Usage Effects on the Cognitive Routinization of Chinese Resultative Verbs

The present study adopts a corpus-oriented usage-based approach to the grammar of Chinese resultative verbs. Zooming in on a specific class of V-kai constructions, this paper aims to elucidate the effect of frequency in actual usage events on shaping the linguistic representations of resultative verbs. Specifically, it will be argued that while high token frequency results in more lexicalized V-kai complex verbs, high type frequency gives rise to more schematized V-kai constructions. The routinized patterns pertinent to V-kai resultative verbs varying in their extent of specificity and generality accordingly serve as a representative illustration of the continuum between lexicon and grammar that characterizes a usage-based conception of language

Semantic and pragmatic motivations for constructional preferences: a corpus-based study of provide, supply, and present

A select group of transfer verbs can enter into four different constructions: the ditransitive construction (He provided John the money), the prepositional-dative construction (He provided the money to John), a construction with a prepositional theme (He provided John with the money), and a construction with a recipient realized by a for-phrase (He provided the money for John). In this article, we take a close look at three such verbs: provide, supply, and present. Corpus analysis shows that these three verbs display different structural preferences with respect to the for-, to-, and with-patterns. To explain these preferences, the study investigates pragmatic principles (following Mukherjee 2001 on provide) and the role played by semantic factors. An examination of the semantics of the verbs and the lexically motivated constructional semantics of the to, for, and with-patterns shows (i) that the three constructions are not interchangeable, and (ii) that the preferential differences between the three verbs find an explanation in the compatibility between lexical and constructional semantics. The description is mainly based on data from the British National Corpus

Sygnalizowanie miejsc spornych w dyskursie sądowym. Analiza korpusowa wybranych rzeczowników występujących w orzeczeniach Sądu Najwyższego Stanów Zjednoczonych oraz Trybunału Konstytucyjnego w Polsce

This paper adopts a comparative, corpus-based perspective to examine the language of judicial justification. Based on substantial corpus data, the study explores one of the linguistics resources, i.e. head nouns (e.g. assumption, belief, notion, etc.) followed by a nominal complement in the form of that-clause in two comparable legal settings: the opinions given in the United States Supreme Court and the judgements handed down by Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal. The findings corroborate the results of previous research which shows that nouns found in this pattern are used to perform various discourse functions but evaluation plays a central role in judicial writing and these nouns are used to signal sites of contentions. The study reveals the general similarity between the two sets of data suggesting that American and Polish judicial writing is underpinned by essentially the same epistemological assumptions. Yet, there are some differences in the way the nouns behave phraseologically. Polish nouns tend to show less collocational variation and they are found performing fewer discourse functions. Niniejszy artykuł ukazuje próbę wykorzystania metodologii korpusowej w celu badania języka uzasadnien decyzji stosowania prawa. Przedmiotem analizy jest użycie grupy rzeczowników takich jak przypuszczenie, pogląd czy sugestia w konstrukcji przed spójnikiem that, a więc kontrolujących zdania podrzędne dopełnieniowe. Celem badania jest zbadanie funkcji jakie rzeczowniki w tej konstrukcji pełnią w dyskursie uzasadnień sądowych. Przyjęta hipoteza zakładała, że jedną z funkcji może być wartościowanie. Przedstawione w artykule wyniki potwierdzają, że sędziowie, zarówno amerykańscy jak i polscy, posługują się chętnie tego typu wyrażeniami w celu dokonania oceny argumentów zgłoszonych przez sędziów rozpatrujących sprawę w niższej instancji, strony procesowe, jak również innych sędziów spośród składu orzekającego. Bliższa analiza ukazuje również, iż rzeczowniki użyte w uzasadnieniach Trybunału Konstytucyjnego charakteryzują się mniejszym zróżnicowaniem kolokacyjnym oraz pełnią mniej funkcji w dyskursie niż ich angielskie odpowiedniki. 

Supporting collocation learning with a digital library

Extensive knowledge of collocations is a key factor that distinguishes learners from fluent native speakers. Such knowledge is difficult to acquire simply because there is so much of it. This paper describes a system that exploits the facilities offered by digital libraries to provide a rich collocation-learning environment. The design is based on three processes that have been identified as leading to lexical acquisition: noticing, retrieval and generation. Collocations are automatically identified in input documents using natural language processing techniques and used to enhance the presentation of the documents and also as the basis of exercises, produced under teacher control, that amplify students' collocation knowledge. The system uses a corpus of 1.3 B short phrases drawn from the web, from which 29 M collocations have been automatically identified. It also connects to examples garnered from the live web and the British National Corpus