LV A STUDY OF SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF MOTION VERBS IN ENGLISH AND THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

1.2 SCOPE OF THE STUDY The research does not focus on all the motion verbs in English and Vietnamese but on 5 commonly used verbs in English come, arrive, leave, run , walk, and their e

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 RATIONALE

Perhaps verbs occur in English sentence as the most important critical component of sentence meaning and completeness It denotes the notion of process, action or activity and also has a temporal component (tense) There are also verbs which have some intrinsic spatial meaning These include motion verbs and existence verbs

Motion verbs are ones of the verbs that posses the biggest quantity of meanings and highest used frequency in English In the book “Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English” by Quirk [47, p.365], we have found it useful to classify verbs into seven major semantic domains, in which activity verbs(or motion verbs) are the most common verbs In the distribution

of semantic domains, the most common verbs (i.e verbs that occur at least 50 times per million words) are far from evenly distributed across the seven semantic domains 50% of all common verbs are activity verbs (139 out of

218 common verbs) They occur almost in conversation, fiction, news and academic prose Overall, activity verbs (or motion verbs) occur much more commonly than verbs from any other semantic domain

In the book “Word Frequencies in Written and Spoken English”( based

on the British National Corpus) by Leech [39,p.215], motion verbs are considered as the most common ones with high frequency However, motion verbs are kinds of fairly complicated words For Vietnamese students,

the differences in two languages cause a lot of difficulties in using words

They may feel confused when encountering such verbs or may not use them

effectively For example, in English we say “I will go to Hanoi, tomorrow”,

although speaker can stay at any position But in Vietnamese we can say

“Ngày mai tôi sẽ đi Hà Nội”, “Ngày mai tôi sẽ ra Hà Nội”, “Ngày mai tôi sẽ về

Hà Nội” When we say “Ra, đi and về” in English, we can use “ go” to express

our thought But in Vietnamese, “Ra” is used when speaker is staying or living in the South or Middle land , “về” is used when speaker has fatherland

is Hanoi Therefore, “go” in English can be translated into Vietnamese “ Ra,

đi and về”.Or to express “ Anh ta đi lảo đảo như người say”, in English it is

said “he was staggering along as if drunk” but in Vietnamese for English

learners at the beginning stage of efficiency will use the structure “Go +

adverbial phrase of manner” to describe the motion Thus, English learners, especially Vietnamese students find it very difficult when they meet such cases in their communication and studying

From the examples above, we can see that there must be semantic and syntactic differences in motion verbs uses in English and Vietnamese The difficulties that Vietnamese learners may meet are not only in semantic form but in syntactic form as well Moreover, motion verbs occur frequently They are popularly used Therefore, I would like to choose motion verbs as my study to help learners use these verbs effectively

1.2 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The research does not focus on all the motion verbs in English and

Vietnamese but on 5 commonly used verbs in English come, arrive, leave, run , walk, and their equivalent expressions in Vietnamese đến, tới, rời khỏi , chạy, đi bộ Due to time, length limit of the thesis and the ability of our own,

the paper is just intended to investigate the syntactic and semantic features of these verbs

1.3 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The thesis is designed to study the syntactic and semantic characteristics of motion verbs in English and Vietnamese In order to do this, the following theoretical and practical matters are taken into considerration in this thesis: how English motion verbs are classified , what the commonly used English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents are and how these kinds of verbs are used in different types of discourses From this, the thesis analyzes the syntactic and semantic features of the English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents In practice, the study aims to supply some implications to language teaching, language learning as well as in translating the English motion verbs The practical information is hoped to raise the language users’ awareness of the differences between the two languages in terms of motion verbs uses so that they can be successful in language communication in English

1.4 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

1.4.1 Aims

The study is expected to provide Vietnamese learners with a description of syntactic and semantic characteristics of English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents

1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

The studies try to answer the following questions :

1 What are the syntactic and semantic features of the motion verbs in

English and their Vietnamese equivalents in novels and short stories ?

2 What are the similarities and differences between English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents ?

3 What are the implications for teaching, learning and translating English motion verbs ?

1.6 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY

The thesis is divided into five chapters as follows

Chapter 1, the Introduction, which includes the rationale, the scope of the study, the aims and objectives, purpose of the study, research questions and organization of the study Chapter 2 briefly reviews previous research works related to the topic and presents the theoretical background of the study

Chapter 3 presents the methods of collecting and analyzing data Chapter 4, Findings and Discussion which studies the syntactic and semantic features of English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents

The last chapter summarizes the results of the tasks done in Chapter 4 This part also provides some implications for teaching and learning English motion verbs and some suggestions for further research

CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 PREVIOUS RESEARCH WORKS

Motion verbs have been the subject of several studies by linguists because they present particularly interesting syntactic and semantic characteristics In particular, even if that are often considered as being a coherent semantic class, we can find verbs displaying different semantic features and syntactic behavior

Many linguists have done researches into this linguistic field In

“ Semantic Structures”, Jackendoff [35] presents some verbs of manner of motion and configuration “A New Approach to English Grammar on Semantic Principles” by Dixon [24] mentions seven subtypes of motion: the RUN subtype which refers to a mode of motion, the ARRIVE subtype which deals with respect to a definite Locus, the TAKE subtype which refers to causing something to be in motion with respect to a Locus, the FOLLOW subtype refers to motion with respect to something which is moving, the CARRY subtype refers to motion in juxtaposition with some moving object, the THROW subtype which describes causing something to be in motion , and the DROP subtype which refers to unwanted motion

Brala Maria [15] in “Location in Motion” supply us with some information about verbs of motion She mentions that verbs of motion include 9 classes: Inherently directed motion, Leave verbs, Manner of motion, Manner of motion using a vehicle, Waltz verbs, Chase verbs and Accompany verbs

Levin, B.[42] classifies verbs of motion into two sub-classes : verbs of inherently directed motion, and verbs of manner of motion

In Vietnamese, there are a number of linguists interested in motion verbs Hà Quang Năng [7] not only mentions motion verbs with different forms of movement ( chạy, nhảy, bò, bay, đi, leo, trỉo, trườn, lí, bơi ) but also talks about a group of motion verbs with particular semantic and syntactic features, they are motion verbs with direction: ra, văo, lín, xuống, qua, lại, về, đến, tới For Hữu Đạt , Trần Trí Dõi , Đào Thanh Lan [3] present that motion verbs are the ones expressing movement in space such as;

đi, chạy, bò, leo, trỉo, and motion verbs with the direction of movement such as ra, văo, lín, xuống, qua, lại, về, đến, tới Besides, the matter has been discussed by Nguyễn Kim Thản [10] with a special group of motion words with direction: ra, văo, lín, xuống, qua, lại, về, đến, tới Nguyễn Văn Thành [11] with verbs with movement meaning such as: ra, văo, lín, xuống, qua, lại,

về, đến, tới, đi, chạy, bò, leo, trỉo, or Nguyễn Lai [6] with words denoting direction of movement in Vietnamese According to him, in modern Vietnamese, words denoting motion are of great interest because of their theoretical and practical values.Words expressing motion are verbs themselves (Nam ra sđn) or they have another functions beside verbs (Nam nhìn ra sđn )

There also have been many researches that focus on verb groups Trần Thị Phước Hạnh [2002] analyzed the semantic and syntactic features of four

English verbs such as say, tell, speak and talk and their Vietnamese

equivalents Đinh Thị Diệp Thảo [2002] studied verbs denoting existential process in English and Vietnamese Causative verbs in English and Vietnamese are studied by Lương Kim Thư [2003] Nguyễn Thị Hồng Đức [2005]with English spatial verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents in the light

of cognitive grammar Lê Thị Tuyết Hoa [2005] investigated motion verbs However, she mainly focused on linguistic and cultural characteristics of the verb “To Go” not all the motion verbs

2.2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

In order to solve the question of meaning , it is very necessary to get the basic information given by semantics as well as its detailed questions such as semantics, meaning, components of word meaning, semantics features, meaning relations, semantic field, componential analysis, syntactic features of motion verb, semantic roles, grammartical roles and syntactic relations

2.2.1 Semantic Features

2.2.1.1 Semantics

In general, semantics can be defined as the study of meaning It is central to the study of communication In addition, there is no doubt that communication is a crucial factor in our life, which is why the need to understand semantics becomes more and more pressing

Many authors hold the idea that semantics is the meaning place of various cross current thinking and various disciplines of the study Philosophy, psychology and linguistics all claim a deep interest in semantics, but their interests are diverse because of their different starting points

According to John Lyons [43,p.xii], semantics is by definition the study

of meaning, and linguistic semantics is the study of meaning in so far as it is systematically encoded in the vocabulary and grammar of natural languages This definition of linguistic semantics, as far as it goes, is relatively uncontroversial But it is also almost wholly uninformative unless and until one goes on to say, first, what one means by “meaning” and, second, what exactly is meant by “encoded” in this context He also adds that those who

draw a terminological distinction between “semantics” and “pragmatics” and take narrower view of meaning than he does will see his book as introduction

to a broader field of linguistic semantics and pragmatics

But Jack Richards, John Platt, Heidi Weber [52,p.172] say “ the study

of meaning is called semantics Semantics is usually concerned with the analysis of the meaning of words, phrases, or sentences, and sometimes with the meaning of utterances in discourse or the meaning of a whole text ”

In order to make a thorough study of meaning, we have to understand other concepts such as meaning, components of word meaning, semantic features, componential analysis and so on

2.2.1.2 Meaning

Meaning plays an important part in communication Meaningless utterances have no value in communication; they can only make their language user a laughing stock, which is why understanding the meaning is very important for the language user It is not easy to identify the meaning expressed by a word or but an utterance because it depends on many factors

concerned For example, the word “spring’ could have different meanings in

the following sentences :

He was born in the spring of 1944 (spring here means the season

between winter and summer)

She is full of energy, like a coiled spring (spring here means a twisted

piece of metal that can be pushed, pressed or pulled but which always returned

to its original shape or position afterwards

There is a mountain spring near here (spring here means a place where

water comes naturally to the surface from the ground)

Where on earth did you spring from? (spring here means to appear

suddenly unexpectedly from a particular place)

According to Lesley Jeffries [37,p.3] meaning is a kind of invisible unclothed being waiting for the clothes of language to allow it to be seen, which is why it is very necessary to take off the clothes of language to understand the real meaning of words, phrases, and sentences e.g.,” the red

flag at the seaside of a resort” means “danger”

Through this example, a conclusion can be drawn that the meaning of the word is not all the time decided by itself but its relation with the others That is why John Lyons [43,p.4] states that the noun “meaning” and the verb

“mean”, from which it is derived, are used, like many other English words, in

a wide range of contexts and in several distinguishable senses

The idea of meaning given by David Crystal [23,p.102] is as follows: ”In modern linguistics, meaning is studied by making detailed analysis of the way words and sentences are used in a specific context It is an approach shared by several philosophers and psychologist.”

And David Crystal [23,p.247] also states: “Meaning is a basic notion used in language study in two main ways First determining the signification

of a message is the chief end of linguistic enquiry: above all, language is concerned with the communication of meaning Second, meaning is used as a way of analyzing the structure of language, through such notions a contractiveness and distinctiveness.”

2.2.1.3 Components of word-meaning

In the study of meaning, the denotational meaning and connotational meaning cannot be avoided The meanings are defined in the Longman Dictionary of Applied Linguistics [52] as follows:

a Denotation is a part of the meaning of a word or phrase that relates it

to phenomena in the real world or in a fictional or possible world For

example, the denotation of the English word bird is a two-legged, winged,

egg-laying, warm-blooded creature with beak In a meaning system, denotation meaning may be regarded as the “central” meaning of a lexical item It is often equated with referential meaning and with cognitive meaning although some linguists and philosophers make a distinction between these concepts

b Connotation is the additional meanings that a word or phrase has beyond its central meaning These meaning show people’s emotions and

attitudes towards what the word or phrase refers to For example, child could

be defined as a young human being but there are many other characteristics which different people associate with child, e.g affectionate, amusing, lovable, sweet, mischievous, noisy, irritating grubby

But some connotation may be shared by a group of people of the same cultural or social background, sex, rage; other may be restricted to use or several individuals and depend on their personal experience In a meaning system, that part of the meaning, which is covered by connotation, is sometimes referred to as affective meaning, connotation meaning, or emotive meaning

Whereas, Charles W.Kreidler [38,p.58] states the denotation is the relation to phenomena outside of language, including imaginary phenomena; the connotation is the cluster of attributes that the lexeme may evoke

About the connotation meanings, Mildred L.Larson [44,p.131] states: a word, which has a positive connotation in one culture, may actually have

negative connotation in another For example, the English word tribe In some parts of the world, ethnic group reacts very positively to being called tribe, but

in other parts of the world, the same word has the negative connotation and

people do not want to be called members of a tribe Referentially, the word tribe would be referring to an ethnic group, but the positive and negative

overtones must also be taken into consideration if the word is chosen to be used

It can be concluded that the negative or positive connotation of a word

is not only decided by itself but by the context in which it exists

of a word may be described as a combination of semantic features”

According to David Crystal [23,p.346], semantic feature is “a minimal contrastive element of a word’s meaning, in some approaches called a semantic component.” e.g Boy = + young + male + human

2.2.1.5 Meaning relations

In order to identify exactly the meaning of a word, we have to consider another semantic phenomenon called meaning (sense) relation, which consists of synonymy, antonymy, polysemy and homonymy

About meaning (sense) relations, Charles.W.Kreidler [38,p.46] states:

“Meaning is more than denotation and connotation What a word means depends in part on its associations with other words, the relational aspects Lexemes do not merely “have” meanings they contribute to the utterances The meaning that a lexeme has because of these relationships is the sense of that lexeme ”

And David Crystal [23,p.349] expressed this idea as follows:

"Sense relations or semantic relations are the relations of meaning

which exists between words, such as sameness or oppositeness of meaning.”

Polysemy is a semantic phenomenon in which a word has two or more similar meanings

The house is at the foot of the mountains

One of his shoes felt too tight for his foot

“Foot” here refers to the bottom part of the mountains in the first sentence and the bottom part of the leg in the second

According to David Crystal [23,p.106], polysemy refers to cases where

a lexeme has more than one meaning For example, the word “chip” can mean

a piece of wood, food, or electronic circuit

In other words, polysemy can be said to be a property of a single lexeme, which is common characteristics of most other lexemes For example,

the noun “neck” is treated in standard English dictionaries as a single lexeme

with several distinguishable senses: “part of the body”, “ part of the bottle” etc

Polysemy is recognized if the senses concerned are related either historically or psychologically , and do not necessarily coincide Two senses are considered to be historically related if they originate from the same source

or one sense derived from the other Two senses could be psychologically related if they are intuitively felt to be related, and are assumed to be different uses of the same word

Polysemy can be considered to be the phenomenon of direct result of semantic change Exactly speaking, it is a chained transference of meaning between the primary and the derived meanings For example, the second is derived from the first; the third from the second etc

Polysemy can be understand as the existence of various meanings of the same word at a certain historical period of the English development on the

basic of which the primary and secondary meanings develop The basic meaning is usually the free one understood by a group of people using the same language When it exists alone, it does not depend on the preceding of following words It is also the referential meaning that includes the conceptual one

2.2.1.6 Semantic roles

Clauses are divided into types according to the types of the verbs that occupies their semantic and syntactic core Verbs, in turn, are divided into semantic according to the kind of involvement of the participants in the state

or event coded by the clause The array of semantic roles typically associated with each verb defines the propositional frame of the verb and thus the semantic type of the verbal clause In Givon.T [31,p.91] terms the major semantic roles in the clause are agent, patient, dative, instrument, benefactive and a set of locational and temporal roles like source / location / goal and associative

Here are typical examples of these semantic roles in simple clauses [31,p.92]

Mary (agent) kicked John ( patient )

John ( dative ) heard Mary

She worked with her father ( associative )

She went to the store ( locative )

2.2.1.7 Semantic field

The semantic structure of vocabulary of a language can be studied in a precise and systematic way by means of componential analysis of which the theory of semantic field greatly leans

The assumption of lexical field analysis or semantic field analysis is that lexemes can be grouped together into semantic fields on the basis of

shared meaning and that most, if not all the vocabulary of a language, can be accounted for in this way The description of meaning, the definition of lexemes, is then undertaken within each semantic field and involves defining each lexeme in relation to the other lexemes in the field

Different terms such as lexical field, semantic field and word field are usually treated as synonyms, but some authors have proposed distinctions among then For example, John Lyons [43,p.429] distinguishes between

“conceptual field” (a structure of concepts on the semantic level, a structured conceptual area)and lexical field (a set of lexemes that covers a specific conceptual field )

Semantic field (lexical field) is defined by Jack Richards, John Platt and Heidi Weber [52,p.164] as “the organization of related words and expressions into a system which shows their relationship to one another.” For example, kinship terms such as father, mother, brother , sister, uncle, ants belong to a lexical field whose relevant features include generation,

sex, membership of the father ‘s or mother’s side of the family, etc

For example, in English there is no singular noun that covers both cow and bull as horse covers stallion and mare

According to David Crystal [23,p.346,347], semantic field is defined

as “the view that vocabulary of a language is a system of interrelated lexical networks, and not an inventory of independent items, also called lexical field theory Examples include the fields of vehicles, fruits, clothing, colour, and part of the body Not all aspects of experience nearly divide into semantic fields, however, and it is always necessary to consider the context before assigning a lexical item to a field For example, “hospital” relates to both the semantic field of health (as in I was in hospital last week) and that of buildings ( as in The hospital needs a new roof )”

2.2.1.8 Componential analysis

Componential analysis analyzes words for their semantic components because the semantic components of a word can affect the meaning of the whole sentence and determiner the possible thematic roles and grammatical roles the word can assume

According top Jack Richards, John Platt and Heidi Weber [52,p.53], componential analysis is the study analyzing a word into a set of meaning components ( or semantic features) For example, the meaning of English

word boy may be shown as <+human> <+male> <-adult>

Usually, componential analysis is applied to a group of related words, which may differ from one another only by one or two components This approach was developed in anthropological linguistics for the study of kinship and other terms in various languages

In other word, componential analysis can be interpreted as an attempt to get at the meaning of words by analyzing them into their “component” parts The theory is that word meanings can be broken down into a series of

“features” (which may be universal) take the following words: bull, cow, stallion, mare, colt, calf, heife, horse We can analyze the “meaning” of these words with the following features : +/-MALE( or of course +/-FEMALE ,+/-ADULT,+/-EQUINE and +/-BOVINE So a bull word would be +MALE<+ADULT,+BOVINE;cow would be -MALE,+ADULT,+BOVINE; stallion would be +MALE, +ADULT, +EQUINE and mare would be +ADULT, -MALE, +EQUINE; colt would be -ADULT, 0 MALE ( 0 means either male or female ), + EQUINE etc

As far as its application is concerned, componential analysis has been successfully used to explain closed sets of words, especially kinship terms It

is done for following reasons :

1 to remove redundancy of features (i.e redundancy rules) and to provide semantic descriptions of those words (i.e binary features)

2 to understand the semantic components of words in order to describe how a sentence’s morphological and syntactic processes are affected by

a word semantic components

The above discussion of semantics as well as other questions such as meaning , components of meaning, semantic field, semantic features … has proved the fact that the meaning of the word is not decided by itself, but by its relation with the others

2.2.2 Syntactic characteristics

Syntax is the study of how combine to the form sentences and the rules which govern the formation of senten ces However, syntactic structure is understood as the arrangement of words and morphemes into larger units( phrases, clauses, and sentences)

Meaning is associated with the way in which words are combines to

make phrases, clauses and sentences Compare The dog bit the postman and The postman bit the dog, which involve the same word meanings but quite

different sentence meanings because of their different syntactic arrangements

As Dixon (1991) claims, there is a principled interaction between the meaning

of a word and its grammartical properties Once a learner knows the meaning and grammartical behaviour of most of the words in a language, then from the meaning of a new word he can infer its likely grammatical possibilities, or from observing the grammatical use of a new word, he may be able to infer a good deal about what it means

Every verb, in its capacity as the core of a clause, is defined semantically in terms of the semantic roles of the participants in the state or event codes by the clause Within the clause, these participants occupy the

grammatical roles of, most commonly, subject, direct object, indirect object, adverb or predicate These grammatical roles are marked in English by a combination of morphology and word-order But they also have other, more subtle, grammatical-behavioral properties, such as various constraints on their distribution in grammaticao environment

2.2.2.1 Grammartical roles

The participants in states or events, in whatever semantic role, may occupy one of four distinct grammatical roles in the clause: subject (S), direct object (O), indirect object (IO) and nominal predicate (PRE) As a brief illustration of the four major grammartical roles in simple clauses consider :

The Woman gave a book to the child

as be and the indirect objects follow the verb (if present) However, they are

morphologically marked by a preposition One that typically marks the semantic role of the participant occupying the indirect object grammatical role For example:

She went to the market [ locative: direction toward]

He walked on the beach [ locative: direction away]

Mary came with her brother [ associative]

2.2.2.2 Syntactic relations

According to the grammartical classification of verbs, verbs fall into three broad subclasses- those that require only one role ( intransitiv verbs), those which require two roles (copular) and those require two or more roles (transitive verbs) There is a considerable difference between intransitive subject and transitive subject

If a verb has only one role, at the semantic level, then it must be mapped onto intransitive subject relation , at the syntactic level Some of the roles in intransitive subject can control the activity in which they are involved (e.g walk, speak) but other intransitive subject roles exercise no control (e.g break, die, grow)

If a verb has two or more roles, one will be mapped onto transitive sub ject and another onto transitive object (e.g Mary cut the cake)

It is clear that verbs are one of the most central syntactic category in language They have deep relations with the other categories: nouns because they select arguments which are often nominals or adverbs because adverbs modify verbs, prepositions, which, in turn assign thematic roles to NPs Verbs associated with adverbs permit the computation of aspect

The role common to all motion verbs is (thing) ‘moving’ (e.g Mary ran) There may also be specification of Locus – the place with respect to which motion takes place an NP in Locus role is most often marked by the appropriate preposition Certain motion verbs may allow the preposition to be

ommited, a slight semantic difference then resulting, e.g He jumped ( over ) the river, She climbed (up) the mountai It is also possible in certain circumstances to omit a preposition before a measure phrase, e.g he ran (for )

a mile [23,p.1991]

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

3.1 RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

In this research, constrastive analysis is suggested to be the main

method of the research Besides, the study also uses qualitative and quantitative approaches that help to analyse the data in a reliable way The data on motion verbs in English and Vietnamese are collected, described and analysed, so that semantic and syntactic features are drawn out

The methods selected to analyze the syntactic and semantic features are

Descriptive method (to describe motion verbs in terms of their structures and

meanings to draw some conclusions on the syntactic and semantic features),

Interpretive method (to collect and interpret what is meant by motion verbs) and Contrastive method (to detect the similarities and differences in aspects

of motion verbs in English and Vietnamese)

With the purpose and model of the investigation described above, the study will also be carried out on qualitative approach as supporting methods

3.2 STUDY PROCEDURES

The study procedures are as follows:

- Choosing the topic to investigate by reviewing the previous works carefully Moreover, in order to have findings on semantic and syntactic features of English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents, the study tries to seek the answers to the following questions:

What are the syntactic and semantic features of the motion verbs in

English and their Vietnamese equivalents in novels and short stories ?

What are the similarities and differences between English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents ?

What are the implications for teaching, learning and translating English motion verbs ?

Basing on the materials collected, I can get some valuable theoretical background as well as practical evidence The theoretical background on the

motion verbs and its related matters are based on the viewpoint of Levin Beth

As for Vietnamese, a lot of linguists are resorted to in this paper such as Nguyen Kim Than [10], Nguyen van Thanh [11] , Nguyen Lai [6]

- Choosing the approach to the problem and the theoretical background Before the study was actually carried out, a proposal of the study had been written The reearch proposal, then, was presented at the master Thesis Proposal Evaluation Council of the university of Danang There are two raesons for presenting the research proposal Firstly, the practicaility of the study will be carefully considered Secondly, the Council members will offer necessary suggestions to help the researcher improve or reorient the study

Collecting data:

The relevant data are taken from 9 English novels, short stories and their Vietnamese translational versions They are

“Uncle Tom’s Cabin” by Cooper, James Fenimore

“The most interesting short stories in the world” by Henry , O

“Witch of Oz” by l.Frank Baum

“Tales from Shakespeare” by Shakespeare

“Condensed Chicken soup for the Soul” by Jack Canfield and Mark

Victor Hansen

“The tempest” by Shakespeare

“Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde” by R.L Stevenson

‘The Stories of The Five Town”s by Arnold Bennett

The Death of Karen Silkwool by Hamman Joyce

From theses novels and short stories, 838 examples are quoted, analyzed and used as the chief source for the qualitative evidence

- Analyzing data:

Firstly, the syntactic features of the 5 English motion verbs and their

Vietnamese equivalents are presented through clear and understandable examples

Then the semantic features of the 5 English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents are presented in turn

After that the frequency of the 5 English motion verbs are investigated After presenting the syntactic and semantic features of English motion verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents, the discussions of findings are carried out in order to find out the differences and similarities of each matter mentioned to state the differences and similarities in English and Vietnamese motion verbs

- Suggesting some sollutions for teaching, learning, and translating English motion verbs

Before the presentation of the thesis, I have attended two seminars held

by the Department of English, College of Foreign Languages in order to be consulted and guided to the completion of the study

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

4.1 SYNTACTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH MOTION VERBS

4.1.1 Syntactic Features of COME

Come belongs to the sub-group of intransitive verbs with a locative

indirect object Its subject is an agent and the indirect object is a locative

Come codes, first, events of motion, whereby the subject moves toward or away from the locative object That is, Come combines with adverbials as adverbs , prepositional phrase, to-infinitive In brief, the motion verb Come

can be used in the following structures:

a COME + no complement

For examples:

(1) When a cyclone came, people went down into their cellars and stayed

( Khi một cơ lốc đến, người ta đi xuống hầm nhà mình và ở đó )

(2) “ It is not so bad”, said Sara “And I have got lots of friend There’s

Becky in the next room, and come and see” [57, p 95] ( “Cũng không tệ lắm”, Sara nói, “Và mình cũng có nhiều bạn Có

Becky ở phòng kế bên và - lại đây mà xem “.)

(Từ từ, trời đê rạng đông)

(Khi Sara bước vào lớp học, cô bé có vẻ vui và khoẻ mạnh.)

(5) He told how he had bought poison and how he intended to come to the

tomb to die, and lie with Juliet [65, p.58]

(Chàng kể chàng đã mua thuốc độc như thế nào và chàng đã dự định tới

nhà mồ để chết, và nằm bên Juliet.)

(6) A friend of his wife’s who owned a little dog would come in for a

moment before taking her evening stroll [66, p 6]

(Một người bạn của vợ anh có một con chó nhỏ sẽ đi vào một lát trước

khi làm cuộc tản bộ buổi tối.)

(7) The people saw my balloon and said, “ This man is a wizard ! He

comes out of the sky!” [57, p.129] (Người dân thấy bong bóng của ta và nói“ Đây là thầy phù thuỷ! Ông ta

từ trên trời xuống !”)

c COME + To - Infinitive / Present participle

For example:

(8) Ermengarde often came to visit Sara and Sara helped her with her

(Ermengarde thường đến thăm Sara và Sara lại giúp cô học bài

(Vừa lúc đó Joss chạy lại.)

(11) She came sobbing into the room [5,p 332]

(Cô ta vừa bước vào phòng vừa khóc thổn thức.)

d COME + Reflexive Pronoun + To - Infinitive For example:

(12) “The friar, having learned that the letters which he had sent to Mantua

had, by some unlucky chance, never reached Romeo, came himself, with tools and a light, to set the lady ” [67, p 54] (Vị tu sĩ biết được rằng những lá thư mà ông gởi đến Mantua do xui xẻo

đã không tới tay Romeo, liền tự mình tới nhà mồ với các dụng cụ và một ngọn đèn để giải thoát cô gái.)

e COME + Adjective / Adverb ( phrase ) For example:

(13) The next morning, the friends came again to the Wizard’s room

[57, p 4]

(Sáng hôm sau mấy người bạn trở lại căn phòng của thầy phù thuỷ.) (14) Her resignation came as a surprise [5, p.332]

(Sự từ chức của bà ta xảy ra thật bất ngờ.)

(15) My shoes came loose [45, p.278] ( Đôi giày của tôi trở nên lỏng.)

(16) Once we get there, our dreams will come true and the pieces of our

lives will fit together like a completed jigsaw puzzle [63,p.180]

( Khi đã đến nơi, mọi giấc mơ của chúng ta sẽ trở thành sự thật ,và mọi

phần của cuộc sống trở nên khít chặt như một bức tranh ghép hình hoàn hảo.)

4.1.2 Syntactic Features of ARRIVE

Arrive is mainly a movement verb of direction whose basic meaning is

reaching a destination It includes a preposition phrase before the Locus NP, ex: arrive at the station The Locus must normally be stated, either through an

NP or an adverbial However, it may also be used without a Locus NP or adverb, and “here” is then implied Here are the structures of the motion verb

Arrive

a ARRIVE + No complement For example :

(17) Tommy’s mother entered and took one of the chairs I had placed near

my desk Then the father arrived [62 p.118]

(MÑ Tommy bíc vμo phßng vμ ngơi xuỉng chiÕc ghÕ mμ t«i ®Ưt s½n

gÌn chiÕc bμn cña m×nh Rơi bỉ Tommy còng ®Õn.)

(18) The inevitable day arrived when the gods came to take the gift and

present it to the world [58, p.126]

(C¸i ngμy kh«ng thÓ tr¸nh khâi Íy còng ®Õn khi Thîng ®Õ trị l¹i ®Ó

mang mên quμ ®i vμ ®Ưt nê vμo thÕ giíi.)

(19) Sooner or later, we lealize there is no station, no one place to arrive

[63,p.182]

( Không sớm thì muộn, chúng ta sẽ nhận rằng chẳng có lấy một nhà ga

nào, chẳng có một nơi chốn nào để đến.)

b ARRIVE + Prepositional phrase

For example:

(20) Soon Tommy’s parents, who had recently separated, would arrive for

a conference on his failing schoolwork and disruptive behavior

[62,p.118] ( Chỉ chốc lát nữa thôi, cả bố và mẹ của Tommy, vừa mới sống ly thân

với nhau, sẽ đến dự buổi họp phụ huynhvề việc học tập sa sút và hành

vi phá phách của cậu.)

c ARRIVE + Adverb Phrase

For example:

(21) The baby finally arrived just after midnight [5, p 109]

(Cuối cùng đứa bé đã ra đời sau nửa đêm.)

d ARRIVE + To - Infinitive (22) Romeo, in Mantua heard the sad story of his Juliet”s death, before friar

Lawrence’s messenger could arrive to tell him that this was an

(Ở Mantua, Romeo đã nghe thấy câu chuyện thương tâm về cái chết của

Juliet trước khi người đưa tin của tu sĩ Lawrence tới cho chàng biết đó

chỉ là một tang lễ gia, )

4.1.3 Syntactic Features of LEAVE

Leave is transitive verb, with the Causer (normally HUMAN) in A

(Agent) and the thing Resting in O ( Object ) function The Locus must be

specified by a prepositional phrase, NP or an adverb However Leave could

also be regarded as intransitive It can stand alone and still express its meaning

We can see syntactic features of Leave as follows:

a LEAVE + no complement

For example :

(23) The doctor came in the afternoon, and Sue followed him out of the roon

(Bác sĩ đến vào buổi chiều và c« Sue theo ông ra khỏi phòng khi ông

dời gót.)

(24) The lawyer left, and Miss Minchin called her sister Amelia: “ Bring

Sara Crewe here at once”, she said [57, p.85]

(Ông luật sư ra về , cô Minchin gọi cô em Amelia : “ Đem Sara lại đây

ngay”, cô bảo.)

b LEAVE + Pro(Noun)/ Noun Phrase For example:

(25)“ We left Fort Edward this morning and we are going to William

henry ” said Duncan Heyward [65, p.18]

(Chúng tôi rời đồn Edward sáng nay và đang đến William Henry đây-

Duncan Heyward nói.)

(26) She lost her shoes , tore her stockings, she left drops of blood on every

piece of ice [65,

p.122]

(Nàng làm tuột cả giày, toạc cả vớ, để lại cả những giọt máu trên từng

tảng băng)

(27) When he had left her, this innocent lady was so filled with wonder at

herlord’s untrue supicion [64, p.304]

(Khi chàng bỏ đi , người phụ nữ vô tội này đầy thắc mắc về sự hoài nghi

không đúng sự thật mà chồng nàng đã gán cho nàng )

c LEAVE + Pro(noun) +Adverb /Adjective/ NounPhrase

For example:

(28) The little girl who-was-not-little anymore decided to leave her home

and went into the world [57, p.52]

(Một ngày kia cô - con - gái - không - còn - bé - bỏng ấy quyết định rời

khỏi ngôi nhà thân yêu của mìnhđể khám phá thế giới xung quanh)

(29) “ What if I had refused and left you there ?”

[32,p.78]

(Nếu tôi từ chối và để ông ở lại đó thì ông biết làm thế nào?)

(30) I will leave the door open

[66,p.1049]

(Tôi sẽ để ngỏ cửa.)

(31) It seems that Uncle Septimus became a little more generous on second

thought and left you a thousand dollars [68,p.51]

(Dường như bác Septimus, sau khi tỉnh lại đã trở nên rộng rãi hơn một

chút và để lại cho cô một ngàn đô-la.)

d LEAVE + Pronoun + To – inf / V- ing For example:

(32) “ I left them” answered Ariel “ searching for Ferdinand, whom they

have little hopes of finding, thinking they saw him drown [72, p.20]

(Bề tôi đã để họ đi tìm Ferdinand, ” Ariel trả lời “ kẻ mà họ nuôi chút

hy vọng tìm thấy mặc dù đã nhìn thấy chàng ta bị dìm chết“)

(33) Here was the first breakin a routine that had never deviated, and it left

him feeling very confused [68, p.8]

(Đây là sự rạn nứt đàu tiên trong cái thường lệ chẳng bao giờ chệch

hướng ấy, và nó làm cho anh cảm thấy rất là bối rối)

(34) “ , when his wicked brother left him, as he though, to die in an open

boat.” [72,p.44]

(Khi mà gã em trai độc ác của ngài bỏ mặc ngài đến chết, theo như hắn

nghĩ, trong một chiếc tàu không có gì cả)

e LEAVE + Adverb / Prepositional phrase

For example:

(35) Macbeth was left alone, without a soul to love or care for him, or a

friend to whom he could trust his wicked purposes [57, p.372]

(Macbeth chỉ còn lại một mình, chẳng có một linh hồn nào yêu quý hay

chăm sóc cho hắn , hay một người bạn để hắn có thể tin tưởng phó thác những mục đích tội lỗi của mình.)

(36) The old king was now left with no other companion than the poor fool,

who still stayed with him

4.1.4 Syntactic Features of RUN

Run is both intransitive and transitive It descibes a mode of motion

The obligatory role is Moving A Locus can be included It is also used in

transitive construction We can see the syntactic features of Run as follows:

a RUN + no complement

For example:

(38) Although the entire team runs, only the top seven runners have the

potential to score points for the school [63,p 94]

(Mặc dù toàn đội đều tham gia tập luyện, nhưng chỉ có một nhóm bảy

người giỏi nhất là có khả năng mang lại chiến thắng cho trường.)

b RUN + Noun ( phrase )

For example:

(39) He has no idea of how to run a successful business [45,p.1626]

(Nó chẳng biết gì về việc quản lý tốt một doanh nghiệp như thế nào) (40) He continued to run four to five miles a day, every day - even the day

(Joey đều đặn tập chạy từ 4 đến 5 dặm mỗi ngày, kể cả khi bị cơn sốt

(Tôi sẽ đưa cô về.)

(42) She ran hot water into the bowl

[45,p.278]

(Cô ấy rót nước nóng vào trong bát.)

(43) When the gun they all started out, not exactly in a desh, but with

the relish to run the race to the finish and win [63,p.80] ( Khi tiếng súng xuất phát vang lên, mọi người đều quyết tâm chạy đến

đích nhanh nhất để trở thành người thắng cuộc.)

d RUN + To-infinitive

For example:

(44) She ran to look at them, and opened the top book

[57,p.117]

(Cô bé chạy đến nhìn mấy cuốn sách.)

e RUN + prepositional phrase

(46) Major Blair ran up with his gun

(Thiếu tâ Blair mang súng chạy lại)

[69,p.132]

(47) Hamno began to run at the side of his cage

(Hanno bắt đầu chạy đến bên chuồng.) [69 p.84]

f RUN + Adjective / Adverb

For example :

(48) The doctor assured us that with treatment he would be able to walk

nomally- but would never run very well [63,p.92] (Các bác sĩ cam đoan với chúng tôi rằng sau khi chữa trị cậu bé có thể đi

lại bình thường đươc - nhưng để chạy nhảy thì rất khó khăn.)

(49) The water run cold when I turned the tape on [45,p.278 ]

(Níc trị nªn l¹nh buỉt khi t«i mị vßi.)

4.1.5 Syntactic Features of WALK

First of all, Walk is basically an intransitive since it deals with self – motion and often occurs with just role of an agent as a mover Walk can

completely stand alone and still express its meaning fully without any complements or objects

However, it is necessary to notice that Walk can combine with some

types of adverbials to create diverse syntactic structures The syntactical

‘Walk’ can appear in the following collocations:

a WALK + no complement

For example:

(50) By the time he was eight, you wouldn’t know he had a problem when

(Năm lên tám, khi nhìn anh ta bước đi, bạn không thể nào biết được

chân của cậu bé có vấn đê.)

(51) Take my bones, every muscle, every fiber and nerve in my body and

find away to make a crippled child walk [63,p.118]

(Hãy lấy từng lóng xương, từng cơ bắp, từng mô máu và hệ thần kinh

của tôi rồi tìm cách làm cho một đứa bé tật nguyền bước đi được.) (52) She was unable to walk, and the doctor did not hold out much hope of

[63,p.150]

(Cô bé không thể đi lại được, và các bác sĩ cũng không hy vọng nhiều

vào khả năng hồi phục của cô.)

b WALK + Adverb ( Phrase )

For example:

(53) When he walks away, he has lots of hair! [63,p.126]

(Khi đi khỏi, ông ta có nhiều tóc lắm.)

[5,p.2005]

(Anh ta đi về nhà một cách chậm rãi)

(55) Soapy walked slowly away, now unsuccessful a second time

[68,p.114]

(Soapy chầm chậm bước đi, đây là lần thất bại thứ hai.)

c WALK + Noun / Prepositional ( phrase)

For example:

(56) We who lived in the concentration camps can remember the man who

walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece

(Chúng tôi, những người đã từng sống trong trại tập trung vẫn còn nhớ

những con người đã đi từ lều này sang lều khác để an ủi mọi người và

cho đi những mẫu bánh mì cuối cùng của mình.)

(57) Ahead of me in the passageway walked a tiny woman in brown slacks

(Soapy đi bộ qua năm dãy nhà trước khi lại thử để bị bắt.)

According to Dixon R.M.W (23,p.90) , come , arrive , are in the subtype group Arrive Subtype : (Arrive verbs : (i) arrive , return, go , come , (ii) enter, depart trael escape, come in , go out , ( iii) reach approach , visit The writer says that, set (i) of Arrive verbs which include Come, Arrive are

almost all intransitive, and include a preposition before the Locus noun phrase

Come includes in its meaning a locus specification “to here” respectively, in

view of this, “here” can be omitted from “come here” although this adverb often is retained

Arrive may also be used without a Locus noun phrase or adverb, and

“ here” is then implied A Locus noun phrase may also be omitted after these verbs when it could be inferred from the previous discourse, e.g: He cycled all the way to town Oh, what time did he arrive?

Run, Walk are in the Run Subtype This subtype refers to a mode of motion, e.g run, walk, crawl, slide, spin, roll, turn, wriggl , swing, wave, rock, shake, climb, dive, stroll, trot, gallop, jog, dance, march, jump, bounce, swim, fly Verbs of this subtype are basically intransitive

There exists the potential for any verb from Run subtype to be used transitively, in a causative sense The Moving or Role (which is S in an intransitive construction) becomes O and an additional role - the Causer ,

normally Human - is introduced in A syntactic function, e.g The dog walked

He walked the dog

Leave is in the Put subtype This subtype refers to Causing something

to be at rest at a Locus , e.g (i) put, place, set, arrange, install, put NP on, sow,

plant, fill, load, pack; hide; peach, land, shelve; (ii) leave, desert, abandon,

take NP off

4.2 SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH MOTION VERBS

4.2.1 Semantic Features of COME

Here is a summary of semantic features of COME

Table 4.1: Summary of semantic features of COME

To move to or towards, into etc a place or something through of

as near or familiar to the speaker

To arrive at a particular place referred

To travel in order tobe with a specified person to do a specified thing or to be present at an event

To become

To pass through along road ( in a clear distance)

To come into being or to be born

To occur , happen or emerge

To approach or reach by or as by moving toward

To be said to someone when correcting, reassuring or urging them on (Imperative)

To take or occupy a specified position in space, order, or priority

To refer time which is defined clearly

To reach eventually a certain condition or state of mind

To join somone in participating in a specified activity or course

of action The meaning of COME is illustrated through the following examples

4.2.1.1 Show the meaning To arrive at a particular place referred

(59) This Tybalt, having a quick and angry temper, could not bear that a

Montague should come under cover of a mask of make fun of them at

p.14]

(Tybalt là một người nóng tính và cáu bẳn, không thể chịu nổi một

người nhà Montague đến dự buổi tiệc dưới một chiếc mặt na để chế

giễu họ.)

(60) My mother was in Grand Hospital and she wrote me about how you

came in one day and sat down and talked to her and read Scripture to

[63,p.172]

(Mẹ tôi đang điều trị ở bệnh viện Grand và bà từng kể cho tôi nghe rằng

chị đã đến thăm, trò chuyện và đọc kinh thánh cho bà nghe.)

(61) My country called me to war, you asked me to come home safely

[63,p.114]

(§ất nước gọi con nhập ngũ, còn mẹ lại bắt con trở về bình an bên mẹ.)

(62) I came last night to Wuthering Heights, and heard, for the first time,

that Catherine has been, and is yet, very ill [60,p.155]

(§ªm qua t«i ®Õn §ơi Giê Hó, vμ lÌn ®Ìu tiªn ®îc tin Catherine ®· vμ

hiÖn vĨn cßn ỉm nƯng.)

4.2.1.2 Show the meaning To move to or towards, into etc a place or

something through of as near or familiar to the speaker

(63) When the ceremony was over, Juliet hurried home, where she waited

impatiently for the coming of night when Romeo had promised to come and meet her to the garden, where they had met the night before

[67, p.30]

(Khi buỗi lễ kết thúc, Juliet hối hả trở về nhà , ở đó nàng nôn nóng chờ