etc . In my opinion, this is completely wrong. As we know, degree an

Chinese learners of English tend to use completely in similar ways to native speakers. However, they are not quite obviously aware of the negative semantic prosody of completely. They may use it in positive contexts while native corpora data show that the semantic prosody of completely is strongly negative. Negligence of the negative prosody of completely may result in embarrassment or impoliteness in communication. It is necessary for learners to come to know the semantic prosody of completely as well as other intensifiers in order to guarantee smooth communication and avoid misunderstanding. 6.2.2.2

The node word totally

Maximizer totally is a frequently used intensifier in the CL corpora. There are twenty-nine concordance lines for totally in CLEC and seventy-three in WECCL. Twenty concordance lines are randomly chosen from CLEC and shown in Table 6.16. Data in the CL corpora show that Chinese learners of English frequently use totally to intensify adjectives expressing basic concepts, as in totally different, totally wrong, totally new, etc. One most frequently used collocation in the learner corpora is totally different, which appears twelve times in CLEC and twenty times in WECCL, accounting for 41% and 27%, respectively among all the collocations. However, totally different appears with a rather low frequency in the native corpora. It only appears once in FROWN and FLOB each, which accounts for 3%

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

101

Table 6.16 Concordance lines for totally in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

is big Modernization Time seems to me as area from any human pollution, to have a gs and her face was badly deform She was cars either in body or in mind. But it’s n’t say “yes” to this argument. I have a h I don’t fully agree to. Some women are tablished relations around and dislike a ht a little. But at the moment he seemed ate the whole society. It is, of course, resourceful. Obviously, this opinion is in it. For him, that process will become eceive new things and ideas which may be to myself As my own title told you, I am of 15. on her arrival, she felt she was o blow up everything old, and build up a . ??Nowadays, senior school students are tter how much you put into the pot, it’s sework during their free time. And it is 25% of short messages sent every day are h some realistic goals, which leads to a

totally amazing. The Modernization no l totally clean earth. Progress has been totally deaf and had her very poor visi totally different in the case of John W totally different view to this question totally independent. They think they ca totally strange enviorment. My opinion totally unaware of the weight on his wa totally unfair. Women possess their uni totally wrong. Actually, fresh water is totally boring and painful without he a totally different from those of their p totally fond of speaking English. Becau totally inharmonic to the country, so s totally new world instead. However, I h totally tired of various kinds of exami totally useless if the exit is blocked. totally wrong of them to get everything totally useless to common people. In th totally wrong direction. First, educati

Table 6.17 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of totally in CL corpora Collocates of totally

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC WECCL

8 (27.5%) 10 (14%)

8 (27.5%) 42 (58%)

13 (45%) 21 (28%)

29 (100%) 73 (100%)

each in FROWN and FLOB. In other words, learners are more likely to use totally to modify common adjectives while native speakers do not have this tendency. Native speakers tend to use totally before adjectives with negative prefixes or suffixes. However, Chinese learners do not typically use it the same way. Only six such occurrences (21%) in CLEC and five (7%) in WECCL are observed, much less frequently than in the native corpora. In addition to the differences concerning the semantic preference, the semantic prosody differences are also found between the NS English and the CL English. The semantic prosody conveyed by totally and its collocates are obviously negative, whereas it appears to be a mixed one in the learner English. The detailed frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of totally are listed in Table 6.17.

102

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Positive adjective collocates of totally in the learner corpora include new, free, true, amazing, clean, excited, fresh, honest, relaxed, successful, etc. Negative adjective collocates include tired, wrong, useless, boring, painful, unfair, dark, silent, etc. Collocates of neutral meaning include different, opposite, unaware, distinctive, etc. Based on the observation of the semantic prosody of totally in the learner corpora and the native corpora, we conclude that Chinese learners of English are not aware of the proper semantic prosody of totally, and they use it in many positive and neutral contexts. 6.2.2.3

The node word absolutely

Concordance lines for absolutely from the learner corpora are retrieved and sixteen of them are found in CLEC and thirty-three in WECCL. Twenty concordance lines are randomly chosen from WECCL and shown in Table 6.18. Data from the native corpora show that native speakers tend to use absolutely to intensify adjectives expressing emotive feelings: content, comfortable, convinced, frightful, mad, etc. However, this semantic preference hasn’t been found in the learner data. Learners tend to use absolutely to intensify adjectives with evaluative meaning such as good, bad, important, right, wrong, true and false. Chinese learners of English employ absolutely to modify adjectives of positive meaning, such as good, right, honest, correct, new, valuable, important; words

Table 6.18 Concordance lines for absolutely in WECCL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

is perfectly good as well as nothing is , as children are different, there is no To be frank, it’s correct, but it isn’t arents and children were grown up in two an’t say something is absolutely true or e that internet is not something that is oying the environment . Also, people are es to their friends and cannot be called est, a beautiful word. But how can we be an probably find no job. And speaking is thout an education degree? The answer is anging world, to live a good life, it is prove your ability of learning something ned, and we may find ourselves set in an ional practice or the western world’s is ness, which is nowadays considered to be e two aspects. We can’t say something is r love for children. If children make an or a stepping-stone to a good job. It is y as getting a degree certificate. It is

Absolutely bad. The same as we live on absolutely correct answer for such a qu absolutely correct, because “the scienc absolutely different times. Thus, their absolutely false. So like traditions an absolutely good or bad. But we people c absolutely good if they are not to acce absolutely honest to friends., to some absolutely honest in this complicated w absolutely important in learning Englis absolutely impossible. What position sh absolutely necessary to learn all throu absolutely new to us, as well we notice absolutely new world. We begin to stand absolutely right or wrong. Each way has absolutely right. However many people d absolutely true or absolutely false. So absolutely wrong decision, what would w absolutely wrong. High education is a v absolutely wrong. Getting a degree cert

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

103

Table 6.19 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of absolutely in CL corpora Collocates of absolutely

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC WECCL

6 (38%) 19 (58%)

5 (31%) 9 (27%)

5 (31%) 5 (15%)

16 (100%) 33 (100%)

Table 6.20 Concordance lines for entirely in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6

walking ahead. He is also dressing in an of ourselves and adapt ourselves to the theoretical and practical seem to be two ssional soldiers. Their army, consisting Lee to join the confederate army, but an e it a second thought, you’ll find it is

entirely western-American style, not ve entirely new environment. So it can har entirely different words, but they are entirely professional soldiers who have entirely different consideration, one t entirely wrong. Firstly, the world is n

carrying negative meaning, such as wrong, false, incorrect, bad, impossible; and those of neutral meaning such as different, necessary, practical. The frequency and percentage of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates are listed in Table 6.19. The semantic prosody of absolutely in the learner corpora appears to be mixed, which is different from that in the native corpora. 6.2.2.4

The node word entirely

Chinese learners of English use entirely significantly less than the native speakers. Six concordance lines are found in CLEC and four in WECCL. Table 6.20 shows those in CLEC. Native corpora data show that entirely tends to collocate with adjectives ending in -able/ible or -al. However the concordance lines for entirely in the CL corpora do not show this preference. The semantic prosody of entirely in the learner corpora is a mixed one, as is the case in the native corpora. In conclusion, Chinese learners of English use entirely similarly to the native speakers as far as semantic prosody is concerned, but learners cannot use the same semantic preference as the native speakers of English. 6.2.2.5

The node word fully

The maximizer fully is another frequently used word in Chinese learner English. Eight concordance lines are retrieved from CLEC and seventeen are from WECCL. All the concordance lines for fully in WECCL are shown in Table 6.21.

104

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.21 Concordance lines for fully in WECCL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

ing for a solution or even you’re almost experience, because they are too young. o share a secret with her. Although, I’m l point is that the government should be may be that we don’t learn things being their true physical states, they can be ion. On the contrary, a well-trained and wever, the kids’ critical faculty is not ion. On the contrary, a well-trained and ree. Their abilities of creation are not secret. But as the technology is not so t. The purpose of education is to form a or all the young generations to grow up, dernization is forward-looking, it’s not But it doesn’t mean that traditions are

fully aware that the lovely young man w Fullyaware of this, when they take up fully aware of the significance of bein fully aware of the importance of the in fully aware of it; sometimes we acquire fully aware of the precious time after fully developed young man may fail to p fully developed. Sometimes it may be a fully developed young man may fail to p fully developed. Certificates are consi fully developed, the secret codes can b fully developing person. First, the exa fully fledged. During the process of re fully true, though traditions and moder fully useless. We can consult the speci

Table 6.22 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully in CL corpora Collocates of fully

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC WECCL

5 (62.5%) 8 (53%)

0 (0%) 1 (7%)

3 (37.5%) 6 (40%)

8 (100%) 15 (100%)

Chinese learners use the collocation fully aware frequently. In addition to this collocation, they tend to use fully to modify adjectives ending in the suffix -ed, expressing the meaning of a certain state, developed, equipped, educated, controlled, fledged, prepared, etc. This particular semantic phenomenon of fully has also been found to be typical in learner corpora. In other words, learners use fully in similar ways to the native speakers regarding semantic preference. It is found that learners use fully to intensify adjective collocates of positive, neutral and negative meaning. The frequency and percentage of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of fully are listed in Table 6.22. In the learner corpora, adjective collocates of fully carrying positive meanings are confident, developed, true, prepared, etc. The negative meaning of the word is useless; the neutral meanings are aware and equipped. We see, from the data in Table 6.22, that the semantic prosody of fully, and its collocates in learner English tend to be positive, which is different from that in the native corpora. In conclusion, Chinese learner English shares similar semantic preference with the native speaker English, but learners have no clear awareness of the semantic prosody of fully.

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

105

Table 6.23 Semantic preference and semantic prosody of maximizers in CL corpora Maximizer

Semantic Preference

Semantic Prosody

Completely

to intensify adjective collocates with negative prefix, indicating bad evaluation, incapability, impracticality, or inferior situation to intensify adjective collocates with a negative prefix or suffix, showing the negative meaning: wrong, tired, bad, etc. to intensify adjective collocates expressing evaluation  to intensify common adjective words; -al or -able adjective collocates are missing  to intensify adjective collocates with the prefix -ed, showing an already finished state

mixed 

Totally Absolutely Entirely Fully

6.2.2.6

mixed  mixed  mixed positive 

Interim summary

The semantic preference and semantic prosody of the five frequently used maximizers were investigated in this section. Learner English shows quite different pragmatic features for the five maximizers. Characteristics of the five maximizers used by learners are summarized in Table 6.23. In this table, the asterisks indicate that learners use the maximizer in a different way than the native speakers; items that are not marked with an asterisk are cases where learners use the maximizer similarly to the native speakers. In brief, learners use maximizers completely, totally and fully in a similar way to that of the native speakers, whereas they use some other maximizers (absolutely) quite differently than the native speakers in terms of its semantic preference. One obvious tendency is that the semantic prosodies of most of the five maximizers in Chinese learner English tend to be mixed. This is strong evidence that they tend to ignore semantic prosody when using the intensifiers. They use them in all situations, unaware that the pragmatic meaning of vocabulary can be different though they carry the similar denotational meaning. They tend to use the five intensifiers interchangeably in most cases.

6.3

Boosters

Three boosters, very, so and too, are most frequently used in both the native corpora and the learner corpora. Learners tend to overuse the three all-around intensifiers significantly in comparison with the native speakers. One hundred concordance lines for the three intensifiers are randomly chosen from each of the corpora. The semantic preference and semantic prosodies of the three intensifiers are investigated based on the randomly chosen one hundred concordance lines (See Appendices VII–IX). The research results are presented in the following sections.

106

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

6.3.1

Boosters in the NS corpora

6.3.1.1

The node word very

Concordance lines show that very tends to modify a wide range of adjectives. The main semantic meanings of the adjective collocates of very focus on evaluations (comments and judgments), physical features (size, colour and amount), qualitative features (qualitative features of a person, a stuff or an event), emotions and feelings, relationships, time and place, situational descriptions, etc. Among these semantic fields, the first three are the main categories. The three main types of adjective collocates amount to nearly three-fourths of the total in the native English. The rest adjective collocates occupy about one-fourth of the whole. Examples of the adjectives for each semantic category can be seen in Table 6.24. The wide range of meaning of the adjective collocates shows that very has a mixed semantic prosody. The adjective collocates carrying positive meanings are advanced, appealing, effective, important, good, helpful, promising, pleased, proud, skillful, etc. Those carrying negative meanings are sorry, sad, radical, difficult, upsetting, unfair, uncomfortable, etc. Those carrying neutral meanings are words such as same, different, retired, similar and familiar. The frequency of the adjective collocates are listed in Table 6.25. Table 6.24 Semantic preferences of very in NS corpora Semantic Fields

FROWN

FLOB

Examples of the Adjective Collocates

Comments and evaluation

29%

30%

Qualitative features Physical features

20% 27%

26% 23%

Emotions and feelings

9%

8%

Time and place Relationships Situational description

3% 8% 4%

2% 9% 2%

bright, effective, unfair, significant, popular promising, proud, wonderful, good, heartwarming, great, interesting, moderate easy-going, discreet, helpful big, small, few, high, large, little, long, many, much, long, wide upsetting, proud, sad, satisfying, pleased, sorry, enthusiastic, fearful, reluctant early, late, ancient, far different, same, opposite, close general, busy

Table 6.25 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of very in NS corpora Collocates of very

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

40 (40%) 47 (47%)

28 (28%) 25 (25%)

32 (32%) 33 (33%)

100 (100%) 100 (100%)

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers 6.3.1.2

107

The node word so

The adjective collocates of so cover four semantic fields: evaluation, quantitative features, qualitative features and emotive feelings. Among the four semantic fields in FROWN and FLOB, evaluation collocates take the biggest percentage and the emotive adjectives take the smallest percentage. The four semantic fields altogether account for 89% in FROWN and FLOB each. In addition to the four main semantic fields, the adjective collocates cover other semantic fields: time and place, relationships and situation description, etc., but altogether they account for a small percentage of 11%. Examples of those adjective collocates are shown in Table 6.26. Data show that the booster so can attract adjectives with positive, negative and neutral meaning. The collocates carrying positive meanings are glad, happy, advanced, appealing, effective, important, good, nice, popular, perfect, pretty, etc. The collocates of so carrying negative meanings are abhorrent, anxious, difficult, evil, dangerous, frustrated, poor, unlucky, etc. Collocates expressing neutral meanings are close, different, many, much, thick, etc. The frequencies of the collocates in each category are listed in Table 6.27. Table 6.27 indicates that the semantic prosody expressed by the booster so is a mixed one. Table 6.26 Semantic preferences of so in NS corpora Semantic fields

FROWN

FLOB

Examples of the Adjective Collocates

Comments and evaluation

31%

28%

Emotions and feelings

10%

16%

Qualitative features

27%

19%

Physical features Time and place Relationships Situation description

23% 4% 2% 3%

26% 2% 3% 6%

awful, acute, bad, funny, unpopular, evil, good, great, important, ugly, stupid, outstanding, pretty boring, dear, glad, frustrated, happy, sorry, proud strong, antiquated, naïve, weak, young, cheap, tough, fertile, romantic big, many, much, tiny, thick distant, close intimate, close, different, inferior defenseless, hazardous, dangerous, cold, hot

Table 6.27 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of so in NS corpora Collocates of so

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

41 (41%) 40 (40%)

38 (38%) 33 (33%)

21 (21%) 27 (27%)

100 (100%) 100 (100%)

108

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

6.3.1.3

The node word too

Concordance lines for too show that adjective collocates of the booster too cover four main semantic fields: evaluation and comments, quantitative features, qualitative features and situational descriptions. The four main semantic fields of collocates altogether account for 89%. The rest adjective collocates of too (emotions and feelings, time and place) take up 11%. Among the four main semantic fields, adjective collocates expressing quantitative features take up the biggest percentage, which is different from boosters very and so. Adjective collocates expressing the concept of relationships are not found for too in the native corpora as they are for the booster very and so. Percentage of each of the semantic category for too and examples of the adjective collocates are shown in Table 6.28. Larger contexts show that the booster too tends to express a negative semantic prosody. The attitude expressed by too is that of dissatisfaction. One typical pattern for too is TOO adj to v, which indicates that the degree is more than enough and dissatisfying. Neutral and positive attitude can also be expressed by TOO adj, but they account for a very small percentage. The frequencies of the adjective collocates in each category are listed in Table 6.29. 6.3.1.4

Interim summary

The semantic preference and prosody of the three boosters, very, so and too, are summarized in this section. The two most frequently used boosters, very and so, share similar semantic preference and semantic prosody. They mainly Table 6.28 Semantic preferences of too in NS corpora Semantic Fields

FROWN FLOB Examples of the Adjective Collocates

Comments and evaluation 12% Emotions and feelings

17%

5%

8%

Qualitative features

31%

27%

Physical features Time and place Situation description

31% 8% 13%

35% 4% 9%

nice, insignificant, good, great, important, ridiculous happy, excited, naïve, old, soft, grateful, pleased conservative, unattractive, unproductive, young, listless, careful, complicated big, large, many, much, long, little, small late, long, close, remote, early dangerous, hazardous, busy, limited

Table 6.29 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of too in NS corpora Collocates of too

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

12 (12%) 13 (13%)

67 (67%) 70 (70%)

21 (21%) 17 (27%)

100 (100%) 100 (100%)

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

109

Table 6.30 Semantic preference and prosody of very, so and too in NS corpora Boosters

Semantic preference

Semantic prosody

very

to intensify adjectives expressing the meaning of evaluation, qualitative feature, physical feature, and emotive feelings, time and place, relationship, etc. to intensify adjective collocates expressing the meaning of evaluation, qualitative feature, physical feature, and emotive feelings, time and place, relationship and situational description, etc. to intensify adjective collocates expressing the meaning of evaluation, qualitative feature, physical feature, and emotive feelings, time and place and situational description , etc.

mixed

so

too

mixed

negative

modify adjective collocates from four main semantic fields and three minor semantic fields. Both boosters tend to express mixed semantic prosodies. However, too appears to carry different semantic preference and semantic prosody from very and so . Adjective collocates expressing the concept of relationships for very and so are not found for too. The semantic prosody of too is inclined to be negative, which is different from the mixed prosody of very and so. Table 6.30 summarizes the semantic preference and semantic prosody of very, so and too. 6.3.2 6.3.2.1

Boosters in the CL corpora The node word very

Chinese learners of English take the booster very as an all-purpose intensifier – i.e. learners overuse it several times more than the native speakers do. However, CLEC data show that collocates of very are limited. One hundred randomly chosen concordance lines indicate that the adjective collocates of very mainly fall into four semantic fields: evaluation and comments, emotive feelings, qualitative characteristics and physical features. The four semantic fields cover 92% of the collocates, which is a relatively higher percentage in comparison to 88% in FLOB in and 85% in FROWN. Within the four main semantic fields of the adjective collocates, the first category accounts for 44%, which is much higher than the 29% in FROWN and 30% in FLOB. Words of the semantic fields of time and place, relationships, situational descriptions are rarely found in learner English. Frequent examples of the adjective collocates of very are listed in Table 6.31. Different from the mixed semantic prosody of very in native English, the semantic prosody of very appears to be positive in learner English. A large number of adjective collocates of very express a positive meaning – for example, glad, happy,

110

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.31 Semantic preferences of very in CLEC Semantic fields

Typical adjective collocates

Comments and evaluation (44%)

glad, happy, nice, important, good, wonderful, popular, powerful, bad, beautiful, useful, well angry, comfortable, glad, greatful (misspelling of grateful), happy, sorry, surprised lazy, friendly, helpful, grand, poor, rich, young big, small, much, many, limited, wide long different urgent, busy, hot,

Emotions and feelings (16%) Qualitative characteristics (15%) Physical features (17%) Time and place (3%) Relationship (1%) Situation description (4%)

Table 6.32 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of very in CLEC Collocates of very

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC

53 (53%)

24 (24%)

23 (23%)

100 (100%)

good, nice, rich, powerful and important. Few show a negative meaning, such as angry, bad, difficult, dreadful and wrong. Some of them express a neutral attitude: small, large, big, different, etc. The frequency and percentage of positive, neutral and negative adjective collocates of very are listed in Table 6.32. 6.3.2.2

The node word so

Concordance lines for so reveal that so in the learner English has slightly different semantic preference than in native English. Learners are more likely to use so to modify quantitative adjectives, while native speakers use so more often to modify adjectives expressing the meaning of comments or evaluations. So in the native English is found to be able to collocate with adjectives expressing the meaning of relationships such as same, different and close. However, this semantic feature cannot be observed in the learner English. In addition to the aforementioned differences, learners use so to modify emotive feelings more than the native speakers. The detailed frequency of each type of semantic field of the adjective collocates of so and the corresponding examples are shown in Table 6.33. By observing the concordance lines and analyzing the adjective collocates of so in the learner English, we detect that the semantic prosody of so is a mixed one. The detailed frequency and percentage of the positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of so in CLEC can be read in Table 6.34. They take similar percentages as those in the native English.

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

111

Table 6.33 Semantic preferences of so in CLEC Semantic Fields of the Adjective Collocates (%)

Typical Adjective Collocates

Comments and evaluation (23%)

abnormal, acute, bad, beautiful, good, popular, happy, unfair tired, sad, satisfactory interesting, soft, many, much, large late hot

Emotions and feelings (19%) Qualitative features (19%) Physical features (34%) Time and place (1%) Situational description (4%)

Table 6.34 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of so in CLEC Collocates of so

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC

45 (45%)

33 (33%)

22 (22%)

100 (100%)

6.3.2.3

The node word too

Chinese learners use booster too in a similar way to that of native speakers in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody. The adjective collocates of too in learner English share three main semantic fields and three minor ones with native speaker English. The three main fields are comments and evaluation, qualitative features and quantitative features. The three minor fields include emotions and feelings, time and place and situational descriptions. The semantic field of the quantitative features takes the biggest percentage in learner English. Learners do not use too to collocate with adjectives expressing relationships, which is a collocational behavior of too in native English. The adjective collocates of too in each semantic category, and the frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of too in CLEC can be found in Table 6.35 and Table 6.36, respectively. 6.3.2.4

Interim summary

The semantic preference and prosody of the three boosters very, so and too in the native corpora and the learner corpora were examined in this section. The investigation shows that learners have a similar semantic preference to that of the native speakers in using boosters very, so and too. However, learner data also display idiosyncratic features in comparison with the native data. They tend to use a narrower semantic range of adjective collocates – i.e. they are likely to use the allround boosters to modify adjective collocates within a limited number of semantic fields. The main semantic fields of collocates for the boosters very and so in learner

112

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.35 Semantic preferences of too in CLEC Semantic Fields (%)

Typical Adjective Collocates

comments and evaluation (12%) emotion and feeling (13%) qualitative features (22%)

important, bad, bright, outstanding, hard nervous, anxious, disappointed, frightened, lazy, soft, academic, cruel, foolish, kind, old, prudent many, much, long short, busy, cold,

physical features (39%) time and place (1%) situational description (13%)

Table 6.36 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of too in CLEC Collocates of too

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC

9 (9%)

79 (79%)

12 (12%)

100 (100%)

Table 6.37 Semantic preference and prosody of maximizers in CLEC Boosters

Semantic preference

Semantic prosody

very

To prefer to collocate with adjectives expressing the meaning of comments and evaluation, quantitative features and qualitative features, etc. To intensify adjective collocates expressing the meaning of physical features, comments and evaluation, qualitative features, emotions and feelings, etc. To prefer to collocate with adjective collocates with the meaning of physical features, comments and evaluation, qualitative features, emotions and feelings, etc.

positive 

so too

mixed negative

English are different from those in native English. Some semantic fields of the adjective collocates in native English cannot be found in the learner English. A summary of the semantic preference and semantic prosody of very, so and too in the learner English is shown in Table 6.37. Items marked with an asterisk are those that are used differently by the native English speakers and Chinese learners.

6.4

Diminishers

As mentioned in Chapter 4, downtoners are a group of intensifiers which are significantly underused as a whole by Chinese learners of English. However, a little and a bit as downtoners for adjectives are among the top-twenty, most frequently used intensifies in the Chinese learner corpus CLEC. In contrast to the underuse

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

113

Table 6.38 Frequency of the observed downtoners in NS and the CL corpora

FROWN (F) FROWN(SF) FLOB (F) FLOB(SF) CLEC (F) CLEC(SF)

a little

a bit

a little bit

43 3.0 38 2.6 61 5.7

23 1.6 25 1.7 33 2.9

2 0.1 2 0.1 8 0.7

of most downtoners in learner English, phrasal intensifiers a little and a bit are overused. Therefore, they are worth an investigation. The phrasal intensifier a little bit is a close synonym for a little and a bit, so it is also examined. The frequencies of the three downtoners a little, a bit and a little bit can be seen in Table 6.38. 6.4.1 6.4.1.1

Diminishers in the NS corpora The node phrase a little

Concordance lines for a little are retrieved from the native corpora FROWN and FLOB. Twenty are randomly chosen from FROWN and shown in Table 6.39. The retrieved concordance lines indicate that a little tends to tone down the modified adjective collocates which express an inferior or abnormal mood, present a poor condition or indicate an increasing degree. Among the intensified adjective collocates of a little, the emotive adjectives expressing bad feeling are angry, crazy, cruel, cynical, edgy, freaked, miffed, nauseous, nervous, stressed, apprehensive, bewildered, crazy, doubtful, peeved, mad, ridiculous, nervous, sad, scared, surprised, etc. Those expressing poor conditions are cold, frightening, hard, uncertain, limited, rough, too heavy, uncomfortable, deaf, cold, husky, crumpled, thinner, more difficult, unhealthy, too difficult, unfinished, smaller, naïve, older, too much, askew, etc. The adjective collocates of a little also include comparative forms: more serious, more patient, more classy, more careful, higher, larger, faster, closer, bigger, better, wider, smaller, older, lower, thinner, easier, cooler, etc. To sum up, semantically, a little prefers to down tone emotive adjectives of expressing bad feelings, bad conditions or down tone meanings of comparative forms. It is not difficult to summarize the semantic prosody of a little based on its semantic preference. Words modified by a little show strong negative connotations. They express mostly bad emotions, poor conditions or a bad trend, which can be seen in Table 6.39. The frequency and percentage of the semantic prosody of a little is listed in Table 6.40. It shows that a little expresses a negative semantic prosody.

114

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.39 Concordance lines for a little in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

t it, but right now P06 174 it makes him a little angry. He’d never do that to h ghtly to her left, to try N20 104 to get a little better look at the silent man. her N14 19 from who and what she was and a little closer to being someone she N1 charm and was probably more J30 45 than a little crazy. His theory that all ill the fat, sitting Sultan started getting a little curious. K25 108 “What occasio L09 159 Fisher: that the young woman was a little cynical and world-weary, L09 1 79 a thing to most voters, it has to be a little embarrassing to his B05 80 sup 9 started driving down the hill. L05 60 “ A little faster wouldn’t bother me,” Co ve. Up close, F06 188 Findelgletscher is a little frightening - a huge, craggy m ial and impatience. A21 178 “He might be a little hard-headed, but all good A21 sigh of relief. It B06 126 will be high, a little higher than last year, but not . A34 86 The crowd at Charles Schwab was a little larger than normal for A34 87 er after.” A39 233 Then, happily, TV got a little more serious. A39 234 Witness 13 211 women flocked to him? If I’d been a little more patient and not K13 212 p e L05 72 Times. Usually the Japanese are a little more classy about who L05 73 t 03 155 she explains, and the reader gets a little nervous about what the C03 156 1 after such encounters, and indulged in a little playful raillery at G55 52 eac dropping her voice so she’d P27 49 sound a little shy. P27 50 He hissed between nie.” N29 85 “Please, Big Man, we’re all a little stressed N29 86 here.” The dir lf-sufficient Wren feel N14 44 more than a little uncomfortable. She ate in sile

Table 6.40 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a little in NS corpora Collocates of a little

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

5 (14%) 8 (21%)

25 (74%) 27 (71%)

4 (12%) 3 (8%)

34 (100%) 38 (100%)

6.4.1.2

The node phrase a bit

Concordance lines for a bit are retrieved from the native corpora FROWN and FLOB. Twenty of them are randomly chosen from FROWN and listed in Table 6.41. Concordance lines indicate that the phrasal intensifier a bit tends to modify adjectives that express bad emotive feelings, certain poor conditions and the comparative forms of the adjective collocates. The adjective collocates of a bit expressing bad emotive feelings include suspicious, startled, sad, nervous, more sympathy, worried, embarrassed, confused, upset, etc. Those expressing poor situations are too dangerous, rough, too free, moist, misleading, frazzled, intense, long, unusual, far-fetched, dizzying, cluttered, odd, tight, stiff, roundabout, pricey, patchy, overwhelming, overdone, odd, etc. Comparative forms include more sympathy, more canny, less strange, cleaner, harder, looser, harder, etc.

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

115

Table 6.41 Concordance lines for a bit in FROWN 1 terms imposed last year, while making it a bit 2 60 compared with somebody whose book is a bit 3 had R07 56 first struck her as homey, if a bit 4 n the A31 99 morning. A31 100 It was all a bit 5 ules Pascin, G52 81 whose inclusion was “ a bit 6 e.” L13 185 The conversation was getting a bit 7 t.” K28 126 “I like your gray hair. It’s a bit 8 e Louis’s interest. But those marks were a bit 9 9 183 Vassila,ó Count Ilitch?s eyes were a bit 10 ways been kind to its land, it has shown a bit 11 record for scoring passes. A16 15 “I was a bit 12 in the P17 98 middle. He thought it was a bit 13 ot happy. I know you probably feel I was a bit 14 nd forms. C05 8 Frankly, it always seems a bit 15 162 stood so much use that it had turned a bit 16 cheek as she P15 165 got out then looked a bit 17 fied smile on his face. P17 67 Mike grew a bit 18 moneyed woman. He’s handsome enough, if a bit 19 his hands he told the cat the trick was a bit 20 ul’s hideout N23 180 had apparently been a bit

harder for Saddam to keep cleaner? How does F12 61 society cluttered. Now, however, her R07 dizzying to two German tourists w far-fetched as there is nothing G intense. It was Costello who L13 long. His looks K28 127 black.” K misleading. G42 134 Instead of ha moist. òWe K09 184 were the deare more sympathy L03 45 for its anim nervous before the game, I though odd, but I told him that I was P1 rough with you this morni sad that by the time most women h shiny, but as far as The N27 163 startled when Kate emerged behind suspicious. “What was your purpos thin. (Thinner P20 55 this year t too dangerous. N25 121 ** too free with that information fo

Table 6.42 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a bit in NS corpora Collocates of a bit

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

FROWN FLOB

3 (13%) 1 (4%)

15 (65%) 20 (80%)

5 (22%) 4 (16%)

23 (100%) 25 (100%)

However, there are much fewer cases in which a bit modifies a comparative form compared with a little. There are ten (SF = 0.68) and twelve (SF = 0.82) occurrences in FROWN and FLOB, respectively, where a little modifies the comparative form of an adjective collocate. And there are only three (SF = 0.2) occurrences of a bit in this usage in each of the two corpora. In terms of semantic prosody, a bit carries a negative prosodic negative meaning. The frequency and percentage of the semantic prosody of a bit is listed in Table 6.42. Though a bit has a number of positive collocates, in general, it intensifies adjective collocates of negative meaning. 6.4.1.3

The node phrase a little bit

Five cases of a little bit modifying an adjective are retrieved from the NS corpora. They are a little bit larger, a little bit mixed up, a little bit jealous in FRWON and

116

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.43 Concordance lines for a little bit in NS corpora 1 aiting all along for you to do something 2 our A17 154 offense,” he said. “And it’s 3 at Nottingham, “ Monica seems to be 4 ach Sunday the congregation F25 113 grew 5 lthough he denies it, he used to be just

a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit

crazy P18 211 like this.” easier on A17 155 the offe mixed up but we still expect larger. The atmosphere was jealous F21 18 of his form

a little bit crazy, a little bit easier in FLOB. Based on this, we can tentatively conclude that a little bit tends to share the semantic preference (modifying emotional adjectives, unusual conditions and comparative forms of adjectives) and semantic prosody (an obvious negative one, three cases out five (60%) express negative meaning) with its two near synonyms a little and a bit. 6.4.1.4

Interim summary

The semantic preference and semantic prosody of three downtoner phrasal intensifiers (a little, a bit and a little bit) as downtoners are explored in the native corpora. They share similar semantic preference and semantic prosody. They are inclined to attract words denoting negative emotions, unnatural or unfavorable poor conditions and bad trends. Their function is to down tone negative meanings and attitudes to show a moderate attitude. 6.4.2 6.4.2.1

Diminishers in the CL corpora The node phrase a little

The phrasal intensifier a little is the most frequently used downtoner in Chinese learner English. The phrasal downtoner a little is retrieved from CLEC and sixtyone occurrences are found. The adjectives modified by a little are classified into three groups according to their semantic meanings. They are adjectives carrying emotional attitudes: afraid (4), angry (2), frightened, hurt, lonely, sad, scared, unhappy (2) and upset (2); adjectives expressing unfavorable situations: dangerous, difficult, dirty, hurt, ill, fat, hot, low, passive, outdated, dry, small, weak, older, late, bald, clumsy, different, disordered and hard; adjectives taking the comparative forms: bigger, cheaper, earlier, higher, older, quieter, etc. Among the sixty-one adjectives collocating with the downtoner a little, forty-nine (80%) express negative meaning, three (5%) have the positive meaning and nine (15%) have the neutral meaning. Table 6.45 shows the statistics in detail. It can be seen that the semantic prosody of a little is clearly a negative one. Twenty concordances of a little in CLEC are randomly chosen and shown in Table 6.44. They show that a little is a device used to modify adjectives of negative meaning, aiming to relieve the degree of the negative attitude expressed by the adjective collocates.

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

117

Table 6.44 Concordance lines for a little in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

r Wu he was about fifty years old. I was r name here before you come in.” We went y two years old at that time. When I was feel my voice trembling. The girl seemed n. Being a college student, I might seem again and again. At the beginning I was ountry. Of course, the situation here is st known of her writtings . This book is front of the mirror. But I found it was resent human beings are born with, seems begun . At this time, I feel excited and you can get him for me?” She questioned, ost fall in love. I was very excited and by those two fact. Perhaps this view is ng her hands into her pockets. They look and lifted up to share the view. She was could make them cry. By the way, you are about them, my speed of reading is still rything is as well as usuall . But I had y winter vacation. One day my Mum looked

a little afraid of him. I hesitated for a little angry because he was so rude. a little bigger, father often worked i a little calm after a few seconds. Agai a little childish to read it. Some of m a little clumsy. By and by I became ski a little different from yours. On one h a little difficult for me to read. Beca a little dirty because it had been hung a little far-fetched for most women in a little frightened. Put the text books a little impatient with my soundless re a little nervous that night. I’d never a little passive, but death is inevitab a little sad and very tired. May be The a little scared by the assaulting sound a little similar to them in this respec a little slow. I think later I should p a little unhappy today: On my way home, a little upset when she came back from

Table 6.45 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a little in CLEC Collocates of a little

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC

3 (5%)

49 (80%)

9 (15%)

61(100%)

To sum up, Chinese learners of English use the phrasal intensifiers a little in the same way as the native speakers, which is a phenomenon worth noting. 6.4.2.2

The node phrase a bit

The phrasal intensifier a bit is the second most frequently used downtoner by the Chinese learners of English. In CLEC, thirty-three concordance lines for a bit are retrieved. Twenty concordance lines are randomly chosen and shown in Table 6.46. The intensified adjective collocates of a bit in CLEC display obvious similar semantic and pragmatic features to the native corpora FROWN and FLOB. Semantically, the adjective collocates of a bit covers three main fields. They are emotive feelings: worried (3), sorry, impatient, frightened, discouraged, disappointed and afraid (2); adjectives expressing an unfavorable condition: older, slow, old-fashioned, noisy, too abstract, husky, hard, foolish, dirty, difficult (3),

118

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

Table 6.46 Concordance lines for a bit in CLEC 1 he mountain, I began felt very tried and a bit afraid. If we not careful we can 2 o my seat with my teachers jacket it was a bit big for me but I felt very warm i 3 om pain dying and do nothing to make him a bit comfortable is also inhuman in so 4 Carrying out Euthanasia may seems to be a bit cruel, but seeing a helpless pati 5 ior middle school, study English is felt a bit difficult, but I will keep on stu 6 an see many black powder on it. It looks a bit dirty. There is a rocking chain o 7 ing the best woman actor. But it made me a bit disapointed , for Leon Lai was fa 8 but now I did not try to be on 90. I am a bit discouraged. Sunday Dec 3rd Su 9 6:05 p.m. I got on the last bus that day a bit earlier than usual, but still fou 10 lly speak at a normal speed, which seems a bit fast to non-native speakers. Thus 11 y. He said to me, “Some people think I’m a bit foolish. They don’t understand wh 12 ght for a few years. Her sight let us be a bit frightened, so we were not dare t 13 ough relation net . However, it is still a bit hard for students to get a positi 14 be useless. “You fool,” my friend became a bit impatient, -maybe afraid. “Necess 15 n playing, laughing, and jumping make it a bit noisy. However, A is obviously mo 16 ways has a teacher of midium age or just a bit older. He or she must has rich te 17 ear the economic development seems to be a bit slow. Furthermore, the market-ori 18 ody, besides studying hard. Though I was a bit tired, I spent sufficiently today 19 down from the ceiling, not dust. I have a bit worried about my safety and that 20 f class must be in their 40’s or 50’s or a bit younger. They do want to teach th

Table 6.47 Frequency and percentage of positive, negative and neutral adjective collocates of a bit in CLEC Collocates of a little

Positive

Negative

Neutral

in all

CLEC

5 (15%)

25 (76%)

3 (9%)

33 (100%)

cruel; and adjectives in the comparative form: older, younger, and better. Chinese learners use a bit properly in terms of the semantic preference in comparison with native speakers. The semantic prosody of a bit in CLEC is also negative, similar to its use in the native corpus. Out of the thirty-three collocates of a bit, twenty-five (76%) express negative meaning, five (15%) have a positive meaning and three (9%) convey a neutral meaning. The statistics are shown in Table 6.47. 6.4.2.3

The node phrase a little bit

The phrasal intensifier a little bit appears eight times in the learner corpus; however, it is still overused significantly compared to that in the native corpora. The concordance lines for a little bit in the Chinese learners corpus are listed in

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

119

Table 6.48 Concordance lines for a little bit in CLEC 1 0 fen for the ticket ?” “ Why?” I became 2 long time will find it, sooner or later, 3 oyment situation in China, I think it is 4 l of romantic thoughts, sometimes sounds 5 change to this new energy because of its 6 to undertake the task. Although we start 7 ill be horrible disaster. Although it is 8 ng your saxophone. The music is good but

a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit a little bit

angry. “ I’m very sorry “ banal. That is why my frie difficult subject. Yes, Ch foolish. But a lot of fact higher price. Though indiv late, but if we keep on ma late for humanity to pay a louder. It not only puts a

Table 6.48. The eight instances are a little bit angry, a little bit late (2), a little bit foolish, a little bit banal, a little bit difficult, a little bit easier and a little bit louder. The eight concordance lines reveal similar semantic preferences to its use in the native corpora. That is, it prefers to intensify adjectives expressing bad emotion, bad conditions, taking the comparative forms, such as higher and louder. So we can conclude that Chinese learners of English use a little bit in a native way in terms of its semantic preference. All eight adjective collocates of a little bit carry negative meaning. Its semantic prosody is obviously negative. To conclude, Chinese learners of English use a little bit in a native way in terms of its semantic prosody. 6.4.2.4

Interim summary

The semantic preference and semantic prosody of the three phrasal intensifiers (a little, a bit, a little bit) are explored in the learner corpora. Different from the findings about the other two groups of synonym intensifiers investigated in this section, learners can use a little, a bit and a little bit in similar patterning in terms of the semantic preference and semantic prosody.

6.5

Discussion

The examination of the semantic features of three groups of synonymous intensifiers brings insights into the understanding of the interrelations of the components within the framework of EUM. Semantic prosody is at a stage of abstraction higher than semantic preference. Semantic prosody is an indication of the speakers’ attitude about the entities and propositions that he or she is talking about. The semantic preference remains relatively closely tied to the phenomenon of collocation. The co-selection between the collocates and the node words, the semantic preference and the distinctive semantic prosody are good illustrations of the theory of EUM. Chinese learners of English use some intensifiers quite differently than the native speakers, and at the same time, they can use some intensifiers in a similar way as the native speakers in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody.

120

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

The characteristic features of intensifiers in learner English as well as the underlying factors accounting for these features are as follows: (1) Chinese learners of English use the synonymous intensifiers interchangeably, even when they show different semantic preferences and semantic prosodies, which may disclose learners’ inadequate pragmatic skill. Native English shows that synonymous intensifiers may tend to express different pragmatic meanings and deliver different attitudes. Pragmatic meanings and lexis are co-selected. The five synonymous maximizers, completely, totally, entirely, absolutely and fully, are typical examples that show that near synonyms carry similar denotational meanings, but they function differently in their connotational meanings. Pragmatically, they express different attitudes ranging from being absolutely negative to obviously positive. For example, completely tends to collocate with adjectives with negative prefixes and has obvious negative semantic prosody, entirely intensifies adjective collocates ending in the suffixes -able/ible and -al and the semantic prosody expressed by entirely is mixed; fully intensifies adjective collocates with -ed and expresses a neutral semantic prosody. Each of the intensifiers has its own particular semantic preference and carries particular semantic prosody. However, Chinese learners of English treat these pseudo-synonymous maximizers as interchangeable and ignore the co-selection between the lexis and the pragmatic meaning. The semantic preference of entirely and absolutely displayed in native English cannot be found in the learner English. Most of the five investigated maximizers in learner English display mixed semantic prosodies, which are markedly different from native English, pointing to learners’ undeveloped pragmatic awareness. Learners’ inadequate pragmatic knowledge will no doubt cause misunderstanding. The building up of the learners’ pragmatic knowledge calls for reform in the compiling of dictionaries and textbook materials. It is suggested that the traditional way of teaching synonyms by listing them together without explicit explanation of their pragmatic usages should also be given up. Learning and using synonyms in the old ways will be a potential trap for learners because it emphasizes the denotational meaning of words rather than their usage (Tognini-Bonelli, 2001: 34; Xiao & McEnery, 2006: 111). (2) Chinese learners can use diminishers properly in terms of their semantic preference and semantic prosody, which can be mainly attributed to the positive sociopragmatic transfer. This research shows that diminishers display negative semantic prosodies, which is in line with the findings of Wu (2010). Diminishers are in many cases used to collocate with adjectives of negative meaning. They function to mitigate threats and down tone the degree of negative attitudes. The present study shows that learners are able to use the synonymous diminishers a little, a bit and a little bit similarly to the native speakers in terms of both semantic preference and semantic prosody. The proper use of the diminishers can be mainly traced to the

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

121

Chinese learners’ traditional cultural backgrounds. The concept of politeness and modesty in Chinese culture enables learners to down tone rough attitudes and to be polite to save face. As Brown and Levinson (1987) propose, the concept of saving face is a universal human need, and it is the key motivating force for politeness and rapport management. Though there are different strategies in specific speech act performances, general concepts and dimensions of politeness do exist (Hill et al., 1986; Yu, 2003). To abide by the politeness maxim (Leech & Leech, 1983), downtoners become the devices to minimize the dispraise of others and to save face. Learners’ proper employment of diminishers in the present study shows that sociopragmatic knowledge in L1 is transferred positively in producing L2 (Kasper, 1992: 209). Sociopragmatic transfer is operative when social perceptions underlying language users’ interpretation and performance in L2 are influenced by their assessment of equivalent L1 contexts. Chinese learners’ traditional concepts of politeness are transferred positively in using diminishers to mitigate the negative attitude. (3) Learners display limited collocational abilities in using intensifiers, which are embodied in the narrow semantic fields of the adjective collocates of intensifiers. The semantic preferences of the investigated synonymous intensifiers suggest that learners have very limited collocational abilities. Learner collocates tend to cover narrower semantic fields in comparison with those of the native speakers. For example, for the booster very, learners primarily use adjective collocates of very to the semantic field of comments and evaluation, and they do not use adjective collocates of the semantic field of relationship; for the booster so, learner collocates are restricted to the semantic field of quantity features, and they do not employ any adjective collocate in the semantic field of relationship; for the booster too, learners use collocates within the semantic field of quantity features and ignore the semantic field of relationship. They are more likely to use intensifiers to modify adjective collocates in the narrower and more focused ranges of semantic fields. This suggests that the learners’ collocational knowledge is limited and their collocational awareness is inadequate. Although there is a growing recognition of collocation in language teaching, there seems to be a lack of awareness of its true significance (Howarth, 1998). Learning vocabulary and learning the collocations of the vocabulary are inseparable. The development of collocational skill is vital to learners’ English ability and the accomplishment of the communicative purpose. (4) Chinese learners of English display their sound knowledge in the employment of familiar intensifiers in terms of semantic features. Chinese learners of English tend to use familiar intensifiers properly and unfamiliar intensifiers improperly. This trend appears to be noticeable in their use of the three groups of synonymous intensifiers under study. The group of synonym boosters very, so and too and the group of diminishers a little, a bit and a little bit are all overused by learners and most of them are used appropriately, which forms

122

Semantic preference and semantic prosody of intensifiers

a sharp contrast with their use of maximizer group synonyms, which are underused and employed improperly by learners. This cannot be taken as a coincidence but to be taken seriously. This is largely due to textbook input bias in that overused intensifiers by learners often have frequent occurrences in textbooks and are emphasized unduly during English learning and teaching process. Since the more emphasized linguistic items in learning and teaching can become familiar to learners, intensifiers, as a key device to express the attitudinal meanings, deserve the same amount of attention in the teaching material and classroom teaching processes as nouns, verbs and adjectives do. With this effort, the overuse and underuse of intensifiers can be avoided and the misuse of certain intensifiers can be reduced.

6.6

Summary

Three sets of synonymous intensifiers have been examined in this chapter. The characteristic features of these intensifiers in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody have been analyzed. We have found that learners have used intensifiers very differently from native speakers in some cases, while they are able to use a few intensifiers similarly to native speakers. For example, in case of amplifiers, learner English differs from native speaker English significantly either because of semantic preferences or semantic prosody, but in the case of downtoners, learners reveal similar features to native speaker English in terms of collocation, semantic preference and prosody. In all cases examined, L1 transfer seems to be an important causal factor for errors and inappropriateness in output. Another factor which has probably caused learner errors is pedagogic input bias, by which is meant the undue emphasis given to relevant linguistic forms in the pedagogic process. Where language knowledge is concerned, leaner English is characterized by noticeable weakness in collocational knowledge. Learners’ collocational range is seriously limited and narrowed. More seriously, they do not possess the skills for using words pragmatically.

7

Conclusions and implications

This chapter summarizes the major research findings and discusses implications for future studies.

7.1

Major findings

The present research has carried out a systematic CIA study of intensifiers in the learner corpora and the native corpora. The overall data distribution of intensifiers has been derived from both the learner corpus and the native corpus. The developing features of using intensifiers across different proficiency levels by Chinese learners have been explored. Patterning and meaning features of intensifiers in learner English have been studied in depth within the framework of Sinclair’s model of EUM in terms of collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. The underlying factors contributing to features of learner English were analyzed. Major findings of this research are summarized as follows: (1) Native data in the present research lend strong support to the co-selection theory of Sinclair. This study provides authentic data demonstrating that lexis and patterns, patterns and registers, pragmatic meanings and lexis are co-selected. They convincingly show the explanatory power of Sinclair’s idiom principle. A large amount of language use consists of words occurring in conventional combinations (Stubbs, 2001). The co-selection phenomenon revealed in this research also echoes with the Firthian contextual theory that the meaning of a word is always contextual. Meaning of any lexical item is always context-dependent. On the other hand, this research shows that Chinese English learners have weak awareness of the co-selections at different linguistic levels. Abundant instances indicate that learners violate the native speaker co-selections and produce inappropriate or even unacceptable English; for example, the overuse of TOO MUCH modifying countable nouns and TOO MANY modifying single nouns, employing the pattern VERY VERY adj in written registers and the mixed semantic prosodies displayed by the five investigated maximizers – completely, entirely, totally, absolutely, fully – in learner English. The violation of the co-selections in learner

124

Conclusions and implications

English points to an important fact that learners have limited collocational proficiencies. Their inadequate mastery of prefixed chunks causes them to put individual words together according to grammatical rules, which results in awkward learner English. (2) The data distribution of intensifiers in the learner corpus exhibits remarkably different features from those in the native corpus. The research data show a general trend that Chinese learners of English overuse intensifiers significantly in terms of tokens and underuse intensifiers significantly in terms of types. The tokens of the investigated INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and adjective collocates of intensifiers in the learner English all display non-positive relationships with the learners’ English proficiency level. The overuse of intensifiers in the learner English cannot be attributed to the overuse of adjectives because learners use fewer adjectives than the native speakers in general. The types of the investigated INT-adj collocations, intensifiers, double intensifiers and adjective collocates of intensifiers display the same trend that the type number increases slowly and steadily with the learners’ English proficiency level. This trend is especially typical of intensifiers. Thus it is suggested that the type number of intensifiers can be a good indicator of learners’ English proficiency level. Learners over-rely on the high-frequency intensifiers and underuse the mediumand low-frequency intensifiers in comparison with the native speakers. And they are more likely to focus on amplifiers than downtoners, compared with native speakers. All the aforementioned trends indicate Chinese learner English lacks variation in the use of intensifiers and intensifier collocations. Learners have limited skills for employing intensifiers to realize meaning and function. In addition to this, learners also demonstrate other distinctive features. They use INT-adj collocations, intensifiers and adjective collocates that are unique and idiosyncratic, and not employed by native speakers at all. These expressions are found to be congruent with features in their mother tongue Chinese, which is an indication of L1 transfer in the L2 acquisition. (3) Compared with native English, Chinese learners’ English shows its unique patterning features. Patterns in learner English lack variation in comparison with those in native English. The higher the learners’ English proficiency level, the more likely they have similar pattern distributions as the native speakers. Learners over-rely on familiar patterns and avoid unfamiliar patterns. They fail to employ alternative expressions and tend to avoid using unfamiliar patterns, which results in fewer pattern varieties and awkward English.

Conclusions and implications 125 Patterns in learner English are over-simplistic in comparison with those in native English. The investigation indicated that some typical patterns used to soften absolute attitude and help make the expressions more acceptable in native English are absent in learner English. This shows that learners’ linguistic output tends to be impolite in attitude, which will easily cause barriers and even misunderstandings in communication. Many problematic patterns exist in learner English. Learners create many patterns which are peculiar to learners and are never used by native speakers of English. The coined patterns in learner English are sometimes grammatically incorrect or may be grammatically perfect but semantically unacceptable. The grammatically unacceptable expressions are mostly influenced by learners’ L1 knowledge. The grammatically perfect but unacceptable expressions show that learners have inadequate pragmatic knowledge. (4) Learners exhibit special traits in using intensifiers in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody. They use synonymous intensifiers interchangeably showing no awareness of their different semantic preferences and semantic prosodies, which reveals their inadequate pragmatic proficiency. However, Chinese learners can use diminishers properly both in terms of semantic preference and semantic prosody, which can be mainly attributed to the positive sociopragmatic transfer. Another feature is that Chinese learners of English employ adjective collocates of narrower semantic fields than native speakers of English, which are manifestations of learners’ weak collocational competence. On the other hand, similar to learners of other mother tongue backgrounds, Chinese learners display sound knowledge in the employment of familiar intensifiers but weak skill in using unfamiliar intensifiers. The input material and the received attention during the teaching process account for this phenomenon. The aforementioned findings have shown a world of difference between the native English and the learner English in using intensifiers. The underlying factors accountable for the particular patterns and meanings in learner English are as follows: (1) L1 transfer plays an obvious role in causing the overuse, underuse and misuse of certain intensifiers. The intensifier patterns overused by Chinese learners are found to have their frequently used equivalent expressions in Chinese. The differences between Chinese and English are the main factors responsible for the abnormal patterns and awkward expressions in English. A lot of problematic expressions in learner English are literal translations from Chinese into English. (2) Biased input in the learning process, for example, the textbooks and dictionary content, is an important factor to shape learners’ behavior in using intensifiers. The present research has found that patterns which occur

126

Conclusions and implications

frequently in textbooks are likely to be overused by learners. Learners rarely use some patterns that are regularly occurring expressions in native English because they have appeared infrequently in textbooks. The lack of pragmatic information in dictionaries available to the learners can account for why learners have weak pragmatic knowledge and are not aware of the semantic prosodies of intensifiers. (3) Learners treat synonyms as interchangeable items, and this causes their non-nativeness language production. This research shows that synonyms cannot substitute one another because they share denotational meaning but have different connotational, syntactical and functional meanings in most cases. Our analyses show that learners tend to treat synonyms as interchangeable items in communication. This will, in many cases, lead to unacceptable collocations and failure in fulfilling the communicative purpose. Learners need to understand that restricted collocations make up a significant part of a typical native speaker’s production in both speech and writing (Howarth, 1998: 186). Textbooks and dictionaries available to Chinese learners more often than not fail to provide information regarding collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody of synonyms. The pragmatic differences of synonyms are often neglected by book editors, teachers and learners themselves. (4) Learners have inadequate register awareness. Learners are not aware of linguistic variations across registers. The present study shows that learners may easily employ oral patterns in written texts. This is more likely to happen when learners fail to find a proper word and therefore they resort to repeating an intensifier to realize meaning. Learners often adopt this communicative strategy without realizing that it may be improper to repeat the intensifier in this specific register. Raising learners’ register awareness is helpful to guarantee the production of native-like English. (5) Learners possess weak pragmatic skills. Learners’ invariable and rigid expressions are a product of their weak pragmatic skills. Semantic prosody has a leading role to play in the extended units of meaning, and it expresses an attitude. However, learners tend to use certain intensifiers for all kinds of attitudes, including positive, negative and neutral ones, which causes misunderstanding in communication. At the same time, weak pragmatic knowledge causes learners to produce exaggerated expressions, which result in barriers in communication.

7.2

Implications

The present study on patterning and meaning features of intensifiers has potential as well as practical theoretical, methodological and pedagogical implications. Theoretically, the EUM is a powerful theoretical framework for descriptive linguistic studies. The present research was carried out within the framework of EUM. Co-selections were observed and described on four linguistic levels: collocation, colligation, semantic preference and semantic prosody. In contrast to traditional

Conclusions and implications 127 grammars, which see a single word as the unit of meaning, the EUM model regards a phrase, a collocation and even a pattern as a unit of meaning. The present study shows that lexis and patterns, patterns and registers, lexis and pragmatic meanings are co-selected. The attitudinal meaning determines the co-selection of lexis and grammar. That is, the semantic prosody plays the leading role in the co-selection of vocabulary, colligation and semantic meaning in language. Methodologically, this study has offered insights for enriching the CIA method. Specifically, this research is based on the pos-tagged corpora. By tagging the native corpus LOCNESS and the learner corpus CLEC, all intensifier-adjective collocations have been extracted from corpora, which makes it possible to obtain a whole picture of the overall data distribution of intensifiers in the learner corpus in comparison with that in the native corpus. All the data were checked manually to remove the inaccurate intensifier-adjective collocations. Furthermore, the intensifiers studied in depth were retrieved from the raw corpora and double-checked manually. Therefore, the research data representativeness and reliability can be guaranteed. This shows the possibility of combining a variety of methods and techniques in a study of this kind. In future studies, the multiple dimensions for data observation and the combination of quantitative and qualitative analytical methods, used in the present study, can be of practical use and reference. Pedagogically, the present study has important practical implications. (1) Patterns deserve to be included in teaching syllabus, textbooks and dictionaries. The awareness of pattern is important to language teaching and learning because it can facilitate the development of both accuracy and fluency (Hunston, 2002). Only when learners have acquired a considerable number of collocational patterns can the creative element be relied on to produce phrases that are acceptable and natural to the native speaker (Kjellmer, 1991). One obvious limitation of the current teaching syllabuses from primary school to university is that they just specify the amount of vocabulary that should be mastered, but have no specific requirements for the collocational patterns. The deficiency in the production of the phraseological patterns of textbooks is responsible for learners’ overuse and underuse of certain language items. And the available dictionaries do not present enough information on collocations. This is certainly a problem if the student is looking for a particular collocation. Furthermore, the content and design of teaching materials need to give more emphasis to the proper coverage of a wide range of patterns (Gouverneur, 2008). The selection and the presentation of the phraseology in syllabus, textbooks and dictionaries are worth investigating and the phrasal expression lists should be included in the teaching and learning materials (Martinez & Schmitt, 2012). (2) Explicit teaching of patterns is of necessity. Explicit knowledge contributes to the development of implicit knowledge (Ellis, 1994; Dekeyser, 1998, 2003). The present study shows that L1 transfer is a key factor in learners’ errors in language production. Therefore, it is suggested that in English classrooms, teachers present every new word and its patterns, which are

128

Conclusions and implications

distinct from learners’ L1. Explicitly drawing learners’ attention to collocations can make learners aware that developing one’s vocabulary lies in learning new words, but also in learning familiar words in new combinations. Collocational patterns must become part of their planned language input. Control over patterns can aid fluency as well as accuracy (Hunston, 2002). Only by storing an adequate amount of patterns can learners retrieve them as a whole rather than generate them from grammars and produce accurate and fluent English. (3) Corpora and the data-driven learning (DDL) method are recommended in language teaching and learning. Corpora should be introduced into the classroom. Corpora are representations of authentic language use, which offer valuable data for teachers and learners. Concordance lines can provide much richer contextual information than dictionaries. Displaying key words in this format can lead to a more efficient exploration of the collocates of a word. Teachers may also guide students to explore corpus materials, either in following a path of investigation determined by the teacher or in exploring an issue in a more open-ended way (Barlow, 1996: 30; Partington, 1998). The DDL approach exerts a considerable influence on the process of language learning, stimulating enquiry and speculation on the part of the learner, and helping the learner develop the ability to see patterning in the target language and to form generalizations to account for that patterning (Johns, 1991a, 1991b). DDL can draw learners’ attention to word combinations of all types (collocations, prefabs or semi-prefabs) (Granger, 2002: 14). (4) Explicit input of register knowledge is needed. Problems of register confusion also regularly arise among learners. Particularly striking is learners’ tendency to use expressions which are more typical of speech in their writing. This is visible in their overuse of adverbs expressing a high degree of certainty. For example, the patterns of VERY VERY adj, REALLY adj or ABSOLUTELY adj are characteristic of speech rather than writing. The present research and many others (Altenberg, 1991, 1997; Gilquin et al., 2007; Gilquin & Paquot, 2008) have shown that some problems in learners’ writing result from the lack of register awareness. Gui (2008) argues that Chinese learners of English face the problem of register awareness. Chinese learners tend “to write what they speak,” and they use the same register to express different social needs. Given learners’ lack of register awareness, it is important to include in the curriculum consciousness-raising activities aimed at underlining the differences that exist between written and spoken registers. Consciousness-raising and other register-related activities should ideally extend beyond the classroom and find their way into pedagogical materials (Gilquin & Paquot, 2007). Raising the learners’ register awareness can enable them to use the second language properly as far as register is concerned. (5) Explicit input of pragmatic knowledge should be enforced. Pragmatic competence is one of the vital components of communicative competence. It is necessary to understand and create language that is appropriate to the situation in which one is functioning, because failure to do so may cause misunderstanding (Thomas, 1983). Pragmatic errors may hinder communication

Conclusions and implications 129 between speakers, may make the speaker appear abrupt in social interactions or may make the speaker appear rude or uncaring. This research has found that learners have weak pragmatic knowledge, which causes the rigidity of expression. Many other studies (Bardovi-Harlig et al., 1990, 1997) have also concluded that grammatical development does not guarantee a corresponding level of pragmatic development and that even advanced learners may fail to comprehend or to convey the intentions politely. Billmyer (1990) and Bouton (1994) have found that learners show improvements as a result of instruction in pragmatics in second language learning. The increased pragmatic awareness should be a goal of classroom instruction (Bardovi-Harlig, 1996). Classroom activities which raise L2 pragmatic awareness provide learners with the necessary information and choices to help them become competent users of the target language (Bardovi-Harlig & Griffin, 2005). Therefore, we suggest that classroom teaching encompass such activities.

7.3

Limitations of this study

As an attempt to investigate the patterning and meaning features of intensifiers within the EUM model, this study suffers from several limitations: First, it focuses on describing the patterning and meaning features of intensifiers in learner English in comparison with those in native English. Factors accountable for the learners’ features of using intensifiers are analyzed only from the monolingual perspective. If the corpora of learners’ Chinese writings are investigated, more insights can be expected to be gained about the underlying factors for the learners’ idiosyncrasies in using intensifiers. The role of L1 and the exact degree of L1 interference in learning a second language will be more thoroughly understood. Second, the present research focuses on one type of collocation – i.e. the collocation of adverbial intensifier and adjective. In future research, more types of collocations of intensifiers – e.g. the verb-intensifier collocation, the intensifierprepositional phrase collocation – are expected to be carried out. By studying more types of collocations of intensifiers, the patterning and meaning features of intensifiers in learner English can be described more comprehensively. Thus a more complete picture of Chinese learners’ use of intensifiers may be drawn, which will undoubtedly contribute more to the description of learner English. Finally, the analysis of the semantic prosody involves subjective judgment to some degree. Subjective judgment plays an essential role, in this line of study, in deciding whether an attitude expressed by the intensifier-adjective collocation is positive, negative or neutral. In future studies, however, more objective assessment needs to be implemented to examine prosodic meanings of words. Dilts and Newman (2006) propose a method designed to eliminate the need for the researcher to make his or her own evaluative judgments in assessing the positive or negative prosodies of words. Based on the numerical correlations with goodness and badness arrived at by Osgood et al. (1957: 47–64), they suggest a formula by which the prosodies of nouns can be measured quantitatively. Enlightenments can be drawn from their experiments and more objective ways of studying semantic prosodies can be carried out in future studies.

Appendices Appendix I: INT-adj collocations in LOCNESS

INT-adj

F

so many

28 much greater

very important so much

22 so great 12 too easy

very strong too much too many very good strong enough terminally ill very difficult much easier old enough smart enough very competitive very significant very low very popular virtually impossible educated enough especially important even greater extremely important good enough highly respected much better

INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

3 fully integrated

2 sufficiently vague 2 that bad 2 that simple

2

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

too bad too busy too far too important too lazy too long too vague totally unacceptable 2 very clever

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2

3 highly effective 3 increasingly difficult 11 too late 3 increasingly weak 11 very basic 3 mature enough 10 very big 3 much cheaper 9 very controversial 3 much different 7 very dangerous 3 much harder 7 very high 3 much higher 6 very long 3 much lower 5 very positive 3 much more effective 5 very powerful 3 much more important 5 very rare 3 much smaller 5 very real 3 much worse 5 very similar 3 nearly impossible 4 very specific 3 perfectly good 4 very successful 3 perfectly natural 4 a bit ridiculous 3 almost dead 3 completely innocent 3 easily accessible 3 especially true 3 far greater 3 far wider 3 fast enough

2 profoundly ambiguous 2 quite clear 2 quite different

very different very effective very expensive very hard very impressionable 2 very interested

2

2

2 very interesting 2 2 very large 2

2 really political 2 very negative 2 simply impossible 2 very subtle 2 so easy 2 so important 2 so simple

2 2

2 2

2 very weak 2 2 very true 2 2 widely accepted 2

Appendices 131

The following INT-adj. Combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw) a bit ashamed, a bit hypocritical, a bit more educated, a bit steep, a little bit, more protected, a little more complex, a little reluctant, absolutely necessary, absolutely ridiculous, absolutely wrong, actually evil, actually inspiring, actually justifiable, actually quite keen, actually relatively young, acutely aware, adequate enough, adult enough, almost appalling, almost immediate, almost impossible, almost inherent, almost omnipotent, almost subconscious, almost unlimited, amazing enough, awfully high, bad enough, basically able, bitterly disillusioned, blatantly clear, bright indeed, broad enough, brutally violent, certainly pertinent, clearly happy, clearly listed, clearly logical, learly marked, clearly present, clearly visible, clever indeed, completely abhoant, completely different, completely equal, completely erroneous, completely ethical, completely impossible, completely indifferent, completely inexcusable, completely modernised and industrial, completely recyclable, completely safe, completely unjustified, completely false, considerably more stale, considerate enough, definitely hard, desperately unhappy, devastatingly shocking, drastically different, easily able, easily accessible, easily identifiable, easily tolerable, enormously fast, entirely contradictory, entirely ethical, entirely separate, entirely unfounded, entirely true, equally valuable, equally worthy, especially apparent, especially careful, especially large, especially physical, especially questionable, essentially economic, essentially rational, even aware, even better, even childless, even dangerous, even faster, even immortal, even lucky, even more central and important, even more credible, even more difficult, even more extreme, even more humiliating, even more phenomenal, even omnipotent, even possible, even probable, even sexist, even shocking, even stronger, evil enough, excessively nice, extraordinarily helpful, extremely ambiguous, extremely beautiful, extremely beneficial, extremely complex, extremely difficult, extremely efficient, extremely expensive, extremely long, extremely negative and hostile, extremely negative and perverse, extremely nice, extremely odd, extremely rich, extremely sadistic, extremely sick, extremely successful, extremely widespread, fairly accurate, fairly easy, fairly high, fairly inactive, fairly new fairly strong, fairly successful, far different, far more complicated, far more damaging, far more general, far more radical, far superior, far too important, far too late, fatally ill, firmly entrenched, fully presidential, fundamentally different, fundamentally free, generally better, generally more favorable, greatly disappointed, greatly influential, grossly insensitive, highly competitive, highly contradictory, highly emotional, highly interventionist, highly intoxicating, highly likely, highly prestigious, highly publicized, highly qualified, highly selective and elitist, highly selective, highly unlikely, hopefully certain, hugely important, immensely greedy, increasingly common, increasingly complicated, increasingly cosmopolitan, increasingly possible, increasingly prevalent, increasingly relevant, incredibly fast, incredibly high, indeed correct, indeed free, indeed human, indeed supreme, indeed true, inherently evil, inherently distinct, inherently duplicitous, inherently evil, inherently good, inherently religious, intelligent enough, intensely aware, just greedy, just too high,

132 Appendices knowledgeable enough, large enough, largely free, largely hostile, largely similar, little more glamourous, lively enough, long enough, lucky enough, ludicrously ineffective, mainly responsible, merely emotional and humanistic, mildly optimistic, mildly pleasant, moderately low, modestly positive, more and more acceptable, more and more competitive, more and more interlinked, more and more powerful, more and more violent, much deserved, much faster, much internal, much larger, much less prominent, much more competitive, much more concerned, much more convincing and acceptable, much more dangerous, much more dominant, much more expensive, much more interesting, much more profound, much more sophisticated, much more stable, much more sympathetic, much nicer, much nonbiodegradable, much professional, much too easy, much tougher, much younger, nearly dead, nearly infallible, necessarily fair, necessarily financial, necessarily good or bad, necessarily lazy, necessarily repentant, noticeably higher, obviously laughable, obviously very upset, optimistic enough, outrageously discriminatory, overly bad, overly friendly or agreeable, overly nice, overly obnoxious, overly prurient, overly strong, partially nude, particularly catholic, particularly difficult, particularly fiscal and monetary, particularly happy, particularly important, particularly interested, particularly low, particularly major, particularly painful, particularly significant, particularly vulnerable, particularly wealthy, particularly important, partly responsible, perfectly acceptable, perfectly healthy, perfectly logical, perfectly understandable, perhaps easier, perhaps selfish, plainly right or wrong, plausible enough, poorly qualified, possibly dangerous, possibly less costly, practically left, predominantly homosexual, predominantly white, pretty damaging, pretty enough, pretty rare, pretty young, probably more correct, probably true, purely economic, purely material, purely selfish, quick enough, quite angry, quite appropriate, quite common, quite considerable, quite effective, quite feminine, quite happy, quite hard, quite laudable, quite logical, quite obvious and clear, quite obvious, quite pessimistic, quite predictable, quite profitable, quite rare, quite ready, quite remarkable, quite significant, quite simple, quite sure, quite upset, quite weak, rather abstract, rather ambiguous and controversial, rather ambiguous, rather clean, rather controversial, rather demented, rather elastic, rather faulty, rather hard, rather harsh, rather horrific, rather immature and desperate, rather important, rather intimate, rather intriguing, rather ironic, rather misleading, rather morbid, rather Satanic, rather short, rather trivial, rather unfortunate, really aware, really clear, really content, really fair, really good, really odd, really relative, really scared, really significant, really sovereign, really strong, really supposed, really unhappy and mortal, really weak, relatively apolitical, relatively easy, relatively happy, relatively inexpensive, relatively little, relatively minor, relatively small, relatively weak, responsible enough, roughly similar, ruthlessly callous, seemingly ambiguous, seemingly miraculous, seemingly peaceful, seemingly uncontained, seriously disabled, shockingly low, significant enough, simply amazing, simply depressed, simply different, simply weak and unsupported, slightly different, slightly more liberal, slightly paranoid, so advanced, so ambiguous, so complicated, so concerned, so dependent, so different, so difficult, so distorted, so eager, so embossing, so emotional, so full, so funny, so general, so immense, so

Appendices 133 inexpensive, so intense, so intent, so jaded, so little, so long, so low, so negative, so new and different, so obsessed, so old, so positive, so powerful, so preoccupied, so prevalent, so proud, so quick, so rampant, so rare, so righteous, so scared, so severe, so sluty, so strong, so terribly and wrong, so tragic, so unable, so uncommon, so undisciplined, so upset, so useful, so wrong, somewhat controversial, somewhat less educated, somewhat ludicrous, somewhat more substantial, somewhat obsessed, somewhat reasonable, somewhat strong, somewhat submissive, somewhat unrealistic, somewhat vague, somewhat true, strictly scientific, stupid enough, supposedly sovereign, supposedly united, supposedly wiser, surely better, terribly distorted, that good, too abstract, too adventurous and utopian, too apparent, too big, too cold, too concerned, too costly, too difficult, too great, too involved, too large, too limited, too low, too minute, too new and unknown, too old, too precise, too premature, too pressing, too radical, too strong, too traditional, too traumatic, too utopic, too violent, too wet, too young, totally abhorrent, totally alien, totally different, totally futile, totally powerless, totally unrealistic, totally perfect, truly free, truly amazing, truly apparent, truly awful, truly happy, uncomfortably high, unrealistically thin, utterly devoid, vague enough, very affective, very alarming, very amusing, very angry, very appealing, very apprehensive, very authoritative, very aware, very beneficial, very boring, very busy, very capricious, very centralised, very common, very complex, very complicated, very confused, very contagious, very credible, very debatable, very dependent, very depleted, very depressed, very devastating, very direct and mocking, very disturbing, very doubtful, very easy, very ethnocentric and limited, very fair, very favorable, very functional, very great, very grey, very happy, very harsh, very helpful, very idealistic, very ignorant, very impersonal, very individual, very influential and powerful, very influential, very ironic, very likely, very limited, very logical, very magnanimous, very masculine, very melancholy, very misguided, very natural, very new different, very obvious, very opposite, very organized, very painful and messy, very patient, very patriotic, very personal, very possible, very powerful and important, very powerful and positive, very profitable, very proud and possessive, very proud, very real and true, very realistic, very recent, very relieved, very respectable, very rich, very scary, very skeptical, very sensitive and controversial, very sensitive, very shocked, very sick, very simple, very sorry, very soft, very sound, very special and peaceful, very stressful and unhealthy, very substantial, very surprised, very technical, very thin, very timid, very typical, very ugly, very uncomfortable, very unfair oppressive, very unique, very unrealistic, very unsure, very upset, very viable, very violent, very wide, very young, virtually unchanged, virtually blind, well-nigh impossible, wholly responsible, widely exaggerated, young enough.

Appendix II: INT-adj collocations in ST2 (CLEC)

INT-adj

F

INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

very happy very good very beautiful so many very important very interesting very excited very busy so happy

175 82 61 46 43 35 32 29 28

7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7

so long too happy too high too limited too short very clever very difficult very exiting very fat

4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4

very fresh very late very lazy very lovely very low very lucky very proud very simple very terrible

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

7

very instructive 4

very ugly

3

7 7

very popular very round

4 4

very unhappy very wet

3 2

6 6 6

very strict widely used a little afraid

4 4 3

a little cheaper a little unhappy almost good

2 2 2

6

3

annoyed enough 2

3 3 3

2 2 2

very tired

26

too much very hot

25 20

very angry very big very bad

19 19 18

very cold

16

so difficult too fat too hot very bright very dirty very easy very poor very silly very surprised very valuable very warm very worried so high very clean very delicious very short

very useful very friendly very nice

16 15 15

very tired too many big enough

6 5 5

quite beautiful and great quite happy really very so big

very well

15

5

so clever

3

very lonely so good

14 13

5 5

so exciting so late

3 3

much easier quite small

2 2

very kind so much so bad

13 13 12

much larger so hot strong enough too anxious too bad too hard

beautiful indeed good enough more and more beautiful much beautiful

5 5 5

so little so poor so powerful

3 3 3

really lovely so afraid so careless

2 2 2

2

Appendices 135 INT-adj

F

very sad so tired very hard

12 11 11

so interesting so glad very afraid very pleased very sorry very wonderful

10 9 9 9 9 9

too nervous very small so worried too disgusting too expensive

8 8 2 2 2

too fast

2

too late too long

2 2

too poor too tired very big and beautiful very blue very cheap very comfortable

2 2 2 2 2 2

INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

too small very clear very dangerous very glad very great very long very young rather flat so beautiful

5 5 5

so sad so strange so useful

3 3 3

so excited so frightened so low

2 2 2

5 5 5 5 4 4

so wonderful so young too dry very careful very convenient very expensive

3 3 3 3 3 3

2 2 2 2 2 2

so busy so dirty too cold very dear very delightful very diligent very fond very frightened very funny very greedy very hard and kind very helpful very hungry very joyful and relaxing

4 4 4 2 2

very famous very foolish very interested very likable very limited

3 3 3 2 2

so nervous so old so popular so short so shy so strong and interesting so tiresome so well too big very rich very silent

2 2 2 2 2

2

very little

2

very strong

2

2 2

very lively very lovable

2 2

very tall very terrified

2 2

2 2 2

very necessary very nervous very noisy

2 2 2

very thankful very thick very thin

2 2 2

2 2 2

very old very pleasant very quiet

2 2 2

very welcome

2

The following INT-adj combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw)1 a bit afraid, a bit big, a bit difficult, a bit frightened, a bit hungry, a little tired, a little bigger, a little difficult, a little dry, a little hot, a little small, a little tired, a little weak, almost asleep, deeply afraid, deeply dark, deeply interested, especially wonderful, even excited, even more foolish, even more lonely, even severe, extremely hot, fairly interesting, fairly well, far enough, fast asleep ,greatly long, greatly worried, hardly able, hardly late, large enough, more and more busy, more and more important, more and more nervous, more and more older, more and more beautiful, more and more fast, more and more popular, more and more troublesome, much afraid, much beautiful, much careful, much cheaper, much clever, much colder, much difficulty, much different, much easy, much exciting, much expensive, much gold, much happier, much hotter, much interesting, much large,

136 Appendices much larger and higher, much larger, much more, much new, much nicer, much older, much plain, much powerful, much riper, much smaller, much taller, much thick, much troublesome, much warm, much wonderful, old enough, quite afraid, quite amusing, quite bad, quite beautiful, quite big, quite busy, quite convenient, quite different, quite fresh, quite important, quite important and useful, quite new, quite normal, quite perfect, quite popular, quite unhealthy, rather bad, rather cold, rather conceited, rather foolish, rather good, rather sad, rather serious, ready enough, really angry, really beautiful, really good, really great, really hard, really instructive, really poor, really tired suffering, round enough, safe enough, so active, so awkward, so bright and blue, so clever careful, so cold, so conscientious, so cool, so cool, so dim, so disappointed, so dull, so easy, so extreme and excessive, so fat, so foolish, so fresh and cool, so full, so hot, so important, so kind, so large and cold, so large, so lazy, so limited, so lively, so loud, so lovely and beautiful, so perfect, so pleased, so pretty, so relaxed, so rich, so selfish and worse, so serious, so silly, so skilled, so smooth and beautiful, so special, so strong and big, so strong, so strong, so stupid, so surprised and pleased, so surprised, so tall and clever, so tall, so terrible, so thick, so thin, so unfair, so unsightly, so upset, so warm, so wet, so white, so wild, sure enough, terribly afraid, terribly frightened, too bust, too busy and nervous, too busy, too cruel, too dark, too difficult, too easy and simple, too excessive, too frightening, too innocent, too long, too old, too popular, too powerful, too rigid, too sharp, too suffering, too surprised, too unfair, very affected, very affectionate, very amusing, very anxious, very ashamed, very attractive, very backward, very beautiful, very beautiful and important, very big and brave, very big and greener, very big and red, very big and clean, very black, very bored, very brave, very brief, very bright and big, very bright and clean, very broad, very beautiful, very bumpy, very bustling, very careless, very charming, very clear and light, very clumsy, very clever and careful, very common, very conscientious, very cool happy, very cool, very critical, very cruel, very dark and quiet, very delicrous, very dilious, very disappointed, very discouraged, very disappointed, very dry, very excellent, very extraordinary, very fit, very flat, very fresh and clean, very friendly and busy, very full, very fun, very good and humor, very good and strict, very grand, very great and wonderful, very greatful, very happy, very handsome, very handsome, very happed, very happy and excited, very happy and glad, very hard and earnest, very harder, very harmful, very harmonious, very healthy, very horrible, very hot and hungry, very important and far-reaching, very innocent, very important, very interesting and happy, very interesting and exciting, very interesting and citing, very interesting and intructive, very interesting and regret, very interesting and useful, very interesting and wonderful, very interesting and old, very intructive, very joyful, very kind and clever, very kindly, very large and beautiful, very light, very long and hard, very loud, very loudy, very luzy, very marvelous, very mild, very moving, very muddy, very naughty, very nervous and fiery, very necessary, very painful, very pale, very patient, very pleased, very pleasantly, very pleasured, very plentiful, very polite, very popular and common, very possible, very precious, very prosperous, very quick, very regretted, very relaxed and joyful, very responsible, very right, very rough, very safe and peaceful, very satisfy, very

Appendices 137 serious, very shy, very sick, very silly and angry, very sleepy, very slim, very small and ordinary, very small and poor, very smooth, very spensive, very strange, very strict, very suitable, very surprised, very tragic, very inconvenient, very unhealthy, very uninteresting, very useful and important, very useful, very very angry, very very beautiful, very very busy, very very delicious, very very glad, very very happy, very very hot, very very kind, very very pretty, very very short, very weak, very wealthy, very wide and beautiful.

Note 1 Some of the words are wrongly spelt in learner English; therefore, they are not corrected when listed here. Data in Appendixes II-V are displayed in the same way.

Appendix III: INT-adj collocations in ST3 (CLEC)

INT-adj

F

INT-adj

F

INT-adj

F

INT-adj

F

very important so many very short too much so much very serious more and more serious very good very difficult too many very necessary very poor more and more important very limited very useful

96 62 46 43 30 25 20

very young very bad very busy so important very easy very hard very helpful

7 6 6 5 5 5 5

very proud very rare very simple very strict even afraid even perfect much enough

3 3 3 3 2 2 2

too strict very afraid very colorful very common very crowded very dull very expensive

2 2 2 2 2 2 2

20 18 15 14 14 11

very scarce very tired good enough so bad very angry very big

5 5 4 4 4 4

much shorter quite necessary so big so difficult so expensive so glad

2 2 2 2 2 2

very fast very global very hot very kind very lonely very long

2 2 2 2 2 2

11 11

4 3

so good so happy

2 2

very low very rich

2 2

very harmful very careful very different very happy very high

10 7 7 7 7

very interesting more and more strong quite different so easy so large very beautiful very limited

3 3 3 3 3

so limited so strong so useful strong enough too easy

2 2 2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2

very little

3

too important

2

very small very strong very surprised very terrible very upset and depressed very worried

very large

7

2

The following INT-adj combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw) a little bit too abstract, a little small and crowded, a little useful advanced enough, almost equal, astonishingly large, badly ill, careful enough, completely new, even hard, even harmful, even longer, even more limitful, even more serious, even more

Appendices 139 tentative, even proud, even worse, extremely necessary, fairly good, far better, far less costly, far from omnipotent, far not enough, fully aware, fully equipped, fully confident, greatly improved, greatly thankful, hardly possible, highly developing, more and more beautiful, more and more decreasing, more and more expensive, more and more heated, more and more heavy, more and more improved, more and more industrialized, more and more interesting and attractive, more and more large, more and more noticeable, more and more prosperous, more and more rare, more and more rare, more and more rich, more and more scarce, more and more smaller, more and more strong and rich, more-or-less related, much better, much cheaper, much happier and warmer, much happier and warmer, much happier, much higher, much larger, much late, much more intense, much more interested, obviously higher, obviously lower, of course brave, partly responsible, plenty enough, pretty white, quite aware, quite difficult, quite fond, quite important, quite rare, quite satisfactory, quite wrong, rather busy, rather little, rather low, rather stronger, really abundant, really afraid, really colorful, really rare, really happy, rich enough, seriously poor, seriously short, sharply increasing, so abundant, so adequate, so afraid, so angry, so busy, so cheap, so close, so common, so different, so eager, so early, so excited, so fresh and cold, so full, so great, so happy and thrilled, so hard, so helpless, so high, so horrible, so intelligent and able, so little, so long, so lucky, so obvious, so optimistic, so poor, so rich, so sad, so serious, so small, so sleepy, so strong and taller, so sufficient, so sunny, so curious, so warm, so wedded, so wide and abundant, so wonderful, somewhat and difficult, too afraid, too bad, too busy, too cold, too cool, too cruel, too difficult, too dirty, too early, too excessive, too expensive, too good, too hard, too kind and friendly, too late, too limited, too lonely, too long, too low, too naughty, too poor, too precious, too severe, too short, too terrible, totally dark and silent, totally wrong, utterly wrong, very absent, very accurate and important, very angried, very angry and upset, very apparent, very average, very awkward, very bare, very beautiful and lovely, very bright, very busy and hard, very clean and neat, very clear, very cold, very comfortable, very complex, very confident, very considerable, very convenient, very current, very dangerous, very dark, very developed, very different, very disappointed, very distinct, very eager, very eccential, very efficient, very enormous, very essential, very excellent, very farmful, very familiar, very foolish, very fresh, very frightened, very glad, very harmful, very important and necessary, very important, very impossible, very likely, very loud, very lovely, very marvelous, very meaningful, very modern, very natural, very naughty and childish, very necessary, very necessary and important, very noisy, very numerous, very obvious, very ordinary, very perfect, very pleasant, very popular, very powerful, very proud, very popular, very reasonable, very right, very sad, very shortable, very shortaged, very shorted, very skilled, very strong and tall, very tall, very thankful, very ungry, very urgent, very valuable, very valuable, very very dry, very very scarce, very very short, very vigorous, very vital and necessary, very vital, very warm and comfortable, very weak, very well, very wide, very willing, very violent very worse, very wrong, widely used.

Appendix IV: INT-adj collocations in ST4 (CLEC)

INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

so many very important so much too much very difficult very poor very good very short even worse

56 38 18 14 14 13 11 11 10

quite different too low very angry very interested very large very useful very worried good enough so bad

4 4 4 4 4 4 4 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2

so strong stimulating enough that silly too anxious too busy too cruel too curious too impatient too moist

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

too many very bad very easy very high very simple too eager very harmful so anxious very interesting very low very reasonable so harmful very dangerous very happy very small even dead lucky enough

10 10 8 8 8 7 7 6 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 4 4

so good so great so short too bad too hard much too too high too late too short too slow too tired very anxious very big very careful very common very different

3 3 3 3 3 1 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

too nervous too shy too soft very boring very glad very hasty very long very necessary very patient very rich very right very serious very strict very suitable very surprised widely divergent

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

very familiar very fat very fit very nervous very popular very tired considerably long more and more rich more and more serious much better much fresh much lower old enough quite proud so apt so dangerous so difficult so eager so easy so glad so great so hasty so opaque so poor so severe

Appendices 141

The following INT-adj combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw) a bit sorry, a little bald, a little quick, a little shy, a little weak, a little bit banal, absolutely clear and reasoning, absolutely necessary, actually essential, almost pushy, almost substandard, almost unseen, brave enough, challenging enough, comparably high, completely different, completely unknown, especially important, especially younger, essentially important, even genuine, even greater, even harmful, even poorer, even terrible, even useless, exceptionally blond and pale, even useless, exceptionally blond, fairly good, fairly profound, far good, far more complicated, fast asleep, greatly annoyed, greatly different, greatly harmful, highly commocial, highly developed, highly lower, highly nuturious, highly responsible, increasingly aware, increasingly strong and healthy, just angry, just interested, just natural, just opposite, more and more bad, more and more beautiful, more and more charming, more and more charming, more and more common, more and more complex, more and more developed, more and more harmful, more and more healthful, more and more healthy, more and more important, more and more important, more and more improved, more and more obvious, more and more popular, more and more scarce, more and more serious, more and more serious, more and more skilled, more and more strong, more and more tense, much careless, much cheaper, much different, much easier, much greater, much heavy, much important, much longer, much more, much older, much practical, much safer, much slow, much taller, much useful, much vivid and interesting, much well, much worse, much wrong, patient enough, probably healthy, quite clear, quite common, quite easy, quite familiar, quite interested, quite nervous, quite reasonable, quite shocked, quite suitable, rather abrupt, rather difficult, rather easy, rather expensive, rather famous, rather limited, rather poor, really beneficial, really good, really great, really harmful, really late, really suitable, really tired, really unsuitable, really wonderful, relatively huge, relatively long, relatively peaceful, relatively recent, sharply long, slightly bitter, smart enough, so abnormal, so accurate, so afraid, so ambitious, so beautiful, so black and long, so boring, so careful, so charming, so conservative, so countrified, so cruel, so delicate, so different, so dirty, so excited, so friendly, so good, so grateful, so happy, so harmful, so hasteful, so heavy, so hot, so important, so impressing, so insane, so intensive, so interesting, so large, so limited, so long, so lucky, so marvelous, so modest, so nervous, so normal, so obvious, so ordinary, so pleasant, so satisfied, so shy, so simple, so slow, so special, so surprised, so thick, so tired, so tremendous and attractive, so troublesome, so venturesome, so true, somewhat unsuitable, strong enough, terribly dark, terribly tiresome, too big, too boring, too careless, too cheap, too dark, too detailed, too dicious, too difficult, too dry, too easy, too exhausted, too fast, too hasty, too hot, too hurried, too ill, too large, too more, too neat and clear, too neat, too poor, too proud, too serious, too simple, too small, too suspectable, too tall, too unreliable, too worried, totally strange, tough enough, very active, very afraid, very aromatic, very beautiful, very benefitful, very bloody and cruel, very boreing, very busy, very clean, very clear, very convenient, very dangerous, very definite,

142 Appendices very distinctive, very eager, very efficient, very embarrassed, very excited, very exciting, very expensive, very familiar, very fast, cheap and safe, very fine , very fitted, very fond, very great, very helpless, very hot, very hungry, very hungry, very hurried, very important and helpful, very impossible, very inconvenient, very interesting, very kindhearted, very knowledgeable, very late, very limited, very lively outer-type, very lively, very lovely, very necessaring, very nervous hasted, very obvious, very ordinary, very peaceful, very pleased, very precious, very proud, very quite clear, very real, very responsible, very satisfacting, very satisfying, very shocked, very silent, very sorry, very strong, very successful, very tense, very thirsty, very tied, very tiny, very tough, very unhappy, very unthoughtful, very upset, very urgent, very very beautiful, very wide, very worrying, very young, widely useful.

Appendix V: INT-adj collocations in ST5 (CLEC)

INT-adj

F INT-adj

63 completely different so many very important 35 more and more difficult 33 more and more very glad important 22 much higher so much quite different 20 seriously ill 17 so kind very good 17 so sorry very happy 16 so worried very sorry 11 strong enough too many 11 too busy too much 12 totally different so good 11 very common very hard very interesting 11 very convenient 11 very expensive very popular 10 very helpful so serious 10 very hot very serious 8 very necessary quite good 8 very special very difficult 7 very wonderful good enough 7 even worse so happy 7 extremely important very angry 7 more and more very exciting important 6 more and more much better popular 6 much easier so difficult so important

6

old enough

very beautiful

6

really important

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

4 very anxious 4 very busy

3 quite high 3 quite satisfied

2 2

4 very dangerous

3 quite uncomfortable 4 very famous 3 rather cold 4 very funny 3 really difficult 4 very great 3 really sorry 4 very small 3 really very sorry 4 very tired 3 so angry 4 very urgent 3 so bad 4 very weak 3 so clever 4 very worried 2 so convenient 4 a bit difficult 2 so cruel 4 a bit worried 2 so expensive 2 so great 4 a little different 4 a little dirty 2 so hot 4 awfully sorry 2 so large 4 competitive enough 2 so limited 4 especially important 2 so poor 3 even more difficult 2 so smooth 3 far from enough 2 so strong 3 good indeed 2 so useful 3 lucky enough 2 so weak 3 more and more difficult 3 more and more popular 3 more and more powerful 3 much bigger

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

2 so wonderful

2

2 too cold

2

2 too frightened

2

2 too hard

2

(Continued )

144 Appendices (Continued) INT-adj

F INT-adj

very delicious 6 6 very grateful very interested 6 very useful so beautiful so excited so glad very bad very big very excited very pleased very harmful very large very limited very lonely Very long

6 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 2 2 2 2 2

rich enough so big so easy so interesting so popular so quiet terribly sorry too heavy too late too old too young very loud very noisy very poor very proud very quiet

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

3 much lower 3 much more better 3 much more competitive 3 much more difficult 3 much rich 3 much smaller 3 much worse 3 much younger 3 quite common 3 quite convenient 3 quite familiar 2 very rich 2 very round and bright 2 very similar 2 very strict 2 very strong

2 too lazy 2 too shy 2 very bright

2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

very clear very clever very different very disappointed very essential very familiar very fast very fun very surprising very sweet very terrible very traditional very young

The following INT-adj combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw) a bit afraid, a bit different, a bit dirty, a bit foolish, a bit hard, a bit noisy, a bit older, a bit slow, a bit younger, a little afraid, a little angry, a little bit, a little bit, a little bit, a little childish, a little clumsy, a little difficult, a little disordered, a little hard, a little higher, a little ill, a little lonely, a little longer, a little lovely, a little nervous and thirsty, a little older, a little outdated, a little quieter, a little sad, a little shy, a little similar, a little slow, absolutely unworkable, almost always profound, almost different, almost entire, almost grateful, almost impossible, almost insignificant, apparently much smaller, big enough, brash enough, brave enough, broad enough, by no means obsolete, cautious enough, clearly aware, closely concerned, comparably easy, comparatively cheap, comparatively easy, comparatively lucky, comparatively more tranquil, comparatively small, completely dark, completely impossible, completely useless, damned disgusting, definitely different, definitely able, easily infected, enormously big, entirely new, equally cheerful, equally important, equally serious, especially good, especially interested, especially little, especially pleased, especially round, especially useful, especially young, even bolder, even impossible, even more furious, even more serious, even false, exceedingly important , exceptionally full, especially round and bright, extraordinarily observant, extremely different, extremely full, extremely good, extremely long, extremely round and bright, extremely serious, extremely tired, extremely well, extremely popular, fairly cheerful, lively and socialable,

Appendices 145 fairly large, fairly optimistic, far from optimistic, fine enough, fully educated, fully aware, generally good, generally less serious, greatly different, greatly pleased, greatly thankful, hardly forgettable, high qualified, highly concentrated, highly educated, highly modernized, interesting and imaginative enough, increasingly serious, indeed bewildering, just compulsory and useless, kind enough, late enough, more and more attractive, more and more competent, more and more competitive, more and more competitive, more and more dejected, more and more difficult, more and more excited, more and more expensive, more and more highly, more and more important, more and more intense, more and more modern, more and more ordinary, more and more popular, more and more popular, more and more private, more and more prosperous, more and more prosperous, more and more rampant, more and more serious, more and more significant, more and more small, more and more unsociable, more and more useful, more and more vague, more and more worse, more and more young, more and more pessimistic, much bigger and famous, much casual, much cheaper, much cleaner, much farther, much free and colorful, much good, much greater, much harmful, much looser, much more efficient, much more faster, much more freer, much more satisfactory, much more spare, much older, much richer, much similar, much too bright, much too high, much unhappy, nearly impossible, necessarily concerned, obviously more peaceful, painstaking enough, patient enough, pretty good, pretty tall, qualified enough, quite big, quite boring, quite comfortable, quite common and easy, quite competitive, quite difficult, quite disappointed, quite easy, quite essential, quite exiting, quite expensive, quite famous, quite fantastic, quite feasible, quite glad, quite good and attractive, quite happy, quite hard, quite harmful, quite heartened, quite helpful, quite impossible, quite interesting, quite limited, quite nervous, quite nice, quite old, quite optimistic, quite pleasing, quite possible, quite practical, quite relaxing, quite serious, quite simple and common, quite serious, quite simple and common, quite suitable, quite upset, quite warm, quite well, rather active, rather anxious, rather bad, rather boring, rather complicated, rather confused, rather convenient, rather exited, rather good, rather hard, rather high, rather late, rather practical, rather sad, rather small, rather strange, rather thin, rather tiring, rather unpleasant, rather weak, really annoying, really anxious, really aware, really bad, really capable, really delicious, really funny, really good, really hard, really harmful, really heartbreaking, really heavy, really humorous, really interested, really invisible, really kind and friendly, really memorable, really necessary and suitable, really successful, really top, really very convenient, really very high, really wonderful and dangerous, really wonderful and memorable, really worthy, relatively better, relatively high, relatively rapid, scarcely natural, seemingly attentive, so afraid, so attractive, so awful, so big and bright, so brave, so bright and full, so bright, so busy, so capricious and stubborn, so careful, so careless, so clean, so clear, so comfortable, so common, so commonplace, so convincing, so cool, so crazy, so dangerous and steep, so different, so delicious, so eager, so elegant, so empty, so exciting, so familiar, so fast, so fine, so free, so frightened, so full, so funny, so furious, so gentle and beautiful, so grateful, so hard, so heavy, so helpless, so high, so inconvenient, so interesting and wonderful, so keen, so late,

146 Appendices so little, so lonely, so loud and piercing, so lovely and active, so lucky, so mad, so memorable, so neat, so nervous, so new, so nice, so noisy, so old, so optimistic, so patient and hospitable, so peaceful and composed, so pursuable, so pessimistic, so pleasurable, so popular and widespread, so practical, so proud, so pure, so rapid, so regrettable, so relaxable, so reliable, so ridiculous, so round, so sad, so satisfactory, so secure, so shameful, so silent, so simple and direct, so skillful, so slow, so soft, so solemn, so strange, so sudden, so suitable, so sure, so surprised, so sweet, so terrible and worrying, so thirsty, so thoughtful, so thriving, so tired, so troublesome, so uncomfortable, so unforgettable and memorable, so unimportant, so various and colourful, so violent, so young, somewhat hopeful, specially delicious, stupid enough, surely good, terribly daring and inquisitive, terribly faint, terribly hard, terribly poor, too arrogant, too authoritative, too bad, too big, too boring, too careless, too common, too dependent, too dull and complicated, too dull, too excited, too exciting, too happy, too hot, too large, too limited, too long, too loud and awful, too luxurious, too numerous, too poor, too prudent, too rare or burnt, too scared, too sensitive and easy, too serious, too short, too shy and coward, too sick, too strong, too tired, too weak, totally amazing, totally unaware, unexpectedly short, valuable indeed, vastly different, very abstract, very annoyed, very appalled, very attractive, very attractive and profitable, very beautiful and clean, very beautiful, very boring, very brave and undaunted, very brave, very brief, very bright and full, very careless, very cautious, very cheap and convenient, very clever and brave, very clever and brave, very colorful, very comfortable, very complicated, very concerned, very conscious, very convenient and efficient, very convenient, very correct and true, very correct, very crowded, very curious, very deligious, very determined, very developed, very delicious, very diligent, very dirty and big, very dirty, very disappointed and angry, very disgusting, very dull and boring, very dull, very easy, very embarrassed, very enjoyable, very excellent, very famous and delicious, very fashionable, very flexible, very fond, very fortunate, very frank, very free, Very fresh, very happy and excited, very happy and tiring, very high, very huge, very hungry, very important, very important and interesting, very inefficient, very interesting and happy, very interesting and instructive, very interesting and stimulating, very keen, very kind, very late, very lovely and amiable, very low, very lucky and happy, very modern, very negative, very nice, very obvious, very outstanding, very patient and enthusiastic, very poetic, very powerful, very precious, very pretty, very rare, very relevant, very round and bright, very round, very sad, very sentimental, very severe and exciting, very sharp, very short, very significant, very simple, very smooth and fair, very stable, very stiff, very successful, very successful, very superficial, very sweet and happy, very systematic, very talkative and interested, very talkative, very tender, very thick, very thin and light, very uncivil, very uncomfortable, very upset, very very happy, very very important, very well, very wise, well educated, wide enough, wide open, widely celebrated, widely used, wise enough.

Appendix VI: INT-adj collocations in ST6 (CLEC)

INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F INT-adj

F

terminally ill so many so much hopelessly ill incurably ill very important too much very difficult seriously ill too many even worse totally different very poor quite different too old too weak

71 58 21 27 25 24 15 14 9 9 8 8 8 7 6 6

very necessary badly deformed completely different fairly large more and more difficult more and more important more and more popular more and more serious partly TRUE quite long rather low really hard so good so tired strong enough terminally ill

4 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

so powerful so simple so wonderful so worried so young too busy too early too easy too limited too low too radical too theoretical totally deaf totally innocent totally TRUE very bad

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

very old very serious highly developed much lower too late very low very rich incurably ill or old much better much easier severely disfigured so important vastly different very easy

6 6 5 5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 4

very common very expensive very good very long very precious very small very useful absolutely necessary absolutely negative absolutely valuable almost impossible badly ill entirely different especially young

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

very convenient very forceful very hard very high very large very natural very popular very rare very severe very slow very successful very young

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2

even better even harmful even more important extremely brutal extremely expensive extremely ill far from enough fortunate enough helplessly ill highly civilized highly sensitive increasingly important just theoretical more and more fierce More and practical more and more prosperous much more severe much more valuable quite common quite humane quite new rather poor really important really more equal relatively low rich enough seriously deformed so civilized so high so lazy

148 Appendices

The following INT-adj combinations all have corpus frequencies of one (raw) a bit comfortable, a bit cruel, a bit husky, a little angry, a little bit foolish, a little bit higher, a little bit late, a little difficult, a little impatient, a little late, a little longer, a little scared, absolutely dominant, absolutely good or bad, absolutely moral, absolutely practical, absolutely right, absolutely unpractical, actually equal, accurately true, almost equal, almost free, almost harmless, almost instinctive, almost meaningless, almost naked, almost revolutionary, amazingly high, anciently historied, astonishingly high, bad enough, badly ill and irritating, badly wounded, basically right, by no means easy, by no means short, certainly better, certainly more comfortable, certainly unreasonable, clear enough, clever enough, comparably poor, comparatively backward, comparatively conservative, comparatively good, comparatively low, comparatively peaceful, comparatively poorer, comparatively primitive, comparatively slight, completely conscientious, completely equal, completely illogical, completely meaningless, completely necessary, completely passive, considerably low, convincing enough, corrupt enough, cruelly aware, deeply rooted, doubtless true, effective enough, endlessly painful, entirely professional, entirely wrong, equally available, equally bad, equally civilized, equally great, equally natural, equally powerful, equally violent, especially evident, especially hard, especially important and beneficial, especially painful, even astonished, even barbarious, even brighter, even cruel, even crueler, even evil, even faster, even greater, even higher, even humble, even more dangerous, even more domineering, even more puzzling, even more toilsome, even soundless, even stronger, even urgent, exceedingly dangerous, extremely careful, extremely dangerous, extremely difficult, extremely nervous, extremely painful, extremely poor, extremely serious, extremely severe, extremely significant, extremely unendurable, extremely vicious, extremely beautiful, fairly short, fairly peaceful, far greater, far more greater, far more important, far more swifter, far opposite, far from perfect, far from rich, foolish enough, fully aware, fully equal, funny enough, good enough, greatly different, greatly helpful, happy enough, happy indeed,, hardhearted enough, hardly able, hardly curable, hardly effective, healthy enough, heavily guarded, high enough, highly necessary, highly skilled, hopelessly dying, hopelessly suffering, indeed more equal, inherently contradictory, inherently unequal, inheritably superior, intensely controversial, ironic enough, just impartial, just unfair, lucky enough, more and more advanced, more and more aware, more and more battered, more and more bigger, more and more capable, more and more comfortable, more and more common, more and more competitive, more and more complex, more and more concerned, more and more dependent, more and more distinct , more and more effective, more and more electronic, more and more equal, more and more healthy, more and more incurable, more and more interested, more and more interesting, more and more limited and finite, more and more necessary, more and more outstanding, more and more plentiful, more and more Powerful, more and more precious, more and more prevailing, more and more professional, more and more quiet, more and more rampant, more and more severe, more and more

Appendices 149 shortsighted, more and more significant, more and more strange, more and more successful, more and more suspicious, more and more thriving, more and more unsatisfied, more and more unstable, more and more violent, more and more vulnerable, more and more promising, much common, much greater, much happier, much higher, much less humane, much less strict, much long, much longer, much more bitter, much more brutal, much more controversial, much more cruel, much more fun, much more happier, much more harmful, much more humane, much more important, much more meaningful , much more optimistic, much more relaxing, much more simple, much more skillful, much more suffering, much more useful, much safer, much stronger, much welcome, nearly indispensable, near-sighted indeed, necessarily applicable, necessarily important, necessary indeed, no doubt illegal, obviously humane, obviously sad, obviously wasteful, obviously true, old enough, particularly foreign, particularly troublesome, perfect enough, perfectly correct, perfectly true, practical enough, pretty easy, pretty equal, pretty high, pretty lower, pretty nice, of course important, quite annoyed, quite available, quite aware, quite better, quite clear, quite concerned, quite difficult, quite easy, quite great, quite high, quite important, quite impossible, quite justifiable, quite large, quite limited, quite lucky, quite natural, quite necessary, quite neutral and concise, quite normal, quite obvious, quite optimistic, quite partial, quite pessimistic, quite precious, quite proper, quite rare, quite rich, quite serious, quite significant, quite similar, quite straightforward, quite successful, quite sure, quite wrong, quite TRUE, rapidly changing, rather conservative, rather controversial, rather dull and boring, rather expensive, rather frequent, rather groundless and ridiculous, rather heated, rather high, rather industrialized and developed, rather inhumane, rather long, rather lower, rather meaningless, rather minor, rather peaceful, rather poor and backward, rather popular, rather selfish, rather serious, rather theoretical, rather theoretical, rather theoretical, really alive, really bad, really beneficial, really capable, really comatose, really difficult, really equal and just, really equal, really happy, really harmful, really human, really incompetent, really incurable, really informative and instructive, really logical, really long, really more capable, really satisfying, really successful, really too long, really unequal, really useful, really very fascinating, really very important, really lucky, really difficult, really painful, relatively poor, relatively poorer, relatively powerful, relatively low, remarkably effective, seemingly luxurious, seemingly ridiculous, sensible enough, seriously horrible, seriously hurt, severely cold, sharply increasing, shockingly giant, slightly difficult, slightly greater, slightly improper, slightly open, so acute, so advanced, so aggressive, so ambitious, so angry, so animated, so appealing, so bad, so beautiful, so bold, so capable, so cheerful, so cloudy, so cold, so colourful, so comfortable, so common, so complex, so conscious, so crazy, so cruel, so dangerous, so different, so dominant, so dull, so eager, so efficient, so excited, so glad, so great, so hateful, so ideal, so ill, so imaginative, so insignificant, so intimate, so kindhearted, so large, so late, so lonely, so long, so lucky, so merciless, so mighty, so mysterious, so naïve, so obvious, so old, so painful, so peaceful, so poor, so popular, so practical, so precious, so preoccupied, so proud, so rare, so reluctant, so rich, so ridiculous and absurd, so rough, so rounded, so rude, so sad, so

150 Appendices satisfying, so scientific, so severe, so sick, so stable, so strange, so strong, so thankful, so ugly and laughable, so unable, so unacceptable, so unbearable, so unhuman, so universal, so useful, so vigorous, so weak, so worthful, somewhat compulsory, sufficiently deferential, supernaturally evil, surely foolish, surely impossible, surely more incurable, surely useful, terminally ill, terminal enough, terminally and incurably ill, terminately ill, that bad, that quick, tightly shut, too academic, too afraid, too bad, too big, too careless, too civilized and mercy, too close, too complex, too crowded, too cruel and inhumane, too depressed, too dysfunctional, too earlier, too extreme, too foolish, too good, too heavily and shortsighted, too high, too innocent, too intelligent, too kind, too large, too lazy, too light, too outstanding, too partial, too precious, too sensitive, too serious, too slim, too small, too tempting, too theoretical, too tired, too unattractive, too wallowed, too young, torturously painful, totally better, totally clean, totally disordered, totally independent, totally inhumane, totally payed, totally unfair, terminally ill, truly equal, unbelievably low, undeniably true, undoubtedly wise and beneficial, undoubtedly improfitable and disadvantageous, very afraid, very angry, very broad, very careful, very cheap, very clean and orderly, very clear, very cloudy and noisy, very colorful, very competitive, very complicated, very considerate, very controversial, very controversial, very cruel, very dangerous very dependent, very different, very dull, very economical and convenient, very effective, very enormous, very essential, very evident, very fast , very fital, very funny and simple, very glad, very grateful, very great, very harmful and dangerous, very harmful, very healthy, very heavy, very helpful, very impartial, very important and practical, very insignificant, very instructive, very intelligent, very limited, very little, very modern, very naughty, very negative, very nervous, very nice, very pleasant, very polite, very practical and efficient, very practical, very precious and relaxing, very pretty, very puzzled, very rapid, very regretful, very rewarding, very ridiculous, very short, very simple, very skillful, very special, very strong, very suitable, very talented, very tired, very typical, very unbearable, very uncomfortable, very unfair, very universal, very unscrupulous, very wicked, very willing, very young, very true, virtually equal, wealthy enough, well cultured, well-polished.

Appendix VII: Concordance lines for very

(1) Concordance lines for very in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37

entury descriptions of what in fact is a iving. It’s a very serious offense. It’s Big Mo. He A11 41 neglected to mention a right and I think the future can also be ing it on its E23 93 side, I can achieve he intends to A35 105 “make our position 03 9 last known coordinates would put it book.” E12 31 ‘Learn’ and ‘know’ are two rder of 80 percent of initial exports, a ulty. Germany A34 169 continues to run a 2 on behalf of particular companies is a upon ionization, often J06 82 leading to own concept of ‘radical,’ even if it was said with A41 220 delicate force. “It’s al eradication of H19 213 coca bushes is “ Gemignani notes, E36 131 “because it’s stallation E25 88 before the fact. It is e K14 171 embarrassed.” K14 172 “No, I’m a G31 104 French vantage point - as four hese two vaccination applications can be said. A41 237 “Then if I get stern, it’s cloth around the trunk is F34 157 also a A37 76 letter on its behalf. “They were nd also SR22 insurance, which is B24 229 83 account, ordering two entrees at this ery F06 148 face. He is about my age and ibovitz are members of the chef’s E11 55 and isolated. And they have been making fully. “He was a very frightened person, bjects. Set firmly in their spaces, with because Lieutenant Parke was one of the s. Not many kind words for parents here; uencies. J02 167 Prior to the mid-1980s, ional program F25 196 than to “something ey are generally based J33 15 on simple, inuum Potts model [21-23] gives J04 38 a Fig. 1 show that this relaxed state is a

very ancient phenomenon. F10 133 As he very B24 233 dangerous and does cost ma very big But: according to the Bush A11 very bright, too, if A35 226 PictureTel very broad marks; marks of medium width very clear to corporate executives that very close to Federation M03 10 project very common words in Kaplan’s E12 32 vo very considerable J55 207 decline in th very dangerous high-interest rate polic very different sort of work. A37 83 Dis very different lowest-energy structures very different from that J58 124 which very difficult for a 9-year-old to be A very difficult, dangerous work and beca very difficult to take music we all kno very discouraging to put the vehicle ba very discreet. And this is only in cert very distinct classes, G31 105 “les six very effective. F13 205 However, these very effective.” A41 238 The trio is co very effective barrier to mice and rabb very effective,” A37 77 says chairman J very expensive. The clerk said the $690 very expensive restaurant and C01 184 t very explicit. “Tomorrow we F06 149 wal very extensive network of friends. E11 very F46 211 great progress.” F46 212 A very fearful. F10 103 He was paralyzed very few poems G33 36 attempting to use very few people J71 158 who had come ou very few parents in G71 187 these books very few measurements of J02 168 pressu very general about schooling.” F25 197 very general, features of documents (e. very general correlated, continuum perc very good J01 149 description for unive (Continued)

152 Appendices 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92

nst cable, and A01 34 the networks did a very good job of convincing people that s - and patted his thigh. L12 36 “That’s very heartwarming,” she said. L12 37 Ha t. Abortion D11 54 has recently become a very heated topic in Catholic circles; at was L22 173 missing. L22 174 Greg was very helpful throughout this terrible t approximation is valid J02 42 except at very high temperatures. J02 43 The F-fa 1 131 July 6, 1972, she reported feeling very ill and alone. As it G41 132 happe ess F05 163 upon the Black community how very important jury service F05 164 is, n. F13 68 Timing of vaccinations is also very important. We must view F13 69 vac 108 record. A06 109 “He highlights in a very interesting way the negatives A06 on of strong emission lines arising in a very J07 193 compact region in the core onal well around the accreting object is very J07 179 deep and the energy source d seem diametrically opposed or at least very J66 10 different - for example, th s in the entire system, or J01 46 over a very large volume of the universe, is u irculation J07 181 will therefore find a very large reservoir of energy which ca reliable and would probably need R07 119 very little supervision, and she finish th the other furniture projects, though, very little E20 24 measuring is necessa Candice and I both went G03 77 through a very long period in our early lives whe gers. In this case, a J05 155 cluster of very long alpha-helical segments intera 9 my mother and I have been at war for a very long time, but G48 100 spiritually id-volume refractories range from low to very low, the J76 224 product crhob run 97 Students who were not interviewed had very low GPAs (about a D+ J24 198 avera As a result, E19 216 the landscaping is very manageable. “I just weed the beds limate would make such E09 25 activities very marginal for them. Thus her happin the A07 140 police,” he said. “It was a very moderate group of A07 141 people.” o grow up and marry an Oregon boy wasn’t very N16 215 far from the truth. Toby o omas chuckled. “I must admit that I know very N18 94 little about your race. But ezy comment was J60 74 an exception. Her very occasional references to photograp idy and cluttered, the N12 147 furniture very old. Dillon sat on a sofa while Fa ian nature. Such sweeping purpose is the very opposite of G30 166 Aristotelian [ y through to A17 62 the next step. We’re very optimistic,” Shorenstein said. A17 it’s worth a try.” L10 158 “Archy can be very persuasive,” my father said L10 15 to P02 9 fetch her. William was clearly very pleased with himself, and with P02 6 all other speculators regarded it as a very poor risk: Jenkins had G47 167 app legislation, which polls show is A03 106 very popular. A03 107 The bill, similar P14 162 him, and he grasped it. “It is a very private and personal P14 163 matte guidance Stafford received didn’t sound very promising. G35 144 What Weeks had cation and A29 90 cachet. A29 91 “We are very proud to have set new standards fo . His looks K28 127 black.” K28 128 “And very proud of it he was. Vain, even.” K tory attached to this - and that was all very R02 112 wonderful and lovely. R02 a cowboy want with a woman like me - not very R06 11 easy-going, an English prof 96 Nofziger says. A22 97 “He was a very, very reluctant candidate in A22 98 1968 e’d failed F09 133 to seek help form the very same authorities in her own countr e,” he A42 210 says. “This was a new and very satisfying experience. . .. A42 211 er, E24 113 and in a character she looks very secure, playing with balance, E24 ed,” says Mr. A08 77 Pikhoia. “That is a very serious problem.” Mr. A08 78 Pikho times the textile J54 133 trade has been very significant; in the English coloni han two hundred colors. E23 136 Color is very significant to me because I don’t aid. A23 90 “But otherwise, the case was very similar to baby Kerri. A23 91 That into your model of vehicle, you stand a very slim E25 72 chance of proving them es whose Lorentz halfwidth J02 147 bL is very small. The Galatry line shape [10] ooperation.” N10 75 “They masterminded a very smooth operation,” N10 76 Gunn sai d then you hear some rustling, and the a very soft K14 59 rhythmic sound, the so for her certainly, but not G51 172 very sorry, possibly because of that se t you to remember him as someone P08 192 very special. But I also want you to st tutor. My father, G58 95 I remember, was very strict with me. Here, take a look

Appendices 153 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100

for reading autobiography G71 152 isn’t very strong. Certainly it is with me, s air blond and wavy, but he was sturdy, a very sturdy R08 193 little boy. R08 194 day, clear and sharp as a blade, P13 44 very sunny and without a breath of wind g a black cotton undershirty thing, with very thin shoulder K14 50 straps. Very ve,” Shining Horse N18 58 said. “It is a very trying time. Everything is changin e Japanese know they can L05 179 make it very uncomfortable. By raising the dust 28% “somewhat unfair to J27 197 me,” 6% “ very unfair to me,” and about 4% J27 19 ing care system, whereby children from a very young age J49 51 are placed in the

(2) Concordance lines for very in FLOB 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42

agreed that we should look into G32 121 very advanced electron microscopy and a on the coy side, L08 167 and he found it very appealing. L08 168 “You’re not fri e West. Recently achieved sovereignty is very B11 56 precious. Military power is Bantus and Fulanis might have a E22 191 very big problem. E22 192 Cameroon has l-prepared and genuinely felt lecture of very bright insights, L21 62 but certai r rub-a-dubbing along. It M04 20 was all very British. M04 21 On occasion I used a.” She looked P15 137 at Lynne. “Is she very busy at the moment?” P15 138 Lynne a dolly dealer! John was as usual E08 29 very busy during the day, but I always blatant untruthfulness: “I’m being very, very C11 36 good.” C11 37 Billy’s magic sing your equipment and I would advise a very careful study E07 128 of the new r ll your roots. If you do, you have to be very certain of your L04 52 support, an 65 the bank itself. Usually the water is very clear in April, with no F38 166 de r Lilley, the department is now B17 146 “ very close” to the confederation and th ies more say over B26 16 their spending. Very commendable, you might say, but th 11 37 For what is happening in Europe is very different from that F11 38 taking sher went up in October 1906 was G14 148 very different from the Oxford of today up to the task of backing C16 80 Webb’s very different repertoire, the result b nority households J29 204 may operate on very different assumptions to the ‘West 5 Doctors and midwives sometimes find it very difficult to say F31 56 when they 21 of the reasons London has always been very difficult to work in and H19 122 m Wessex Electric trains. These trains are very E07 104 similar to the High Speed can be solved numerically apart from the very early J79 101 stages, when the rat no B24 162 apologies - no explanations. Very embarrassing for me. I must add B2 r’s leadership. Emma F13 58 Nicholson is very enthusiastic: “Of course Margaret society as described by Durkheim is the very F28 155 opposite of the plural soc that at least some of the music will be very familiar B22 63 to you. B22 64 B22 second); very F38 111 deep water needs a very fast-sinking shooting-head, becaus girls J38 176 (58 per cent; n = 15) and very few white girls (15 per cent; n = ly - you should choose the nearest one,” very few J29 104 respondents are inclin damage and there J03 182 are areas with very few people, a short settlement his 118 revealed. In either event, he got a very fine example of the former G45 119 but there’s nothing A09 24 serious. I’m very frightened of getting married agai commercial exploitation. He was indeed a very G32 140 skilled craftsman as well sely institutionalized and in receipt of very G64 203 limited public finance. By books and films will know, he B07 130 is very gifted. A recent interview with Ly od enough P22 163 for her.” P22 164 “And very good she is with them.” P22 165 “I 139 needed. F07 140 Sonja had never been very happy at home. Her father was stri lue felt cap on her head. She G27 91 was very happy with Bernard [Freyberg] who alties resulting from air raids would be very heavy. The F24 184 general public bly when I was a child. F13 54 There’s a very high divorce rate in the House of 83 managers can justifiably point to the very high returns that they A15 184 hav design figure. This J76 186 represents a very high target value, particularly in (Continued)

154 Appendices 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96

E30 199 inclusion, in their book. We are very hopeful of a positive E30 200 outc women interviewed had declared sex to be very important in F01 93 marriage, in 1 ty at home means that there is plenty of very important C07 100 work for our pro Bryant said: “Cruise ship passengers are very important E21 85 to us, not only b Lady Waverton’s forehead. “She P10 15 is very innocent. More so than most girls w E07 157 stable its images were. It was very interesting to see the E07 158 dif ich, for well-known reasons, give only a very J30 9 uncertain indication of the part of the original. But this is not a very J53 124 natural use of the notion work expended in the deformation. It is very J71 70 difficult to obtain accurat Turner thought he could never have been very L02 176 dashing, even when young on: the need to mobilize internationally very large amounts J43 178 of finance o evision, the one medium that might reach very large H12 204 numbers, remains lar n the last two weeks? On the face of it, very little. In D12 185 our own communi epeated occasions, it would take a very, very long time for him to J47 167 be ju had all existed and been commended for a very long G56 108 time. Not only do the dbent (1979) has reviewed the effects of very loud noise on J24 35 this task and lusters of J15 182 four each, which have very low, low, and normal absorption. M ticising my daughter. Oh L03 123 no, I’m very lucky, and I’m not one of those ol sm in order to C17 65 be themselves in a very male-dominated world. The 44-yearmilk off once or twice. They are usually very milky ewes and E36 140 this probab o much older than the son. G05 54 He was very much a Victorian figure, and the a e herself described as having G27 5 been very much “a boy and girl affair”; and . (The other two K13 37 old friends were very much alive.) K13 38 The Eye had ma ee here is passing it. Their scrutiny is very N14 74 thorough. They wouldn’t let ther for a few years and A10 111 she’s a very nice lady.” A10 112 Vitas Gerulait n his back. L18 188 He looked now like a very ordinary, nice young man. He calle thout entertaining strangers, and she is very P10 75 exacting. Besides, I think t as your Roman remains. My governess is very P22 92 interested in this area. Yo 23 “Is that all?” Andy had grown into a very P29 24 handsome and charming man s at any distance E26 80 whilst keeping a very personal relationship. After all, literary portrayals J67 188 of devils as very physical agents provocateurs such camcorders available. Incidentally, I am very pleased to report E07 133 that the cks of pre-cut squares for patchwork are very popular. E03 144 ‘Patchwork and Qu . She decided N07 3 to go for the money. Very practical.” N07 4 They’d reached t d immovably in N18 71 the stone. N18 72 “ Very pretty,” she said, trying not to s B24 91 that doing business in Europe is very profitable. B24 92 We can help loc should have thought she should have been very proud P22 104 of her present pupil istians. Some of this criticism has been very radical, and there D04 190 have be 143 the film-noir option has exerted any very real attraction even G67 144 among t, she cooked superbly, and G28 131 “her very remarkable efficiency” seemed to b 0 16 circumstance of our having lived so very retired. She would have no P10 17 hen all the people I saw went about with very sad faces G04 69 because, as they I. J09 61 However, the FVIII molecule is very sensitive to proteolysis during J0 ace in Japan’s motor vehicle industry is very similar J44 111 to that of Sony’s n A20 119 . . . and has turned out to be a very skilful politician.” By A20 120 Ju J67 62 the minuscule text in Caligula is very small in relation to the J67 63 sp and aggressive. E36 151 The weights were very small and mostly 13lb deadweight a r these and all the sins of my life I am very sorry. But L17 86 most of all for e turned back to Martha. L08 28 “She’s a very special girl, Kate. Very trustwort the G47 77 contract, five months, with a very strict and specific penalty: G47 7 1 E20 124 1/2-2 hours until the skin is very tender and the water has E20 125 r le.” R05 182 How very true that was, how very true. R05 183 Diana flicked throug and smoke his pipe. “She’s got P16 195 a very unhealthy gleam in her eye,” he sa 176 few questions. Of course, it must be very upsetting for you. A N11 177 matte

Appendices 155 97 4 148 laboratory could produce something 98 the end of the week A34 181 it should be 99 1 comparison than the new GCSE, with the 100 ldren’s needs. So, for example, with the

very very very very

useful at almost no M04 149 cost. warm again, with a lot of dry weat wide range of J47 52 attainments s young, F05 92 practice sessions ne

very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very

angry. He told me: “ You should no bad influence among the public Fro beautiful toy in the box. I was “1 big restaurant and many people go big, clean and beautiful. Inside t busy, I regretted I had never give careful, and we don’t have too exc comfortable and very pround of the commen . In many family , the tele different from each other ? Whethe difficult to understand, we must r difficult problem. Though more and difficult to you to keep your secr efficient that you spend little tim expensive. It is also a great burd extraordimary . The match began. W fital to our life, our constrution free and relax , because I hear yo friendly. One of day there is an o glad to hear from you. You said it glad to have the oppotunity to show good . For example, during your st good for me! good at physics. Xiao jiang doesn’ good time to you and to others. Th grand. I as really very happy on i greatful to my teacher. Our monito happy. But their mother was not. B happy when you say such words,you happy, because I learned more thin happy. The Sports Meet Of No.4 Mid happy, because I have just decided happy and give up plenty of vexeds hard to deal with. I decide to giv helpful for old people runing slow helpful for me. First, reading ext high combat effectiveness. In figh high. But in 1990 after three deca hot and you will wear cool clothes hot, the temperature s about nearl important thing. Because it relati important sport. It can make our b important day to all of the Chines important, I won’t give up any opp important in one country’s economi important. It can assure that you important to every student. There

(3) Concordance lines for very in CLEC 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47

s later. Dad knew that thing and he felt e the punishment freely. All these exert an.” I opened the box at once. I found a It lies in the Long Jin Xi road. It is a er market, we call it “ Nen World.” It’s had to go to work that day. Though I was ood effects of sports. As long as we are uld say good to you . Then you will feel h machine but also motor car and car are the Love and What’s the like ? Are they ce. For example, we read a book which is least, the pollution of fresh water is a . It is crowded, dirty and noise . It is Someone think it’s ent. The expense on medical treatment is paper on the card . It was made my class have died away. all the facts above are from the countryside. Life there must be k something . The people in the shop are ohn Smiths London Britain Dear John, I’m , , , , , , , , 3????? I am hen you do the same work, you will do it ld outside the campus. And all these are me . Sunday. Apr. 20. Sunny Xiao Dong is ou forget everything, only know having a seum and The Great Wall because they are ce. Now, I have made some progress. I am too. But they kept on playing.They were ou may say: “It’s wonderful!” he must be olen. I have many work to do, but I felt at morning I felt not so luckly , I felt Now, I’m ppy days . In these time all people feel lf experience has told me that women are trong and benifits heart and lung. It is sively, as a way in learning English, is rich experience and firm will, will have ctancy very low and the infant mortality in the fields. In summer, the weather is dy. June 14th. Sunny. This afternoon was ec. 2 Sunny Protect the environment is a gfeng and Chen Guoyi) Body-building is a way! March 23rd Sunday Sunny Today is a utor. Since getting to know the world is up others, the Reform and open policy is ork harder than others. So the health is to know the world outside the campus is

(Continued)

156 Appendices 48 etc. Among these, these is one which is 49 It’s 50 badminton. I like football because it is 51 changing jobs, can you know the life is 52 Exercise should play a 53 . My neighbour always said: “The cat is 54 f fresh water. First, the fresh water is 55 nietly . But fresh water in our world is 56 people like to pursue the same job for a 57 t in China. as their life, it was lasted 58 he street. the street was narrow and not 59 ater is supplied any time if wanted on a 60 and nothing else could be seen.-We were 61 n in my Chinese test. These examples are 62 ago. . .” April 7 Sunday Cloudy Magic is a 63 our words is too poor and our grammer is 64 opinion, the fresh water in the earth is 65 ge To reach this goal, studing theory is 66 e happening. On the other side, money is 67 ahead. If not, I will surely be put in a 68 s meet of campus. Today, the weather was 69 list Daphne du Maurier. This novel has a 70 ebody. In other’s eyes your lover may be 71 y developing countries, they are usually 72 etter treasure it. In recent years, it’s 73 ing . By the efforts, the food supply is 74 e by boat, The water was green clear and 75 wonderful dinner. Because the dinner was 76 As a matter of fact, the fresh water is 77 they want to change this condition in a 78 r isn’t so full . On the contrary, it is 79 or these reasons nowadays fresh water is 80 e sands towards his boat. The island was 81 eve in the Christian religion are only a 82 lation work I may be supposed to do. I’m 83 , , , , , , , , “?D??? I’m 84 rs in our school are excellent. They are 85 regarded her as our grandmother. She was 86 ot, more than 1.90 metres high and has a 87 our grade. I was only sixty cent . I was 88 ly, I had many homework to do. So I felt 89 we are still not prepared for it. It is 90 o fat and keep us healthy, they are also 91 wither . However, the withered flower is 92 upon. As we all know that computers are 93 ial part of our modern daily life. It is 94 all the summer vacation . I hope you are 95 College Street to Long Hai Street. It is 96 the basketball match.These matched were 97 get fresh water when they want to. It is 98 n the wallet. I think you must have been 99 l something about my grandma. When I was 100 yer. This idea occurred to me when I was

very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very

important but has often been ignor important to us students to learn a interesting. Mid-Autumn Day. Mid-A interesting. Besides, we can get d large role in dailylife. Firstly, lazy. In the daynight it goes to s limited. Second, we need more and limited. If we use it up, we can’t long time. Because if you do a job long time.In the 2100s BC, one peo long. He walked along the street a low price. It seems we have too mu lucky; after a few minutes, I foun many. So, we should work hard no m marvellous technique. The famous m mess , we must not write conversit much. It rains in many places in t necessary. So the university shoul necessary to everything which bene negative state. In cold winter mor nice. Everybody’s frame of mind wa obvious characteristic that it can ordinary. But he (or she) has the poor. But they have changed greatl popular that many graduates go abr powerful . The people of the Devel quiet. We sat on the oat and enjoy rich we all ate it up. The chicken scarce now. The population and the short time. So they felled woods, short. First, fresh water doesn’t shortage. Faced with such situatio silent, Crusoe wondered if there w small group, compared with the gre sorry for the inconvinience caused sorry to know what happened to your strict with the students. and the strict with us. She wished we woul strong body. In less than three we surprised. Because I always think tired. When will I have a good res urgent and necessary for us to hav useful for charcter tranining. We useful. It can be make as tea leav useful. With their help, people ca very important for us. For example well. And I have a good summer vac wide,and it is very busy,too. The wonderful. The most of the forgett wrong. In fact, fresh water is ver worried. So I am writing to you to young, I had known the care of her young. When my father is a policem

Appendix VIII: Concordance lines for so

(1) Concordance lines for so in FROWN 1 164 perhaps one hundred million would be 2 e. K22 103 “I’ve never heard of anything 3 ny English castle, and a P02 109 kitchen 4 ndness of G65 46 the seeing eye which is 5 clothed . . . and yet why F11 86 do I feel 6 ll; can’t be sure - that “the family was 7 oncrete tasks and attainable victories 8 ants crawling on my skin. M05 99 It got 9 Vincent G73 112 writes: G73 113 So open, 10 it: Nothing makes our own troubles seem 11 t before P28 128 school started. “You’re 12 rs has the European scene A11 190 looked 13 et. I thought that when my mind - always 14 d blouse - which that morning had seemed 15 s. I want to sleep, but it is clear now. 16 parked the K19 39 flouncy piece o’ fluff 17 03 101 Nothing can get between us we are 18 would undermine the myth of improvement 19 k for their care for children and a love 20 the disease into retreat F04 50 don’t be 21 th or her J61 14 moral worth, nor is she 22 52 looked frantic and wished she weren’t 23 47 student of linguistics should find it 24 THAN YOU THINK! E02 3 Many beauties are 25 39 with,’ but far more boss than friend, 26 they are unable. The federal government, 27 the fellowship, and that’s what makes it 28 83 Reasons why the public is, seemingly, 29 s our loneliness at this hour, but he is 30 med to relax, but I didn’t find it quite 31 E09 141 sport,” said David Raposa. “It’s 32 of Roe vs. Wade. B22 137 The position is 33 ost a month. You can see, then, why it’s 34 had changed. M05 92 These fights left me 35 n the insidious Oriental master criminal 36 P15 19 “Oh, Sen-tildeorita Weston, I am 37 d. Then MacLeish said, “Well, that’s not 38 cool eunuchs K05 12 harmonizing It feels

so abhorrent to all who F46 165 survive so absurd. Pull the other K22 104 one, so antiquated it reminded Sarah of some so astonishing in the attitude of mothe so awful?’” says Jay Amsterdam, M.D., t so B19 52 oppressive that women could o so B27 134 essential to the morale of a so bad I didn’t go into town after a wh so barefaced is the character of Melvil so bearable A24 8 as the knowledge that so big,” she says. P28 129 “We never ex so bleak. And yet, the Old Continent is so busy, always R06 66 going around in so classy P12 68 and stylish but was no So clear the dark K03 171 bowl the pile so close to the pumps, the stupid K19 4 so close. Lots of girls here want K03 1 so dear to G12 106 Raphael. Obliquely, so deep F29 171 that it can nurture or so defensive. Recent research suggests so detached that she is indifferent to so determined. But even old P02 53 Lord so difficult to articulate J58 148 his so disease-resistant all you need are t so distant that he would be C06 40 out so distant from urban J45 43 poverty, i so E01 187 outstanding.” E01 188 Two ye so eager to accept F34 184 Barefoot ser so easy to K07 133 distract with the ob so easy. N05 91 “Tell Buffalo Hump we g so expensive to E09 142 show, and if an so extreme, lacking in thought and comm so F03 135 important to know the exact so frustrated that I often ran screamin so full N28 33 of life. The invasion of so glad you have P15 20 come! The Sen-t so good. Look G36 191 at my stomach,” w so good. She had forgotten how it K05 1 (Continued)

158 Appendices 39 P27 171 something, little girl. If he’s so great why’s he still suiting up P27 40 eness of Montana’s venue rules H16 61 is so great that the rules can no longer b 41 13 169 country would have induced him to so hazardous a G13 170 conduct.” G13 17 42 esome to you that a P16 28 person can be so immersed in eating. You have the fee 43 stel stick. Since individual strokes are so important to E23 120 me, I’m unwilli 44 nd vocals - nice to kiss by, if you were so inclined. L23 16 As it turned out, t 45 , even M03 193 provisionally. “If you’re so inclined, do some M03 194 discreet c 46 nce a morpheme for which the evidence is so J35 165 skimpy, especially when it d 47 comes from so prepossessing, so winsome, so K09 218 elegant and manly a gentlema 48 now there’s another inadequate word . . . so K14 199 porny, so gorny, so yorny .. 49 ind. Never had he experienced a blackout so L01 7 absolute. L01 8 “We can’t stay 50 uggested she was embarrassed about being so L09 153 beautiful, but couldn’t help 51 N28 64 unknown. N28 65 “I want something so large, so devastating to the N28 66 52 r, God G75 155 willing, we should all be so lucky as Jacob, such a good son he G 53 had been Beverly’s trademark P04 14 for so many years. And she wasn’t really a 54 and, there is the natural objection that so many modern D15 150 pioneers in cult 55 66 163 meadows without dread, than among so many images of death to be G66 164 t 56 J28 192 ‘need for achievement,’ include so many possible lower-level J28 193 va 57 tue. It’s all a blur, though. There were so many statues K14 129 in those years. 58 ing pitcher in the league.” A21 207 That so many years are yet to come fuels Fer 59 l abolition of F44 172 requirements that so many colleges embraced in the late s 60 Ryder shake his P09 163 head. He’d seen so many female ankles in his day, so ma 61 ts good aspect, the R09 159 gathering of so many fine minds for such an extended 62 , but I can’t remember when anyone spoke so many words to P17 165 me in such a s 63 things happen” and “lifting the team in so many A19 212 areas.” A19 213 But tha 64 y Sturm after the Japan game for “making so many A19 211 things happen” and “lif 65 decided that if philosophers could make so many useful and N22 146 expansive co 66 o spectators of G15 26 both sexes, after so many years have passed? Of course, a 67 ong that thoroughfare, a hodgepodge like so many P08 22 colorful child’s clocks 68 the greedy Wall Street types who amassed so many B13 31 millions of dollars engi 69 d seen so many female ankles in his day, so many female P09 164 legs and female 70 s the C06 208 title. C06 209 “Fiction is so much fun,” Buchanan recently C06 210 71 g it.” N07 112 “What were you doing with so much money?” Lance N07 113 asked. N0 72 ent dream thoughts so they do not arouse so much anxiety as to J30 168 wake the 73 ina ventured to A41 13 New York. She was so naive, she did not know enough to be 74 5 10 waistlines nor the firm young flesh so necessary for haute C05 11 couture. 75 xperience in the 1700s and long after is so obvious that it has J57 167 often be 76 110 peculiar way to “save” them, she was so outraged at the C02 111 suffering of 77 A44 23 Prynne, is fundamental to a novel so overwhelming in its images and A44 2 78 f her trip she did not even stop to eat, so P29 45 anxious was she to get to Gun 79 er. I love K25 180 the way she does it - so perfect and so exact you’d think the 80 reviewed in G56 129 Artnews. G56 130 So pervasive is the acceptance of styli 81 ginine-guanine interaction, which played so predominant a J05 134 part in five o 82 old woman, the fairy tells her: “You are so pretty G63 52 and so polite that I a 83 nces at Sarah Bernhardt. P05 29 “She was so proud of those,” I said. He nodded. 84 dominates F42 21 every conversation, and so quick on the draw that virtually eve 85 it’s because they were once made to feel so R01 116 wrong, so impotent, probably 86 ife with the woman in the movie, who was so R06 110 different from his thin, ner 87 colds or whatever. It’s G07 66 simple.” So simple, in fact, that there is a rem 88 with the Speaker!” F42 44 “This place is so steeped in custom and tradition that 89 almond green. C11 29 The two shows were so strong, yet so different, that the r 90 I was too hurt to listen, I was feeling so stupid for L22 75 having imagined th 91 wearing miniature roses in their lapels, so sure of A15 122 themselves they chal 92 to share a life with. N17 119 He wasn’t so sure about Print’s new wife. His eye

Appendices 159 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100

ir wheels, kicking P21 27 clouds of dust 22 simplicity, although the typeface is show the N04 163 world they’re so tough. ree daughters, “two G63 127 of whom were P14 45 more.” P14 46 “John, why are you red thousand N28 212 years.” Han smiled. 131 always outlasting everyone and being 1 Max waved a well-dressed pair forward;

so thick the grass looks brown and dead so tiny as to strain the C05 23 eyeball So tough they can take a ball in the be so unlucky that everything they did tur so unwilling to spend time among P14 47 So weak. All they could contemplate was so weird and dramatic and L22 132 never so well-dressed that N27 132 they smell

(2) Concordance lines for so in FLOB 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43

simply turning on a tap. We have become . The threat of a Third World War became immediately liked her: G28 117 “she was me this weekend because he K19 6 sounded 101 Then afterwards I thought, it’s not that’s all. You L05 48 don’t have to be today. But if B06 108 opinion polls are ter system for handling it. P21 212 It’s d G18 170 sympathy for one so gifted and ‘d have to do.” R02 169 “That’s why it’s K21 83 putting the words bear and beard we could all get home. K19 167 But it’s very essence of what makes the movement e road from N09 54 Berlin to Leipzig was w that he was under the stairs if it was B08 10 the historical precedents are not of her neck P18 122 which made her seem I’d R09 7 have married the devil, I was 30 42 isolated position in hilly country 24 My hands, I further told Mother, were hint of witty R08 116 nostalgia that was ted her dead.’ G52 175 ‘That seems to me eforehand to say the G31 39 Princess was the top of the steps. P05 109 It was all es. Not by any means the first man to be the twelve foot G26 43 deep top soil is ring and gave it to me. Her fingers were conomic point of view has proved J28 148 sult he sent over! Too G13 162 bad - but ut so funny.” G13 163 Yet it was not all one so gifted and so brittle and withal 139 matter of fact.” She laughed. “I was ost in the K13 70 Cabinet Office. So far e rose to a wail. “But - P27 78 you seem and. . . and I loved him. N26 231 “We were 29 it. I’m happy here at the moment. I’m the rhythm of the dance. The Turks were 1 of those suffering to which I had been ina from India, to whose finances it was on and off the pitch A08 206 were rated ons come thick and fast. F36 107 What is e with the imagery that it housed became blood, at least it’s dark, that can’t be

so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so

accustomed to the F09 14 convenience acute G17 181 that there were severa alive and warm and interested. She s bad on the phone even though my aunt big a thing, not D06 102 really.” D0 blatant about it.” L05 49 Kramer dug boring and unpopular, why do we have boring, I don’t really want to talk brittle and withal so G18 171 lovabl cheap,” said Louis. R02 170 “My God, close to each other K21 84 in the di cold that even Paschal’s knob would D15 158 attractive: the New Age is n dangerous that vehicles often drove dark; and if he knew J60 48 by some daunting as many pundits B08 11 thin defenceless. P18 123 Daniel Stern wa desperate to keep you.” R09 8 “No wo different from the low G30 43 coasta distant from my body K06 25 that I d essential these days. Perfect. He br evil that it’s beyond my understandi exhausted that she could not make it familiar. P05 110 But the Duke had t fascinated, G08 152 Shakespeare woul fertile that it is cheaper to buy mo frail it slipped off K05 105 easily. frustrating. For a start, the two so funny.” G13 163 Yet it was not all s funny. Lifting the lid on the volcan G18 171 lovable.” G18 172 Immediatel glad to be P07 140 home I forgot all good. K13 71 However, after a long a happy in here. Don’t you long to get happy together. I don’t think you ca happy I could weep. But A26 30 that hated that the leader of F37 163 the helpless a witness - when K28 182 su important, ended J57 71 abuses conne inferior to Bundesliga parameters th interesting about these dark, six-le intimate J64 174 that it is difficul K02 147 dangerous, but as I crouched (Continued)

160 Appendices 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97

the sports day was over, G04 188 “It was ss France, too. Even with Graham, who is ing started a couple of weeks ago. I was G05 45 large part because they had spent nine months - and two other P21 142 not 22 “All right.” Neither moved. He added, lk about Alex, he L16 52 always makes me n one of the side R02 79 streets and not th the E08 172 fact that it will be only 210 by other help agencies. B19 211 But abundant love of life, A27 219 which at 32 49 answer all the questions: but like hod - although she lived with Rivera for 92 had only eleven and twenty-one. With le it contains. Should it surprise us if 72 Party which had controlled Ulster for in being the J63 75 unhappy Occasion of ster more than ten men, I think; and not “ He opened his jacket, at the heat from l development which has G62 104 blighted said Mrs Turner. L02 170 “We’ve all got 35 she thought her head would burst with associate G29 81 with the minor and not ector of productions, suggests A26 9 not aret. “If the girls hadn’t shown E23 126 he Oral Torah has developed, D07 153 are ‘re pretty small fry. The rock star gets ight. A06 70 It explains why he has been Giles frowned. “So long? Were the stores t was wrong with her. She wasn’t usually and Caroline dreaded leaving with things eep voice that had a husky flavour to it e it, and even if they do, visibility is berries in the orange E02 52 colourings managed to squeeze inside its Wispa bar. ouldn’t remember when he’d last seen him ing pleased R05 175 with himself. It was scinating King P22 154 Charles. It’s all world breathed through that blue space, e L04 10 explained. L04 11 “The timing’s relationship), which can scarcely be for 05 Francois Mitterrand - the man who was within E29 87 the UK or the EC at large, dia - but thanks, P24 81 anyway.” It was hispered Daisy. “Oh, R09 27 darling, I’m erything had been different. They’d been during the Gulf War. Indeed this proved y to carry out one more act of genocide. “Intersting you should say that. I’m not 1 in Chicago last Monday nobody could be he moved with a lightness surprising in 1 235 He said it was just because it was there. But let’s not use that word, it’s to B23 113 their notice that the tax was

so kind of you to let Everest come down so kind, so L22 216 thoughtful -” L22 2 so L16 56 pleased, he seemed so good. O so little time together during G05 46 E so little ones,” Tom confessed. P21 143 so low P18 23 she could hardly catch th so mad. Tell me what happened with lunc so majestic, but it still had a fair bi so many shopping days to Christmas, San so many people and small businesses are so many times seemed to diminish to alm so many children of that G32 50 generat so many years and was J65 96 as militan so many colleges there simply D02 93 we so many families G75 179 collapse in an so many years. This locates G71 73 the so many fatal Mischiefs,” “’tis J63 76 so many M01 56 experts with arms. Madam so many K16 114 people. “It’s just the so many towns in Western Europe. G62 10 so many numbers now, no one can get rea so many facts, June said, P15 136 “Now, so minor aristocracy without awe or G29 so much carelessness as crisis. Is larg so much interest we would have disbande so much hot air.” Jacobs notes that Sac so much fan R09 67 mail, he ought to be so nice to Liberal leader Paddy A06 71 so P09 47 vast?” P09 48 “I do not know, so P29 167 tetchy. P29 168 “Andy!” she so P29 202 awkward between them. She wi so pleasurable that Dance N22 167 invar so poor it is F38 67 doubtful if they c so popular at that time. Inevitably the So precise is G75 30 the Wispa machiner so R02 103 enthusiastic about anything. so rare for him to influence events so so romantic.” P22 155 “And you do not w so serene and empty K14 132 it looked. so significant, Beth. Patterson L04 12 so simple a J60 68 reason as that the r so slow to condemn the Soviet B13 106 c so small are the E29 88 numbers.sic! Wh so smooth it couldn’t possibly have giv so sorry.” R09 28 “Why the fuck didn’t so stiff - arms, K24 106 legs, and thou so successful G76 155 that the BBC is c So successful has he B15 174 been, over so sure that’s P16 203 what Philip had so sure: big Lucy, the great A26 132 It so tall a L07 85 man. He’d lived with h so trivial that it got him down. P21 23 so ugly. Let’s just say L08 59 we’re ai so unpopular. B23 114 I also believe th

Appendices 161 98 to leave E31 60 them in because they are so unusual. E31 61 The engineers say: “ 99 e owner J16 207 claims may not have been so valuable, ‘but for’ the wrongdoer’s 100 P22 11 My mother was saying: “Oh, I’m so weary, and ‘Can I P22 12 help you, M (3) Concordance lines for so in CLEC 1 de the window waked me up. The sound was so abnormal that Mimi erected his tail 2 what is happening in our country; if not so acute, it is significant to a great 3 new Tom was beated in his fight, he was so angry that he went out to hit the fa 4 to make progress in studies, but we are so anxious that we fail. In a word, we 5 English text’s result was over 76. It’s so bad. So, I decide that today and tom 6 hard at them. But the school record was so bad. For examble,before the English 7 his best to protect the peace. Peace is so beautiful that we all like it. But i 8 Li Hua. I am in Class 3, Senior3. I was so careless that I had lost my blue spo 9 Is it time to say this society has been so civilized that we should give up pri 10 with my life. Their soothing remarks are so convincing that they help me over co 11 t to the same school. In my eyes, he was so countrified and stupid because he ca 12 for take fake medicines. You know, it is so dangerous that produce and sell fake 13 s me a lot. But there’s one thing I feel so deep, and I’m sure that it makes me 14 ame --- “Two men and three feet.” It was so difficult to walk that I hardly fell 15 fficult. But do you think that why it is so difficult? That’s because you lack p 16 t must be answered. the question was not so difficult that each group can answer 17 they write freely as they like. They are so eager to get success but can only ge 18 But I think that studying abroad is not so easy and it needs the students’ cour 19 f calisthenics in the chilly wind. I was so excited at the thought of going home 20 Then Miss Lin gave us a letter, she was so excited that she could not keep back 21 echnique, I think , that makes the novel so exciting and attrative . First of al 22 mark of a man’s foot in the sand. He was so frightened that came into his cave. 23 r a diligent student, the spare time was so full, but for a lazy one, it was lit 24 MET 95 June 1st, 1995. Dear Peter, We’re so glad you’re coming to join us on Sun 25 hina, the situation of job market is not so good. Nowadays, Chinese school and c 26 in one of these articles his English was so good that Engels wrote him a setter 27 e Spring Festival comes. It makes people so happy. They can visit their old frie 28 any wonderful things in the shop. We are so happy, and want to buy everything. D 29 st ten we reached there. Ah! The hill is so high and we all surprised at every t 30 y’s life, you join in a contest. You are so highsprited , and believe that you w 31 to settle down. The stuffed carriage was so hot, he had to sweep away . The swea 32 The sun was shineing and the weather was so hot. At 1:25 we went to the worker’s 33 quickly pick it up and eat it. They are so interesting that we all like them. A 34 . When it asleep ,it likes a ball. It is so interesting. You ee, it is a bird-35 just as we wish, they think the earth is so large that Fresh water is plenty. We 36 e is said again: “ Dan, be quickly! It’s so late. You will late for school if yo 37 cuts us off from the real world. We get so lazy, we choose to spend a fine day 38 me reading on one or two subject. It is so limited and I think reading extensiv 39 fact has a contray side. Fresh water is so limited that some scientists have al 40 the game. Though that morning I felt not so luckly, I felt very happy. The Spor 41 volleyball pat, because my roommate is so mad about him that she would really 42 ing, river, under the ground and so on, so many pirsons think the fresh water w 43 e so many words you must know. There are so many grammar and idiom you should le 44 econdly, water is limited, but there are so many people in the world, according 45 At last he enters the society. There are so many social evils. If he is not so h 46 se up all fresh water. Because there are so many rivers and wells and rains is a 47 urry to the dining room, there have been so many students in it and long line be (Continued)

162 Appendices 48 f football in grade was held every year. 49 hy when we haste to do things, there are 50 a developing country, and there are not 51 I know many people want staying abroad, 52 f the most important . languages because 53 e than two weeks, and the home-works are 54 for that. And Thank you to you gave us 55 rden from then on. I think that’s why in 56 aid as authritative. Galileo could make 57 tisement in the newspaper for job unting 58 , , , , , o ? Lantern Festival There are 59 ties come into our daily life. But among 60 OH! The next Friday is middle autumn day 61 d put our knowledge to pratise. We have 62 way. But they didn’t and don’t offer us 63 s been increased. Factories have earned 64 or trouble. I turned back and went away. 65 support this opinion may think there are 66 l along, including this time. But, since 67 won’t use out of fresh water. There are 68 plenty of the fresh water every day. And 69 was the moot respectable person, he had 70 l and the patient’s family. So why waste 71 train was roaring past his nose. It was 72 speaking like a shy girl, the sun looked 73 ow faster. As we know, the result is not 74 Burma and China, the transportation was 75 changes of China. In the past China was 76 ne through hard work in our society” was 77 ciety. Nowadays, the use of computers is 78 er to clean the oil. The Super Power was 79 stared at something in the gate. He was 80 n in Britain. As far as I know, it’s not 81 in other countries, the situation is not 82 ical effect of this terrible accident is 83 acus to count. But the speed of count is 84 water, I forget everything. the water is 85 in Guang Dong Commercial College. It is 86 s fist into the boy’s face. The fist was 87 ead in my heart. The desire for life was 88 until they came. When I saw them, I was 89 ut a cry of happy. Our Chinese girl were 90 ly, We have been back home. Today, I was 91 ‘t go to bed until late. Many of us were 92 onluy one book shop on the street. It’s 93 But he stood there like a stone. He was 94 us happiness as well as misery. Money is 95 love leaps out at the windows.” Money is 96 explore the archaic civilization. It was 97 cause I felt it was so early. And it was 98 Because of the heavy rain, the street is 99 ded! My mum smiled and asked me if I was 100 very country in the world. Also, neither

So many things of me about the football so many mistakes? The main reason is th so many factories or companies to meet so many people try every thing to go ab so many people use it not only in Engla so many. I’d rather I studied at school so many good books. I very like to read so many novels, the criminals succeedin so many discoveries. Most of Galileo’s so many times you will hear and see one so many festival served in China. today so many goods, there are a few fake com so many people go to the shop by some f so many ways to get to know the society so many values. Because they are fake so many profits in industry. Preseants So many years have passed, I can’t forg so many source of it such as rain, rive so many classmates agree with him, one so much fresh water, such as rain, rive so much fresh water was polluted by was so much knowledge that no question he c so much money to let a patient suffer m so noisy that everybody could not hear so peaceful and composed. Grandma and I so pleasant. Because “haste make waste” so poor and inside the city was so urgl so poor that people couldn’t get enough so popular and wide-spread. As it turne so popular . Nearly all the companies h so powerful. It can not only get rid of so sad and hopeless maybe because he kn so satisfactory in China, either. For e so satisfying. Most of its black people so severe that for a considerably long so slow that people spend much time. Co so soft that it makes me totally relaxe so strange for students to study in the so strong that John was knocked down to so strong that I exerted the rest of my so surprised and pleased, my good frien so tall and clever, they gave full play so tired, but very happy. Nov25. Saturd so tired that we fell asleep very soon. so unfair! Books are very important to so unhuman and nothing meant to him. We so useful that everybody seeks to poses so useful that we need money. No one ca so venturesome that I didn’t know if he so warm in my quilt. I was thinking how so wet that everyone have to walk caref so worried just now. I pretended to be so young nor so old . Short and tall, a

Appendix IX: Concordance lines for too

(1) Concordance lines for too in FROWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38

could have won the election but it was “ too A11 96 late,” the First Lady wore a dawdle, fall behind and wait until it is too A20 68 late to mount a rally. Hey, ful anachronism C05 184 on us, as if all too aware how tough a sell this C05 185 the political cliche-acutes. Before it’s too B06 117 late. B06 118 B06 119 The t “I guess he won’t be sailing.” K17 114 “ Too bad,” said Browne. He began to gath man he was N01 99 dealing with. “That is too bad. I was N01 100 interested.” N01 try going B23 232 down the tube, that is too bad. Some places on this Earth are ave exploded says, B19 26 “government is too big and costs too much,” people B19 17 11 good. The office party hadn’t been too boring and now there was P17 12 not of Danto’s condition is G19 152 now too broad to catch only ‘artworks’ in i because the R03 113 store employees were too busy with other, higher-priority R0 ble. But gradually it became E05 154 all too clear that the situation was seriou . G53 95 O’Neill thought World War I was too close; his audiences would not G53 J31 161 been that classical technique is too conservative in addressing J31 162 animal was too N25 37 quiet to be heard. Too crafty for Kord to see it. So Kord s A32 175 that emergency rooms often are too crowded for police officers A32 176 pparent that generic theism is just too D12 9 generic to permit anyone to s d up most of the water, which was either too deep or too fast P13 144 for his st r our true selves, because we are F16 66 too distracted in the light.” His insig mensions. Some stereo systems are simply too E25 24 large to be mounted into the died. A26 118 Investigators said it was too early to say why the two engines A2 The case against Stacey Wilson had been too easy. The pieces L14 77 fell into p hardonnay in the market-place clearly is too enticing to F38 147 be resisted. Ne 18 because suf-ficient testing is either too expensive or F23 118 are “fueling” e Web. Questions are asked: Is it D03 12 too experiential? Is there enough Chris t was N25 101 too dangerous and probably too far for the bulky sabertooth to N25 y G60 40 taking on too many opponents in too few years. His lifestyle had G60 41 f his sight. But life to him N22 189 was too full of pleasant surprises to dwell ll his problems, G60 106 Kerouac was far too gifted to let the experience lie fa rtunity this presented was E11 24 almost too good to be true. E11 25 La Tulipe w gment? B18 219 B18 220 B19 1 Task Proves Too Great for Bush B19 2 George F. Will . Never one G60 83 to sit by himself for too great a period of time, he was driv y. I don’t K05 216 remember anyone being too happy about it.” K05 217 “Your fath compassionate.” Such a view certainly is too harsh. But J61 180 surely the moral e elaborate, C11 182 knotted rhetoric is too high-pitched, inflated for rhetoric rial Bridge. The blur of pedestrians was too immune to N10 15 revolving lights a 9 81 operation of a nuclear plant is far too insignificant to have any J79 82 im A30 163 you a stiff sentence. They were too interested in getting the case A30 (Continued)

164 Appendices 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92

h against them and in favor of unity was too J37 202 strong to permit them to st ,” he said. “The D.R. is perfect - never too K01 199 cold or hot.” K01 200 Susan ed my mother very much and she died much too K15 102 young. I think I have every arch, sawed level to P21 153 the ground, too large to pull out with a team of ho his dish. His ears were two N10 58 sizes too large for his head, and he had a lo 18 October 5 actions were too little and too late. G68 119 On October 12 and 13 nd desire cannot now be hoped for, it is too late G35 92 and I have been too muc , H23 170 states disburse funds that are too late and too little for local H23 1 ference of Women Religious (L.C.W.R.) is too liberal. D16 181 The L.C.W.R. has b some nights when the heat made me K06 10 too listless to work, I watched the nei elt he was receiving too much of it; had too little privacy, P17 226 too little h of it; had too little privacy, P17 226 too little quiet, too little relaxation ind of weak.” P17 124 “Too much work and too little relaxation, I P17 125 suppos that the regime’s political strategy was too little too late. J37 179 The spring o much the better. N04 205 Don’t give me too long a life, he asked the stars, ju ectrons from cathode to anode was J80 32 too long. The real, unrecognized, probl 3 115 “It’s been four days, Carl. That’s too long to be L13 116 missing.” L13 11 ors closed. I bowed back, but not R03 71 too low, for fear of getting my head ca t which distortion J03 125 occurred were too low. Other factors considered by Be makes a woman unsteady, perhaps, to have too many K10 148 attractions; it preven 4 216 too many facts, too many theories, too many subjects, too many F44 217 spe aurant, for example, and we’d have a few too many glasses of R03 187 wine, and o ‘t afford to let much by me, Van. I have too many N09 116 people who want to see There are simply F44 216 too many facts, too many theories, too many subjects, t s, too many theories, too many subjects, too many F44 217 specializations to per king too many K11 38 drinks and spilling too many beans in front of Jake Vickers must F12 182 seek out new perspectives. Too many enterprises are currently base t in Calusa, though L11 266 nowadays not too many people were going out to eat, know him and I’d rather not P20 59 spend too much time on the project. P20 60 St Mary. He said, “You been K26 74 watching too much Miami Vice, man.” K26 75 I mus n, and try it all again. L03 151 There’s too much money involved to lick his wou ng.” Always the questions, Is it R05 207 too much? Not enough? Everything must b is old man because it K26 111 would take too much energy. He said his father was orchestra’s board decided it E22 191 was too much and asked for Shaw’s resignati percent indicated that homosexuals had “ too much” G20 202 political power. Once ught that homosexuals have too little or too much political G20 177 power (8 per Washington for the holidays. She’s much too N16 12 old to travel alone.” N16 13 ce said to me: “Let’s not be K11 33 too naive, shall we?” K11 34 I wish I h f the time. L24 72 Staying home was out. Too nice a day for that, and already fe g money. This J49 169 statement would be too obvious to mention were it not for kept putting it off, and then Evelyn got too old. Teddy K15 22 was the only one re P02 35 born.” P02 36 “Precisely. He’s too old. We’ll see someone P02 37 young arried, as my mother felt G74 149 he was too old for her. He was maybe twenty-si reed.” Justine put down her teacup. “I’m too P07 91 grateful to have you here at ian doctrine in it? Is the D03 13 method too phenomenological? Something of this black-squareUse forceful words; but not too R05 230 forceful for the thoughts d ugh to graze without losing N21 77 cows, too remote for recreation. All you pay osed? Three seem obvious. Perhaps D07 28 too self-evident is that the word conve LC E32 45 vendors view such solutions as too shaky and are reluctant to E32 46 s t defendant’s interest in convenience is too slight to H16 16 outweigh the plain a “Jesus is My Friend” T-shirt that was too small on her: K26 152 it left a few . He examines my boots with displeasure. Too soft, F06 156 he says, but they wil 79 decades. N22 180 A genius? No, he was too steady to be a genius, too content, ed economic populism G10 133 considered too strong’ by most social liberals - c

Appendices 165 93 ck in March. B05 74 Actually, that’s not 94 ce leans close. Her hand holding mine is 95 fa or daybed in her living-room, G51 122 96 considered were either E11 9 too large, 97 ughs. “That kind F15 159 of structure is 98 earth city A20 163 seemed too rooted and 99 4 acres of Chardonnay planted in grossly 100 o leave our P11 28 home?” P11 29 “You’re

too too too too too too too too

surprising. Most politicians are B0 tight. I try K03 158 to say with my tired to do anything, apparently to unattractive, in need of too much r unproductive for me. My all-time fa various to be greatly transformed b warm Regions F38 143 IV and V, acco young to understand, Heather,” the

too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too

A07 198 exacting for Epervier Bleu A27 16 large for the proposed site. A41 7 obvious. A41 8 Not that too m arduous a task to be G75 194 undert B26 170 important to lose. B26 171 big. My brother gave it to G17 50 m big to have C12 174 singletons; and busy to allow the sweet fragrance o busy looking after their P27 119 tw busy looking at D12 164 the source C05 135 clean for us to believe his careful not to argue or offend: the complicated. It can’t F03 132 all b conservative to implement F25 143 p crude, my dear, and far too dull. N deep, the toll in the dead and maim difficult to use split stitch. E01 dreadful to be borne. Females G43 1 dull. No, I L08 72 merely wish you E09 105 numerous, often irrelevant E14 123 much for her already-pressu E23 139 many benefits to ignore. E2 early to N05 36 tell.” N05 37 “I’ll early in the season. I’m just conce easy to become selfish. Now, all th evasive to D08 199 provide a true a evident in the lives of Christians, -evident male chauvinist aspects it excited to L06 189 go to bed anyway exhausted and too sore to undress h expensive for children to use. D12 F06 184 much!” thought Linda. “Here F20 49 hazardous. F20 50 David has F30 38 timid to continue with the a far M03 130 from us. To try and tal few but from too many D02 172 candi H12 22 few students are studying S& happy to P15 72 oblige,” Dr Ryan ob happy to accept your M02 80 hospita hard L08 81 to find one.” L08 82 “T heavy for him. Nor does he enjoy th high, too low or H15 85 just about

(2) Concordance lines for too in FLOB 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42

louche and Wildenstein consider the race y threw out the scheme saying it was far 22-hour return trip on Thursday were all arents, unqualified personnel. It is far gree the chimney needs preserving. It is 49 superior affair, but in truth it was which are otherwise just like sets) are from the world. At first N20 156 he was plete P27 118 with stock, because she is g. They are not thinking of it. They are s entertainingly awful, but his arms are ech - she was almost P18 65 over-polite, .” F03 131 bulletSome of the language is he F25 142 eighties, seen as too old and virtue of an L08 71 outright cheque. Far d between Serbia and Croatia runs B13 78 s of the embroidery where E01 182 it was s G43 176 impersonation true, he made it cheque. Far too crude, my dear, and far plain that the new issues of NZ Post are st year’s scorching summer may have been t being in a single sex organisation has 35 completely. Some don’t. With him it’s ep up every year, but it’s still A41 102 no one to share your L04 5 worries. It’s smus in the early sixteenth century were . The element of D12 90 struggle is only rds F01 170 socialism, but if it had its ke I told you. . . Besides, I guess you’re nd gradually disappearing. P03 77 He was t D12 37 in ancient times paper was much hey had reached Linda’s age. “It was all tle along the roads for milking would be February 1791, but appears to have been ever saw their masters at all. They were England, Nonconformity suffered not from of 16 are becoming more attractive. But lly. P15 71 “I’m sure Simon will be only hung over them both. M02 79 “We are only l of talented directors, it shouldn’t be costume: the rest of A26 158 Turandot is t about right? Is the level of borrowing

(Continued)

166 Appendices 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96

rdous situations. Noise levels which are too high are hazardous J72 109 to healt was littered with R08 46 clothes. It was too hot for velvet, and the pale chiffo come out. The air itself was dangerous. Too humid, K09 118 too moist, It collec , “policy in Northern G71 60 Ireland was too important for normal inter-party wr nd it unless to hang himself. But he was too K16 81 tenacious of life, or too co today, even though there wasn’t anything too L11 5 exciting going on. I would th he sighed. P24 96 Even if he had, it was too late now. She’d blown it. P24 97 Sh ested in S&T and were H12 197 introduced too late in the education process to in number of potential partners for you is too limited, thus placing F06 70 too ti the time delay of the echo is not J70 93 too long, then distraction is unlikely, pending that we have announced too high, too low H15 84 or just about right? Is long technology transfer J78 17 has had too low a profile in the UK and been an ull market because he feels premiums are too low, while more bad A25 88 loss new but which Wheldrake dreaded as being all too M02 158 familiar, and the Rose acce mage of myself. She had long black hair, too M06 130 luxuriant for a kid her age how to pass their test. B18 63 There are too many deaths and there is too much m e scope back home - there are far A10 35 too many people and far fewer shows.” A ssment of riches. D02 173 The problem of too many men wanting to become minister ions or video-recorders. Where there are too many suppliers H28 87 and too much , he was not tempted to M04 78 introduce too many new species too fast or to mic r us? We have no N10 159 guns.” N10 160 “ Too much whisky in camp for them to loo s and their effect on dancers’ bodies if too much reliance is E13 172 placed on 3 There are too many deaths and there is too much misery for B18 64 Whitehall to ere. C15 49 C15 50 Scrawny voice is just too much these days C15 51 SINGLES C15 economist Girgory Yavlinsky A06 227 said too much aid could be harmful unless th of production to G05 121 ensure quality. Too much money was at stake to do other d out. A07 160 It was always going to be too much for defending champion Nick A0 k of it, the picture is perhaps a little too much even G45 114 for the bedroom: n.” A17 107 Rickman himself does not set too much store by his stint at A17 108 tions, and restrained J57 16 others from too much interference harmful to Britai the cottage and hoped he wouldn’t become too P08 25 bored and try to uproot the Well, I don’t suppose the judge would be too pleased L02 151 if I asked a few ex that seems all N12 196 wrong.” N12 197 “ Too public,” Christian said. N12 198 “F do you?” P10 180 Edmund looked back, all too quick to pick up her meaning. P10 1 ion and political turmoils is all C07 95 too real. C07 96 Increasingly, however, which the law does not J16 166 consider too remote such as the lost opportunity me he thought of Alabama? It was getting too ridiculous. He R08 104 was the toug ility. G12 136 Many thought that she was too self-effacing and let her husband G programmes which has been described as too sensitive R05 160 for transmission’ too M06 130 luxuriant for a kid her age, too sensual. M06 131 “I loved our perfo Edgar’s large head. Though just slightly too small, it made him so K06 88 happy arning. Again, some colleges were simply too small and D02 88 had too little mon Julie wouldn’t hear of it. “Women can be too soppy. E14 44 Maybe that’s why ther that B11 161 they were not bound by the too -stiff rules which applied to the B1 the ‘unimaginative’. Or is K04 94 ‘hate’ too strong a word?” K04 95 “No.” K04 96 ears, K10 156 Tristram.” K10 157 He was too stunned to get up off his knees as 0 untroubled when they were too thick or too thin for the current G28 71 weather e Wisconsin randomized phantom, which is too time consuming for J15 151 routine nd Phyllis’ N07 126 desk. They were both too tired and tense to talk much. After rential E28 112 enough to be Labour. Far too unfashionable to be a Liberal. He’l latest EC plan would work. Diplomats are too wary of Mr A05 152 Milosevic’s inte ndicates that these bands may H06 168 be too wide, while the Retail Consortium a successes on the stage. Some actors are too worried to portray living politician special for me, although I haven’t been too worried about scoring as long as the

Appendices 167 97 m. And K27 105 young she was, back then. 98 112 about. We often say that someone is 99 their own father, whom G27 148 they were 100 have been born E05 47 around 1778, was

Too young maybe. Half done. She awoke K too young for his beard - he’ll K21 113 too young to remember. She also wanted too young to have been his pupil. But t

(3) Concordance lines for too in CLEC 1 ce.” In a short word, academic degree is too academic and can only be academics 2 time to do it again. Anymore , if we are too anxious to come to our goal, we may 3 o search him up and down. If you are not too arrogant, you will likely find him 4 meeting during these years. Because I am too bad in sports, I am afraid to lose 5 front of e .Go! At last I got NO. 7. Not too bad I thought. Beijing Beijing, the 6 e neighbour could hear? Everyone is much too bright to do that. On the other han 7 tter from my parents they said they were too bust to go home and to celebrate my 8 always like to visit Jessy, but as I was too busy and as I was gradually used to 9 e will do some homework for me when I am too busy or too lazy. I will buy the ti 10 e railway station. But you haste and are too careless to take something importan 11 iday , everyone was happy. This year was too cold. All the eople walk in the str 12 get the answer. In my opinion, they are too common to solve; however, so long a 13 ictims. In New York, as the prison being too crowded, many criminals are freed s 14 the student may consider the teacher is too cruel. The best way to give away th 15 and went over the knowledges . There are too difficult. I was often questione to 16 friend, you will help him when it is not too difficult. But if you think some on 17 ok, sweep and do other things . It seems too difficult. But once you do it skill 18 ss. If we could do it really , it is not too difficulty to study well. Teachers 19 st mustn’t be trampled and Peter made me too disappointed. As the dean was tired 20 ous, you want finish it fast. But you’re too eager to keep you mind on paper. Yo 21 meanings in it. The first is people are too eager to make success, the second i 22 It often can be seen that someone is too eager to do things ahead , but they 23 sh which was tought in middle school was too easy. I was obliged to study it sim 24 s we are very careful, and we don’t have too excessive exercise, sports alway do 25 deed, but playing late into the night is too excessive. June 14, 1997. Sunny. To 26 d not have sympathized.” The peasant was too foolish to help the snake. But, he 27 grandpa, when I saw his grey eyes, I was too frightened and I began to cry. ‘Don 28 I have bought a very nice clothes . So I too happy. After some time, I have alre 29 er with its feet. However, the tiger was too happy. because it thought that the 30 nt job is lower paid or their bosses are too hard to get along with. As I think 31 ke dough, which shouldn’t be too soft or too hard. Then shape the dough into sli 32 t break the laws, for the price would be too high. In such a social invironment 33 e scientists said that its temperture is too high to live there,” he say . “Can’ 34 too fast, and the price of the house is too high. So many people can’t afford t 35 season of the year. The weather neither too hot nor too cold. The sky is blue a 36 ou try to, you will failed, because it’s too hot. It’s the same question when we 37 anuary.In spring, the weather is neither too hot or too cold. Grass begins to gr 38 .. when I rode on my bike at last, I was too hurry to break my bike, so you can 39 r letters must be beautiful. Practice is too important. If we want to be a succe 40 al In my opinion, they are fool They are too kind to all of the people, includin 41 all, the number of Tsinghua students is too large. There are few words which ar 42 firstly, the population of China becomes too large, and the government can not a 43 tion. But I’ll join it. I think it isn’t too late. Farther more, wether should I 44 e those criminals “Pull back before it’s too late.” (t1-4) There’s an old Chines 45 . But I have never seen it. Because it’s too late when I heard something about i 46 n they realize crime does not pay, it is too late. (t1-3) Nowadays, at every cor (Continued)

168 Appendices 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100

they dream of passing it. Then, it is he public. Why they always said that I’m asic knowledge of Chinese that I know is at’s more, the amount of my glossary are ugo was able to hear her cry. But that’s in the kitchen. “these new trousers are Mrs. A is a good singer but her voice is es can’t earn money because the price is s When I was still a child, I have heard a, the work-force is large and there are take part in social activites. However, ey are fond of their jobs or didn’t like rths.The reason leading to the result is ne. Besides, during the peaceful period, how clean the snow is! But it covers up a lot of problems. Will we take part in sed to each other. In a sense, there are s, around us. Social activities bring us too many benifits . But, activities are time to practise what I learn. There are ve healthy white teeth. Please don’t eat ed on a very low price. It seems we have he didn’t mean to lose the card and it’s The advantages of two-day weekends are us have no energy to study. We will have baly can’t run the end. Because you cost t like this weather, even more stay here husband was struck by Rebecca, which was and so forth, so we think that there is ealthy. Because most of them are contain solve this problem? Fresh water is never will do harm to the family and it may be at more fruit and vegetables, not to ear pers to London himself, but the trip was the children. The children always spend early age from heart illness. Not to eat anasia when I become very old and suffer lease othetr’s pain? It has already been protect themselves any longer. However, portant to us. People in the western eat st the two men. Because hey seemed to be men coming from London. And they looked people from suffering incurably ill and e some do). If a war comes when they get he wasn’t able to keep her job for she’s xam. On the other hand, my physical base e too powerful, The darkmen’s science is to read what’s on the text books. He is mpossible. Because my winter holiday was water to make dough, which shouldn’t be bad.When I received my test paper, I was e university, I must admit my English is t the beginning of the passage, they are faster and faster, finally, the horse is

too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too too

late. So, even they work hard duri lazy, and my maths lack of hight sc limited. The question is I like Eng limited. How to improve them is my little. People seldom pay attention long,” he said, “they need shorteni loud, when she sings just a few met low. The price was pulled down by t many story about these kind men who many labors. In addition, like Brit many activities, on the other hand, many change in their usually daily many. The first one. After the worl many professional soldiers will cau many evils. The world does not appe many activities. We will put our en many things that are the results of many benifits . But, activities are many and will affect our study. aft many activities and lectures that t much fat and sugar foods . Because much water to use it up. In fact, t much for her to do so, she just ins much to be listed. In the two days, much social matters to do and too m much energy in the front of the 500 much time. But anyway this country much for Amelia to bear. Rebecca’s much water for us, thus we use and much flower, fat and sugar. People much for us all to use, so we must much for women to take a job as wel much sugar and fat is a real health much for him. So there would be two much time on watching TV. It is bad much potato crisps, potato chips, b much from some illness. I believe t much for them to kill, there is no much severity in punishment will le much fat, sugar, salt and do not ta nervous and were too anxious to lea nervous and were too anxious to lea old when themselves their families, old, what will be the result? They outstanding, too intelligent and sh poor to work out those problems. So poor to make it .” “OK!” Jack hit t prudent to have his own opinion. Wh short, it only had 11 days. And I h soft or too hard. Then shape the do supprised. It is too bad truely. Th terrible for me to go on studying i theoretical to some extent, especia tired to ride , if you doesn’t forc

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Index

adjective 2, 3, 6–12, 23–25, 27, 30, 34, 36, 42, 47–50, 52, 55, 57, 58, 66, 75, 76, 85, 87, 90–9, 101–21, 124, 125, 127, 129, 169, 170, 172, 174–6 amplifier 6, 9, 24, 25, 27, 28, 122, 169, 173 approximator 6, 8, 31, 54, 78 attitudinal meaning 1, 2, 9, 14, 39, 65, 83, 90, 93, 127 BNC(British National Corpus) 23, 173 booster 8, 24, 59, 60, 64, 69, 74, 89, 107–9, 111, 121 Chinese learner English 4, 22, 31, 33, 103–5, 116, 124 CIA (contrastive interlanguage analysis) 172 CLEC (Chinese Learner English Corpus) 22 colligation 2–4, 13, 14, 22, 28, 30, 34, 35, 57, 82, 86, 123, 126, 127, 176 collocation 1–4, 10, 13, 14, 16–22, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 32, 33, 35, 52, 53, 57, 82, 86, 100, 104, 119, 121–3, 126, 127, 129, 169, 173, 176, 177 compromiser 6, 31, 54, 59, 60, 78 contextual theory 29, 123 contrastive analysis 175 co-occur 1, 7, 13, 82, 97 co-selection 14, 30, 56, 69, 82, 83, 119, 120, 123, 127 data distribution 2–4, 31, 32, 35, 36, 43, 46, 48, 53, 123, 124, 127 degree 5–10, 21, 23–6, 32, 40, 43, 50, 55, 60, 78, 100, 102, 108, 113, 116, 120, 128, 129, 167, 169, 170, 173–5 diminisher 8, 31, 54, 59, 60, 78, 81, 89 double intensifier 42, 48 downtoner 6, 82, 116, 117

EUM (extended unit of meaning) 3, 14, 29, 30, 88, 119, 123, 126, 127, 129 FLOB (Freiburg-Lob Corpus of British English) 33, 35, 54–6, 60, 63, 65, 67–72, 72–7, 79–81, 88–101, 106–9, 113–17, 153, 159, 165 FROWN (Freiburg-Brown Corpus of American English) 32, 33, 35, 55, 56, 60, 61, 63, 65, 67–70, 72–5, 77–81, 88–101, 106–9, 113–15, 117, 151, 157, 163 idiom principle 18, 21, 56, 83, 123 idiosyncrasy 20 INT-adj. collocation (INT-adj.) 35, 52, 131 intensification 1, 2 5, 6 9, 10, 23–8, 63, 75, 76, 170, 174 intensifier 2–7, 9–11, 19, 24–6, 28, 30, 31, 39, 40–5, 47, 48, 51–4, 59, 60, 62, 64, 66, 69, 71, 73, 76, 77, 78, 81, 84, 87, 88, 90, 91, 100, 109, 113, 114, 117, 118, 124–7, 129, 175 KWIC (key word in context) 30 L1 transfer 21, 23, 28, 37, 50, 71, 76, 84, 85, 87, 122, 124, 125, 127 L2 acquisition 25, 50, 124 language learning 16, 19, 35, 86, 87, 128, 129, 169–72, 174 learner English 2–4, 10, 19, 21, 22, 25, 28, 30–3, 36, 43, 44, 46–8, 50, 51, 53–5, 57–9, 62, 63, 68, 69, 71–5, 77, 79, 81–7, 101, 103–5, 109–13, 116, 120, 122–5, 129, 137, 169, 171, 174 LOCNESS (Louvain Corpus of Native English Essays) 11, 22, 27, 32, 34–49, 52–4, 127, 130

180

Index

maximizer 24, 55, 59, 60, 82, 89–92, 94, 95, 97–100, 103, 105, 122 minimizer 31, 54, 59, 78 misuse 22, 67, 68, 70, 71, 77, 84, 85, 87, 122, 125

prefabricated chunk 16, 17, 18, 19, 82, 84

native English 2–4, 19, 21–3, 26, 27, 32, 48, 53–5, 57, 58, 60, 62, 63, 68, 69, 71, 73, 75, 79, 82–4, 86–8, 94, 106, 109–12, 120, 124, 125, 126, 129 NNS (Non-native speaker) 64, 170, 174 node word 20, 31, 51, 52, 57–60, 64, 66, 69, 82, 87, 90, 92, 94, 95, 97, 99, 100, 102, 103, 106–11 NS (native speaker) 17, 20, 21, 23, 2735, 36, 59, 104, 111, 122, 123, 127, 174

semantic preference 2–4, 13, 14, 28, 30, 35, 82, 86, 88, 94, 95, 98, 101–5, 108–13, 116, 118–20, 122, 123, 125, 126, 175 semantic prosody 2–4, 13–15, 28, 30, 35, 82, 86, 88, 91, 94, 95, 97–113, 115, 116, 118–20, 122, 123, 125–7, 129, 172, 175, 177 SF (standardized frequency) 37, 46–9

open-choice principle 18, 21, 83 overuse 21, 25–8, 36, 37, 39, 40, 42, 44, 46–8, 50, 60, 66–8, 70, 73, 77, 81, 83–6, 105, 109, 122–5, 127, 128 pattern 7, 13, 15, 16, 23, 29–31, 35, 40, 51–60, 62–6, 69, 71, 73–7, 79, 81–7, 108, 123, 124, 127, 172 pattern distribution 35, 83, 87 pattern grammar 29, 30, 31, 172 patterning feature 52 pedagogy 22, 31, 171 pos-tagged 3, 34, 127

qualitative 20, 106–12, 127 quantitative 4, 20, 107, 108–12, 127, 172

token 37, 39–43, 46, 47 type 6, 7, 21, 30, 33, 34, 37, 39–43, 48, 50, 61, 63, 86, 110, 124, 129, 142 underuse 21, 25–8, 36, 37, 39, 40, 42, 48, 50, 77, 81, 83, 85, 112, 124, 125, 127 variation 50, 54, 59, 66, 81, 82, 87, 124, 171, 172 WECCL (Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners 1.0) 33, 54–8, 65, 88, 89, 99, 100–4 Wordsmith 33, 34, 35