A Study on Structural and Semantic patterns of Wh-questions in English

Chapter 3 is the study about the mistakes that the students in Kinh Mon high school often make in using a wh-question.. SEMANTIC PATTERNS OF ENGLISH WH-QUESTIONS...28 Chapter 3: Errors

Wh-questions in English

Nguyễn Văn Cương

Trường Đại học KHXH&NV Luận văn ThS Chuyên ngành: English Linguistics; Mã số: 60 22 15

Người hướng dẫn: Assoc Prof Dr Vo Dai Quang

Năm bảo vệ: 2011

Abstract: The thesis entitled “A Study on structural and semantic patterns of

Wh-questions in English” is to analyze and illustrate the types of wh-Wh-questions and their semantic features This one is also to investigate the students' categories of mistakes when using wh-questions, find out the causes, suggest some possible solutions to these matters, and propose several pedagogical implications for the teachers at the research site This study is divided into three major sections The first one sets out the rationale of the study as well as the aims, the methodology and the design of the study The second section contains three chapters Chapter 1 offers the most relevant factors involving a wh-question such as notions of wh-wh-questions, wh-rhetorical wh-questions, operators, wh-words and their semantic features relating information structure, presupposition and theme and rheme Chapter 2 is to describe the types of wh-questions based on structures and discourse and the types of presuppositions in wh-questions Chapter 3 is the study about the mistakes that the students in Kinh Mon high school often make in using a wh-question The data were collected among 100 eleven grade students in Kinh Mon high school by means of questionnaires The findings highlighted students’ categories of mistakes including wrong use of wh-words, wrong use of operators, non-inversion failure and some other subtypes Through the findings, the author also assumes some causes of the mistakes and suggests some possible solutions in order to help students avoid committing these types of mistakes

Keywords: Tiếng Anh; Cấu trúc; Ngữ nghĩa; Ngữ pháp; Câu hỏi có từ hỏi

TABLE OF CONTENTS Page

Retention i

Acknowledgements ii

Abstract iii

Table of contents iv

List of tables vii

Part 1: Introduction 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Objectives of the study 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Methods of the study 3

6 Design of the study 3

Part 2: Development 4

Chapter 1 : Literature review 4

1.1 English questions .4

1.1.1 Definition of question 4

1.1.2 Definition of Wh-questions in English 5

1.1.2.1 Wh-information question 5

1.1.2.2 Wh-rhetorical questions 6

1.2 English operators 6

1.3 Question words 7

1.3.1 Wh-word functions 7

1.3.1.1 Wh-words as interrogative pronouns 7

1.3.1.2 Wh-words as determiners 10

1.3.1.3 Wh-words as adverbs 10

1.4 Given - New Information Structure 12

1.4.1 Given information 12

1.4.2 New information 12

1.4.3 Information structure 12

1.5 Theme -Rheme Structure 13

1.5 Theme- Rheme Structure in wh-questions 14

1.6 Presupposition 15

Chapter 2 : The structural and semantic patterns of English wh-questions .16

2.1 STRUCTURAL PATTERNS OF ENGLISH WH-QUESTIONS 16

2.1.1 Wh-words as subjects of the wh-questions 16

2.1.2 Non-subject wh-questions 18

2.1.3 Verb-oriented questions 19

2.1.4 Wh-questions with prepositions 20

2.1.5 Emphatic wh-questions .21

2.1.6 Negative structures in Wh- questions 21

2.1.7 Response questions 21

2.1.7.1 Short response questions 21

2.1.7.2 Wh-echo questions 22

2.1.8 Multiple wh-element Questions 23

2.1.9 Wh-rhetorical questions 24

2.1.10 Formulaic wh-questions 26

2.2 SEMANTIC PATTERNS OF ENGLISH WH-QUESTIONS 28

Chapter 3: Errors made by eleventh grade students in using wh-questions 31

3.1 Introduction 31

3.2.Setting 31

3.2.1 Setting of the study 31

3.2.2 Participants 31

3.3 Research instrument - Questionnaire 32

3.2.1 Objectives of the survey questionaire 32

3.2.2 The Survey questionnaire 32

3.4 Procedures 33

3.5 Findings 33

3.5.1 Wrong use of wh-word 35

3.5.2 Wrong use of operator 37

3.5.3 Non-inversion failure 39

3.5.4 Other types 40

3.6 The causes of Vietnamese students’ mistakes 41

3.7 Solutions to the problems 42

3.8 Summary of findings 43

PART 3: CONCLUSION 44

1 Conclusions 44

2 Implications of the study for teaching English wh-questions 45

3 Limitations of the study 45

4 Suggestions for further research 46

REFERENCES 47 APPENDIX I

The thesis entitled “A Study on structural and semantic patterns of

Wh-questions in English” is to analyze and illustrate the types of wh-Wh-questions and their semantic

features This one is also to investigate the students' categories of mistakes when using wh-questions, find out the causes, suggest some possible solutions to these matters, and propose several pedagogical implications for the teachers at the research site This study is divided into three major sections The first one sets out the rationale of the study as well as the aims, the methodology and the design of the study The second section contains three chapters Chapter 1 offers the most relevant factors involving a question such as notions of questions, wh-rhetorical questions, operators, wh-words and their semantic features relating information structure, presupposition and theme and rheme Chapter 2 is to describe the types of wh-questions based on structures and discourse and the types of presuppositions in wh-questions Chapter 3 is the study about the mistakes that the students in Kinh Mon high school often make in using a wh-question The data were collected among 100 eleven grade students in Kinh Mon high school by means of questionnaires The findings highlighted students’ categories of mistakes including wrong use of wh-words, wrong use of operators, non-inversion failure and some other subtypes Through the findings, the author also assumes some causes of the mistakes and suggests some possible solutions in order to help students avoid committing these types of mistakes

Part 1: Introduction

1 Rationale

It is undeniable that English has been an essential means of communication and more and more Vietnamese students are aware of the importance of English to their study and their future The ability to communicate clearly and efficiently in English contributes to the success of the learners at school and later in every phase of life However, the sad fact is that students’ English proficiency especially their ability to communicate in English orally does not really meet employers’ demand

At Kinh Mon High School, English is a compulsory subject in the curriculum and it is considered as a major subject for the high school examination It is taught with the purpose that students have some basic knowledge of English in order to communicate and to use it as a key to science and technology However, there still exist many difficulties facing the students They often keep quiet during speaking lessons; they mind speaking English There are many students who have good knowledge of grammar, can do reading and writing exercises wonderfully but they cannot express themselves in English and find it hard to make questions to discuss during the speaking lessons They often make mistakes in using the correct question words and in giving the right form of a wh-question

Besides making the discussion during a speaking lesson successful, questions also play an important role in our daily life We are not able to keep communicating going on well without asking questions We ask in order to exchange information, ideas, feeling and knowledge On the other hand, we sometimes ask questions not for the above purposes but for confirmation, refusal irony or reply avoidance It is undeniable that questions can not be missed in communication English wh-questions have long been the subject of the study of many researchers and linguists Each of them investigates some aspects of this type of questions Their study on English wh-questions have provided a great help for Vietnamese learners of English There are some MA thesis that pay attention to English Wh-questions Hoa N.T.X (1996) studies English questions in terms of S-P inversion Meanwhile, Ms Nguyet D.T.M (1996) pays her attention to the aspect of English questions concerning teachers' questions and politeness strategies And Tuyet L.T.A contrasts English wh-questions and their equivalents in Vietnamese in terms of syntactic, semantic and pragmatic features Especially there is also a Ph.D dissertation investigating English Wh-questions Quang V.D (2000) looks at contrative analysis of questions

in English and Vietnamese in terms of semantic and pragmatic features in his Ph.D project

Generally, such researchers mentioned above studied English wh-questions from different angles and mostly either focus on syntactic and semantic features of English Wh-questions or provide a theoretically general picture of wh-questions between the two languages, English and Vietnamese However, besides such certain contributions, there still exist some gaps that need dealing with

There are a lot of aspects concerning English wh-questions, however, in this paper the

author would like to devote all my interest in the structural and semantic patterns of

Wh-questions in English Then he would like to investigate the kinds of mistakes in using

wh-questions the students in Kinh Mon High School often make Basing on the findings, the author can make some suggestions in order to help the students to overcome these difficulties and make

questions fluently

2 Aims of the study

The aims of the study are to:

- help raise the students' awareness of structural and semantic features of English

wh-questions

- deepen the author's knowledge for the improvement of teaching English wh-questions to Vietnamese learners of English

3 Objectives of the study

The objectives of the study are to :

- examine the structural and semantic patterns of English Wh-questions

- identify some common errors and mistakes made by Vietnamese students and present some suggested solutions

The objectives of the study can be realized through the research questions:

1 What are the structural and semantic patterns of English wh-questions?

2 What categories of mistakes do the students in Kinh Mon High school often make in using English wh-questions?

3 What should be done to improve the students' skill in using English wh-questions?

It is hoped that the findings from this study will be of some benefits to teachers and students

at Kinh Mon high school

4 Scope of the study

The study on structural and semantic patterns of Wh-questions in English focuses on

English wh-questions from the perspectives of structural and semantic features There are two

types of wh-questions will be focused: wh-information questions and wh-rhetorical questions

The author also conducted a questionnaire to find out the mistakes made by Vietnamese students, and from these mistakes, some possible solutions to the problems identified

5 Methods of the study

A combination of different methods of analysis will be used in this study Firstly, the author applies the descriptive method to find out the structural and semantic patterns of the English wh-questions The study is conducted by carefully collecting materials from various sources to have full-blown information of English wh-questions Secondly, the author designs a questionaire in order to find out what categories of mistakes the studetnts often make when using wh-questions The students' errors and mistakes will be analized All comments, remarks, recommendations and conclusion are based on the data analysis

The sheets of questionaire will be collected randomly so that this research will help to gain reliable data and a close investigation into the problems that the students are encountering

6 Design of the study

This study is divided into three main parts:

- Part 1 is the Introduction of the study It includes the rationale for choosing the topic, the aims, the objectives, the scope, the methods and design of the study

- Part 2 contains three chapters, in which Chapter 1 provides readers some theoretical background on English questions in general, wh-words and their functions and the operators

and their functions in English question in brief Moreover, some basic terms ( such as given

and new information, theme and rheme, and presuppositions ) are also discussed Chapter 2 is

also the main part of the study, provides the detailed analysis of English wh-questions in term

of structural and semantic patterns of wh-questions in English Chapter 3 presents a small research of the author to find out some common mistakes made by Vietnamese students in using English wh-questions and to suggest some possible solutions

- Part 3 is the conclusion of the study It also gives some implication for teaching and learning wh-questions and some suggestions for further studies

Part 2: Development Chapter 1 : Literature review

This chapter deals with the relevant matters in wh-questions to help language leaners understand how to use English wh-questions effectively The relevant matters are:

- The operators and their functions

- Question words and how they are used

- Given and new information

- Theme and rheme in wh-questions

- Presuppositions

1.1 English questions

1.1.1 Definition of questions

1.1.2 Definition of Wh-questions in English

1.1.2.1 Wh-information questions

1.1.2.2 Wh-rhetorical questions

1.2 English operators

1.3 Question words

1.3.1 Wh-word functions

1.3.1.1 Wh-words as interrogative pronouns

1.3.1.2 Wh-words as determiners

1.3.1.3 Wh-word as adverbs

1.4 Given-New Information Structure

1.4.1 Given information

1.4.2 New information

1.4.3 Information structure

1.5.1 Theme-Rheme Structure

1.5.2 Theme and Rheme in wh-questions

1.6 Presupposition

Chapter 2 The structural and semantic patterns of English wh-questions

In the last chapter, the author has deeply discussed some relevant matters relating to English questions, in this chapter, the author would like to examine the structural pattern of the wh-questions in general and then he will thoroughly illustrate the use of wh-wh-questions in daily discourse and finally he will discuss some types of semantic features of the wh-questions - presuppositions

2.1 STRUCTURAL PATTERNS OF ENGLISH WH-QUESTIONS

2.1.1 Wh-words as subjects of the wh-questions

2.1.2 Non-subject wh-questions

2.1.3 Verb-oriented questions

2.1.4 Wh-questions with prepositions

2.1.5 Emphatic wh-questions

2.1.6 Negative structures in Wh- questions

2.1.7 Response questions

2.1.7.1 Short response questions

2.1.7.2 Wh-echo questions

2.1.8 Multiple wh-element Questions

2.1.9 Wh-rhetorical questions

2.1.10 Formulaic wh-questions

2.2 SEMANTIC PATTERNS OF ENGLISH WH-QUESTIONS

In the previous section, the author has discussed some types of wh-questions in terms of structure and discourse functions In the following part, the author would like to investigate the most prominent feature of wh-questions- the presuppositions Because of the focus of the study, I only discuss its semantic patterns in terms of persuppositions

These six types of presupposition can be brought together under the heading of potential presupposition which represents the whole In the discussion below, the author would like to discover how these six types of presuppositions appear in English wh-questions

The existential presupposition is assumed to be either in possessive constructions or in any

definite noun

The second type of presupposition is called factive presupposition since some words are used in

the sentences to denote facts such as know, realize, regret, glad, and aware