Tasks in Corpus Linguistics

Concordances provide us with real text examples. Each of them has been used by someone in an act of communication, and so they have a status which made-up examples do not have. Many people find it difficult to recognise the status of an actual example. They may argue that just having occurred does not mean that an utterance is typical or special in any way; and that is true - many if not most actual examples are so integrated into the language around them, and to other features of the situation that they may be of little value in the simple presentation of linguistic points. It is almost accidental that some stretches of text can be isolated from the language in which they occur and still make sense and show the patterns of language accurately. So it is not claimed that attestation in usage is a sufficient condition for a clear example, but only that it is a necessary one. The reason for this is that when someone is thinking about their language, rather than using it, they cannot control all the variables that would lead it to sound natural. For example, it is extremely difficult to invent the cohesive relations that a real sentence has with the surrounding text, when there is no surrounding text. So we do not know what makes an authentic example, but most fakes are easily spotted. Presumably many, if not most, of the choice patterns that govern natural utterances have not yet been discovered. Until they are, we should always study real data, taken from utterance or document.

1. Consider the sample of borrow (in this concordance file). It is taken from spoken data. Look at the word immediately to the left of borrow. What is the commonest word? What word class does it belong to?

Key to task 1.

2. Are there any other words of the same word class, either in this position or nearby? (To go back to the concordance file, click here)

Key to task 2.

3. What sort of meaning do these words have? Are there any other expressions of similar meaning? (To go back to the concordance file, click here)

Key to task 3.

4. Summarise your findings on the left of borrow. (Concordance file)

Key to task 4.

5. There are some instances left over. What do they have in common? If these patterns are representative of the language can you conclude anything about the usage of borrow from them?

Key to task 5.

6. Is the sentence People borrow books. typical of this sample? Compare it with lines 7 and 16. (Concordance file)

Key to task 6.

7. Now look at borrow in open text. Compare it with borrowed etc.

The complete key to these tasks.