Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T23:13:56.507Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Stretched verb collocations with give: their use and translation into Spanish using the BNC and CREA corpora

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2010

Silvia Molina-Plaza  and
Eduardo de Gregorio-Godeo
Silvia Molina-Plaza*
Affiliation:
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros Navales, Arco de la Victoria s/n, 28040 Madrid, Spain (email: Silvia.Molina@upm.es)
Eduardo de Gregorio-Godeo*
Affiliation:
Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, Departamento de Filología Moderna, Facultad de Letras, Avda. Camilo José Cela s/n 13071 Ciudad Real, Spain (email: Eduardo.Gregorio@uclm.es)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Within the context of on-going research,1 this paper explores the pedagogical implications of contrastive analyses of multiword units in English and Spanish based on electronic corpora as a CALL resource. The main tenets of collocations from a contrastive perspective – and the points of contact and departure between both languages – are discussed prior to examining the commonest types of verb + noun combinations as a significant case of so-called ‘de-lexicalized’, ‘light’, ‘empty’, ‘thin’, ‘stretched’ or ‘support verbs’. A qualitatively and quantitatively-oriented case study is accordingly conducted, determining the weight of dar in support verb constructions within the Corpus de Referencia del Español Actual (CREA) and of the English equivalent stretched verb constructions with give within the British National Corpus (BNC). Based on the empirical data obtained in this way, this paper provides relevant insights for more accurate translations, helping to enhance the collocational competence of L2 students, who tend to avoid constructions including empty verbs like give in favour of full-verb forms. The detailed findings in this paper come to shed light on the potential of CALL resources for improving the collocational usage of foreign-language learners, as quantitative and qualitative comparisons of collocations based on electronic corpora serve to highlight the similarities and, more importantly, the lexical and typological differences between both languages, thereby substantiating the invaluable role that corpus analysis may play for language teaching in general and for collocational knowledge and proficiency in particular.

Keywords

Collocationsstretched verbstranslationphraseologyCALL
Type
Regular papers
Information
ReCALL , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , May 2010 , pp. 191 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © European Association for Computer Assisted Language Learning 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aijmer, K. (ed.) (2009) Corpora and language teaching. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alba-Salas, J. (2002) Light verb constructions in Romance: a syntactic analysis. Ph.D. thesis, Cornell University.Google Scholar
Allerton, D. J. (2002) Stretched verb constructions in English. London/New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Bahns, J. (1993) Lexical collocations: a contrastive view. ELT Journal, 47(1): 56–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bank of English. http://www.collins.co.uk/books.aspx?group=153Google Scholar
Beatty, K. (2003) Computers in the language classroom. In: Nunan, D. (ed.) Practical English language teaching. Boston: McGraw Hill, 247–266.Google Scholar
Beckett, G. H.Millers, P. C. (2006) Project-based second and foreign language education: past, present and future. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.Google Scholar
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S.Finegan, E. (1999) Longman grammar of spoken and written English. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Blake, R. (2001) What language professionals need to know about technology. ADFL Bulletin, 32(3) [Chairing the foreign language and literature department, part 2]: 93–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
BNC (British National Corpus, Sampler, XML version) (2005) [Distributed by Oxford University Computing Services on behalf of the BNC Consortium]. http://www.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/Google Scholar
Campoy, M. C. (2004) Computer mediated lexicography: an insight into online dictionaries. In: Campoy, M. C. and Safont, P. (eds.) Computer-mediated lexicography in the foreign language learning context. Castelló de la Plana: Universitat Jaume I, 47–72.Google Scholar
Chapelle, C. A. (2001) Computer applications in second language acquisition: foundations for teaching, testing and research. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cowie, A.Mackin, R. (1993) Oxford dictionary of phrasal verbs. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Cowie, A. (2004) Phraseology – The Hornby legacy. In: Williams, G. and Vessier, S. (eds.) Proceedings of the eleventh EURALEX International Congress, Vol. 1. Lorient: Université de Bretagne-Sud, 37–52.Google Scholar
CREA (Corpus de referencia del español actual). http://www.rae.es.Google Scholar
Davies, G. D. (2002) ICT and modern foreign languages: learning opportunities and training needs. International Journal of English Studies, 2(1) monograph issue.Google Scholar
de Schryver, M. (2003) Lexicographers’ dreams in the electronic-dictionary. International Journal of Lexicography, 16(2): 143–199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Egbert, J. L. (2005) Conducting research on CALL. In: Egbert, J. L. and Petrie, G. M. (eds.) CALL research perspectives. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 3–8.Google Scholar
Gabrielatos, C. (2005) Corpora and language teaching: just a fling, or wedding bells? TESL-EJ, 8(4) [A1]: 1–37.Google Scholar
Godwin-Jones, R. (2000) Emerging technologies: Literacies and technology tools/trends. Language Learning & Technology, 4(2): 11–18.Google Scholar
Godwin-Jones, R. (2005) Messaging, gaming, peer-to-peer sharing: language learning strategies & tools for the millenial generation. Language Learning and Teaching, 9(1): 17–22.Google Scholar
Gries, S. (2008) Phraseology and linguistic theory: a brief survey. In: Granger, S. and Meunier, F. (eds.) Phraseology. An interdisciplinary perspective. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 3–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hanson-Smith, E. (ed.) (2000) Technology-enhanced learning environments. Alexandria, VA: TESOL.Google Scholar
Hanson-Smith, E. (2004) Computer-assisted language learning. In: Carter, R. and Nunan, D. (eds.) The Cambridge guide to teaching English to speakers of other languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 107–113.Google Scholar
Hornero, A. M., Luzón, M. J.Murillo, S. (eds.) (2006) Corpus linguistics. Applications for the study of English. Bern, Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Oxford, Wien: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Jeong-Bae, S. (ed.) (2004) Computer-assisted language learning: concepts, contexts and practices. New York: APACALL.Google Scholar
Jespersen, O. (1942) A modern English grammar on historical principles, VI. Copenhagen: Ejnar Munsgaard/London: Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Johnson, K.Johnson, H. (1999) Encyclopedic dictionary of applied linguistics. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Kearns, K (2002) Light verbs in English. http://www.ling.canterbury.ac.nz/kate/lightverbs.pdfGoogle Scholar
Kern, R. (2006) Perspectives on technology in learning and teaching languages. TESOL-Quarterly, 40: 183–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koike, K. (2001) Colocaciones léxicas en el español actual: estudio formal y léxico-semántico. Alcalá de Henares: Universidad de Alcalá.Google Scholar
Levy, M. (1997) Computer-assisted language learning: context and conceptualization. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
López, M.Campoy, M. C. (2003) User guides in computer-mediated dictionaries. In: Posteguillo, S., Ortells, E., Prado, J. R., Bolaños, A. and Alcina, A. (eds.) Internet in linguistics, translation and literary studies. Castelló de la Plana: Universitat Jaume I Publicaciones, 439–452.Google Scholar
Luzón, M. J. (1999) Dictionary websites: transforming and adding value to the dictionary. In: Campoy, M. C and Safont, P. (eds.) Computer-mediated lexicography in the foreign language learning context. Castelló de la Plana: Universitat Jaume I, 73–94.Google Scholar
McCarthy, M. (1990) Vocabulary. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mel’čuk, I. (1993) La phraséologie et son rôle dans l’enseignement/apprentissage d’une langue étrangère. Études de linguistique appliqué, 92: 82–113.Google Scholar
Mills, D. (2000) Enthusiasm, experience and collaboration: technology in the IEI at UIUC. In: Hanson-Smith, E. (ed.) Technology-enhanced learning environments. Alexandria, VA: TESOL.Google Scholar
Moliner, M. (2000) Diccionario de uso del español. Madrid: Gredos.Google Scholar
Moon, R. (1998) Fixed expressions and idioms in English: a corpus-based approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nation, I. S. P. (2001) Learning vocabulary in another language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nattinger, J.de Carrico, J. (1992) Lexical phrases and language teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Oster, U., Ruiz Madrid, M. N.Sanz Gil, M. (eds.) (2006) Towards the Integration of the ICT in Language Learning and Teaching: Reflection and Experience. Castelló de la Plana: Servei de Publicacións de la Universitat Jaume I.Google Scholar
Ruiz-Madrid, N. (2007) Integration of the ICT in language learning. In: Usó-Juan, E. and Ruiz-Madrid, N. (eds.) Pedagogical reflections on learning languages in instructed settings. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 62–93.Google Scholar
Sinclair, J. (1990) (Editor-in-Chief) Collins COBUILD English Grammar. London: Collins.Google Scholar
Sinclair, J. (1997) Corpus evidence in language description. In: Wichmann, A., Fligelstone, S., McEnery, T. and Knowles, G. (eds.) Teaching and Language Corpora. London/New York: Longman, 27–39.Google Scholar
Sobkowiak, W. (1999) Pronunciation in EFL machine-readable dictionaries. Poznan: Motivex.Google Scholar
Smith, D.Baber, E. (eds.) (2005) Teaching English with information technology. London: Modern English Publishing Ltd.Google Scholar
Sokolik, M. (2001) Computers in language teaching. In: Celce-Murcia, M. (ed.) Teaching English as a foreign or second language. Boston, MA: Heinle & Heinle – Thomson Learning, 477–488.Google Scholar
Szendeffy, J. de (2005) A practical guide to using computers in language teaching. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, G.Hunston, S. (2000) Evaluation: an introduction. In: Hunston, S. and Thompson, G. (eds.) Evaluation in text. Authorial stance and the construction of discourse. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Tirkkonen-Condit, S. (2002) Process research: state of the art and where to go next? In: Tirkkonen-Condit, S. (ed.) Across languages and cultures 3(1): 5–19 [Joensuu: University of Joensuu, Savonlinna School of Translation Studies].Google Scholar
Ueda, H. (1989) Estudio cuantitativo del léxico español. Tokyo: Publicaciones del Dpto. de. Idiomas Extranjeros, Univ. de Tokio.Google Scholar
Warschauer, M. (2001) On-line communication. In: Carter, R. and Nunan, D. (eds.) The Cambridge guide to teaching English to speakers of other languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 207–212.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Warschauer, M.Kern, R. (2000) Network-based language teaching: computers and practice. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wierzbicka, A. (1982) Why can you have a drink when you can’t *have an eat? Language, 58(4): 753–799.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilkins, D. A. (1976) Notional syllabuses: A taxonomy and its relevance to foreign language curriculum. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wray, A. (2002) Formulaic language and the lexicon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar