Words and Phrases: Corpus Studies of Lexical Semantics

ISBN-13: 9780631208327 / Angielski / Twarda / 2001 / 288 str.

Michael Stubbs

Opis

This book fills a gap in studies of meaning by providing detailed case studies of attested corpus data on the meanings of words and phrases.

Recenzje

"This invaluable book places words and their phraseology at the centre of an account of language that covers meaning, discourse, culture, and much more. The author successfully demystifies his own discovery processes, providing the reader with tools for further investigation. The book′s clarity and depth make it indispensable for students and researchers alike." Susan Hunston, University of Birmingham

"Stubbs does a great job of demonstrating the use of corpus techniques for the analysis of lexical semantics. He shows that it is indeed possible to analyse meaning by looking at corpus data, and that the way meaning is constructed through repeated patterns of usage can only be investigated by doing so. His style is very explicit, and his prose is easily readable. I well definitely be using this book in my seminars next term." Oliver Mason, Literary and Linguistic Computing

Spis treści

Figures, Concordances and Tables xi

Acknowledgements xii

Data Conventions and Terminology xiv

Notes on Corpus Data and Software xvi

Part I Introduction 1

1 Words in Use: Introductory Examples 3

1.1 Text and Discourse: Some Distinctions 5

1.2 Language, Action, Knowledge and Situation 6

1.3 Words and Expectations 7

1.4 Language, Logic and Truth 8

1.5 Common–sense Knowledge 9

1.6 Linguistic Conventions 11

1.7 Possible and Actual 13

1.8 Summary and Implications 19

1.9 Background and Further Reading 21

1.10 Topics for Further Study

2 Words, Phrases and Meanings: Basic Concepts 24

2.1 Terminology 24

2.2 Words: Word–forms and Lemmas 25

2.3 Collection 29

2.4 Words and Units of Meaning 30

2.5 Delexicalization 32

2.6 Denotion and Connection 34

2.7 Relational Lexical Semantics 35

2.8 Frequent Lexical Semantics 35

2.9 Two Examples 43

2.10 Summary and Implications 49

2.11 Background and Further Reading 50

2.12 Topics for Further Study

Part II Case Studies 55

3 Words in Phrases 1: Concepts, Data and Methods 57

3.1 Background 57

3.2 Communicative Competence 60

3.3 Corpus Methods: Observing Patterns 61

3.4 Terminology 62

3.5 Corpus, Concordance, Data–base 66

3.6 The Cobuild Collections Data–base on CD–ROM 67

3.7 Data for Semantics and Pragmatics 71

3.8 Summary and Implications 72

3.9 Appendix 1: Measures of Statistical Significance 73

3.10 Appendix 2: Further Notes on the Data–Base 75

3.11 Background and Further Reading 77

3.12 Topics for Further Study 78

4 Words in Phrases 2: A Case Study of the Phraseology of English 80

4.1 Frequency of Phraseological Units 80

4.2 Strength of Attraction: word–forms, Lemmas, and Lexical Sets 81

4.3 Lexical Profiles: Comprehensive Coverage of data 84

4.4 A Model of Extended Lexical Units 87

4.5 Summary and Implications 96

4.6 Background and Further Reading 97

4.7 Topics for Further Study 97

5 Words in Texts 1: Words, Phrases and Text Cohesion 100

5.1 Words and Co–text 100

5.2 Routine and Creativity 101

5.3 Variable Phrases and Textual Cohesion 102

5.4 Antonyms and Synonyms 103

5.5 Discourse Prosodies 105

5.6 Lexical Cohesion: Textual Examples 108

5.7 Collocations and Coherence 117

5.8 Summary and Implications 120

5.9 Background and Further reading 121

5.10 Topics for Further Reading 122

6 Words in Texts 2: A Case Study of a Short Story 123

6.1 Public Data and Replicable Experiments 123

6.2 Lexis and Text Structure 124

6.3 Analysis 1: Frequency Statistics 126

6.4 Analysis 2: Frequency Statistics (Keywords) 129

6.5 Analysis 3: Frequency Statistics (Order of Occurrence) 130

6.6 Analysis 4: A Vocabulary Management Profile 133

6.7 A Further Note on Replication 140

6.8 Limitations on the Analyses 141

6.9 Summary and Implications 142

6.10 Background and Further Reading 144

6.11 Topics for Further Study 144

7 Words in Culture 1: Case Studies of Cultural Keywords 145

7.1 Data and Citation Conventions 146

7.2 Text and Discourse 147

7.3 Case Study 1: ETHNIC, RACIAL, and TRIBAL 147

7.4 Case Study 2: HERITAGE and CARE 149

7.5 Case Study 3: PROPER STANDARDS 154

7.6 Case Study 4: Little Red Riding Hood 161

7.7 Discursive Formations 164

7.8 Summary and Implications 166

7.9 Background and Further Reading 168

7.10 Topics for Further Study 168

8 Words in Culture 2: Case Studies of Loan Words in English 170

8.1 Data 170

8.2 The Etymological Fallacy 171

8.3 Language Change 173

8.4 Terminology 174

8.5 Words, Politics and National Stereotypes 175

8.6 Fields of Knowledge and Text– Types 177

8.7 A Case Study of German Loan Words in English 178

8.8 Frequency in the Vocabulary versus Frequency in Texts 184

8.9 False Friends: Flak, Blitz and Angst 185

8.10 The OED and Cultural Keywords 188

8.11 A Further Note on Vocabulary and Text 190

8.12 Summary and Implications 192

8.13 Background and Further Readings 192

8.14 Topics for Further Study 193

PART III Implications 195

9 Words, Phrases and Connotations: On Lexico–grammer and Evaluative Language 197

9.1 Connotations 197

9.2 Verbs, Discourse Prosodies and Point of View 198

9.3 A Lexico–syntactic Example: MAKE one s way somewhere 206

9.4 A Note on Syntax 210

9.5 A Cognitive View 210

9.6 A Syntactic Example: BE–passives and GET–passives 211

9.7 Summary and Implications 215

9.8 Background and Further reading 216

9.9 Topics for Further Study 218

10 Data and Dualisms: On Corpus Methods and Pluralists Models 220

10.1 Principles 220

10.2 Problems? 221

10.3 Dualism and Monisms 226

10.4 Pluralist Positions 232

10.5 Brute and Institutional Facts 232

10.6 Physical, Psychological and Social 234

10.7 Worlds 1, 2, and 3 236

10.8 A Pluralist Model 238

10.9 Performance Data, Corpora and Routine Behavior 239

10.10 Summary and Implications 242

10.11 Background and Further Reading 244

10.12 References 245

10.13 Name Index 259

10.14 Subject Index 263 

 

O autorze

Michael Stubbs is Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Trier in Germany. He was Chair of BAAL (the British Association for Applied Linguistics) from 1988 to 1991. He has published widely on language in education, on text and discourse analysis, and on corpus linguistics. His previous books include Discourse Analysis (Blackwell 1983), Educational Linguistics (Blackwell 1986), and Text and Corpus Analysis (Blackwell 1996).

Blurb

This book fills a gap in studies of meaning by providing detailed case studies of attested corpus data on the meanings of words and phrases. It places lexis and phraseology at the centre of semantics and pragmatics.

Words and Phrases starts from traditional concepts of lexical semantics, including meaning as use, denotation and connotation, lexical field, sense relations, phraseology and collocation. It also uses innovative corpus data to explore these concepts with an exciting new technology.

The main chapters are detailed case studies of words in collocations, words in texts and words in culture. Concluding chapters discuss the implications of corpus analysis for linguistic theory, especially lexico–grammar and theories of competence and performance.