A study on the english collocation containing the verb SET with reference to their vietnamese equivalents

THESIS A STUDY ON THE ENGLISH COLLOCATION CONTAINING THE VERB “SET” WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS NGHIÊN CỨU CÁC KẾT HỢP TỪ CHỨA ĐỘNG TỪ “SET” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ NHỮ

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A STUDY ON THE ENGLISH COLLOCATION

CONTAINING THE VERB “SET” WITH REFERENCE TO

THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

(NGHIÊN CỨU CÁC KẾT HỢP TỪ CHỨA ĐỘNG TỪ “SET” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆT)

NGUYỄN THỊ TOÀN

Hanoi, 2016

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A STUDY ON THE ENGLISH COLLOCATION

CONTAINING THE VERB “SET” WITH REFERENCE TO

THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

(NGHIÊN CỨU CÁC KẾT HỢP TỪ CHỨA ĐỘNG TỪ “SET” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆT)

2.2.2.3 Classification of sentences in terms of sentence elements and

Chapter 4: SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF THE ENGLISH COLLOCATION CONTAINING THE VERB SET WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS 27 4.1 4.1 Syntactic features of the English collocation containing the verb

4.2 4.2 Semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb

4.2.2 4.2.2 Conveying the meaning of “causing to be in a particular state or

4.2.3 4.2.3 Conveying the meaning of “ adjusting or arranging” 34

4.2.5 4.2.5 Conveying the meaning of “making or becoming firm or fixed” 36

4.2.6 Conveying the meaning of “presenting in the right form” 37 4.2.7 Conveying the meaning of “moving or flowing” 37

4.3 4.3 Comparison between the English collocation containing the verb

4.3.8 4.3.2 In terms of semantic features 46 4.4 4.4 Implications for teaching and learning the English collocation

5.4 5.4 Recommendations/Suggestions for a further research 59

I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report

entitled A study on the English collocation containing the verb Set with reference

to their Vietnamese equivalents submitted in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the degree of Master in English Language Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis

Hanoi, 2016

Nguyen Thi Toan

Approved by SUPERVISOR

Assoc Prof PhD Hoang Tuyet Minh

Date:………

This thesis could not have been completed without the help and support from a number of people

First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Assoc Prof Dr Hoang Tuyet Minh, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher

A special word of thanks goes to my colleague and many others, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for me to have this thesis accomplished

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my family, my husband for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work

Collocation is a big area in linguistics, it has become the subject of a linguistic study only recently, it arouses a growing interest in numerous linguists and is defined in various ways However, Vietnamese students also meet difficulties when acquiring English collocations Therefore this paper aims at investigating the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents It was conducted with the hope of finding out the equivalents of the collocation containing the verb and suggesting implications for learning and teaching of English as a foreign language in Vietnam Data used for analysis in this study were mainly collected from books, literary works, and dictionary Data analysis

is based on descriptive, quantitative, qualitative and contrastive methods

OAL’ED: Oxford Advanced Learner’s Encyclopedic Dictionary

EFL: English as a foreign language

SLA: second language acquisition

Sb: somebody

Sth: something

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale

Vocabulary in general plays an important role in any language as we cannot

communicate without words British linguist Wilkins (1972) once stated without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed There is a common assumption that the

more words a learner knows, the larger the learner’s vocabulary knowledge is However, words are not used alone and separately but go with each other and depend on each other Words are combined into phrases There are free phrases and fixed phrases The latter often confuse learners because there are not any fixed rules for all the combinations English-as-a-second-language learners often have difficulties treating fixed phrases in their learning process That is why many learners cannot communicate fluently although they know a lot of words Therefore, the possible combinations of words or collocations have to be taken into consideration

Although collocation has become the subject of a linguistic study only recently, it arouses a growing interest in numerous linguists and is defined in various ways Accordingly, there is no exhaustive and uniform definition or categorization of collocation Therefore, it tends to be one of the most problematic and important area of vocabulary, especially for second language

learners Hill (1999) goes so far as to suggest: We are familiar with the concept

of communicative competence, but perhaps we should add the concept of collocation competence to our thinking He also claims that non-native speakers have problems not because of faulty grammar but a lack of collocations Along with Hill, McCarthy (1990) claims that collocation deserves to be a central aspect of vocabulary study These pieces of evidence done can show the great

importance of collocation in acquisition of a language The author would like to investigate the possibility of combining words into fixed expressions

As mentioned above, phrases are formed by words together Words in English are classified into different classes in which verbs have always been one

of the most complex classes of words because verb, or rather, phrasal verb is the central to the structure of the sentence

According to Palmer (1965), learning a language is, to a very large degree, how to operate the verbal forms, the pattern and the structure of the verb in that language There is a question which need to be answer is that how verbs

collocate with other classes of word A verb can collocate with a noun, a preposition, an adjective or even another verb Verb phrases are then created Investigating the combinations of verbs must be necessary for improving the students’ knowledge and lessening their difficulties

As can be seen from the discussion above, collocation is a big area in linguistics In the frame work of this study, the focus of this study is only on the

collocations containing the verb set, a rather special and complex verb in

English Since the research is carried out against the Vietnamese backgrounds, the corresponding Vietnamese equivalents are also provided The research is so

entitled A study on the English collocation containing the verb set with reference

to their Vietnamese equivalents

1.2 Aims of the research

This study aims at pointing out the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents in order to help to teach and learn the English collocation containing

the verb Set more effectively

1.3 Objectives of the research

This study is intended to:

- Describing syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation

containing the verb Set

- Pointing out the similarities and differences between English and

Vietnamese equivalents in terms of syntactic and semantic

- Suggesting implications for teaching and learning the English collocation

containing the verb Set

1.4 Scope of the research

This study is confined to the investigation into a very small aspect of vocabulary issue - the collocations of the verb Set in English Set as a verb has

a number of meanings when it collocate with other classes of word In other words, the verb Set can be in different collocations with different meanings Set

as a verb can collocate with a noun, a preposition, an adjective or an adverb, etc Vietnamese equivalents of collocations of Set will be later discussed through analyzing English - Vietnamese examples in different contexts

1.5 Significance of the research

- Theoretically, the study supplies a comprehensive understanding of semantic and syntactic features of the collocation of the verb Set in order to help the English teachers and learners use the meanings and structure of the English

collocation containing the verb Set exactly

- Practically, the study provides the collocations of the verb Set with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents in order to help the teachers of English

to teach better and and help the learners of English to study better

1.6 Structural organization of the thesis

The study is organized into five chapters as follows

Chapter 1, Introduction, presents the overview of the thesis including rationale, aims, objectives, scope, significance as well as the organization of the study Chapter 2, Literature Review, overviews the previous studies and builds up the

theoretical background in the study

Chapter 3, Methodology, focuses on presenting research questions, and research methods

Chapter 4, Findings and Discussions, presents the semantic and syntactic

features of the English collocation containing the verb set with reference to their

Vietnamese equivalents and suggests some implications for teaching and learning

Chapter 5, Conclusions, summarizes the major findings of the thesis along with the practical implications, the limitations of the study and the suggestions for further study

References and Appendix come at the end of the study

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Previous studies

Indeed, the term collocation is known very early, along with the language

itself At the beginning, this issue has been neglected in teaching and learning vocabulary for English foreign language students The vocabulary was being learnt and taught only with the words in isolation However, with the development of society and that of pedagogical methodology as well as with the learners’ needs, there have been several studies of English collocations in the field of English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) teaching There are many linguists deal with the notion of collocations and its importance in vocabulary acquisition and teaching process such as Firth (1957), Gairns & Redman (1986), Halliday (1966), Sinclair (1966), McCarthy (1990), Hill (1999)…Studying collocations

is an interesting topic, touching on the key issue of what students really need to learn Clearly, any student who wishes to communicate like native- speakers will have to come to terms with the challenge of collocation However, as you hint, Recently, the issue of collocation has been highly estimated In the book

English collocations in use, McCarthy & O’Dell (2005) gave simple definitions

of collocation with examples as well as exercises for learners to practice This book had been also given with collocations in several topics of daily conversation Collocations of everyday verbs were introduced into table which listed their collocations with example and also some tips to remember them, some exercise to practice are then followed Bahns & Eldaw (1993), in the article

Should we teach EFL students collocations, highlighted the importance of

collocation In their research, German advanced EFL students' productive knowledge of English collocations consisting of a verb and a noun were

investigated in a translation task and a close task Results suggested that EFL students should concentrate on collocations that cannot readily be paraphrased

In his own article, Bahns (1993) also raised the neglected aspect of vocabulary and the teaching of lexical collocations in EFL should concentrate on items for which there is no direct translational equivalence in English Similarly, Farghal

& Obiedat (1995) addressed the issue of collocations as an important and neglected variable in EFL classes Two questionnaires, in English and Arabic, involving common collocations relating to food, color, and weather were administered to English majors and English language teachers Results showed both groups deficient in collocations

As students of other languages, Vietnamese students also meet difficulties when acquiring English collocations In a conference at the University of Western Sydney, Trinh (1995) mentioned to collocation, in particular English collocation, particularly those for whom English is their second and weaker language The results showed that there were very few syntactic errors, and that the examiners probably have treated syntactic and grammatical errors as one area

of error only The author also realized that the errors being made were a result

of the candidates' lack of knowledge of English collocations, whether they are grammatical or lexical Moreover, in the frame of M.A thesis at Vietnam National University, Hanoi - University of Languages and International Studies, there are also studies of collocations Works by Chu Thị Phương Vân (2005), Lê Thanh Hà (2007) and Đào Thị Ngọc Nguyên (2007) are some of typical examples They are all interested in the collocation issue They investigated the collocation’s definition, classification and the students’s knowledge about collocations Chu Thị Phương Vân (2005) analyzed the collocations of one English textbook on Electronics and Telecommunications In her works, various types of collocations with different frequency of use and their characteristics are

found out A test is followed in order to obtain information about students’ knowledge of collocation Likewise, the common errors and the causes for these errors are also drawn from the test result analysis Lê Thanh Hà (2007) carried out the lexical collocations and implications for the translators of English- Vietnamese when meeting with lexical collocations More concretely, Đào Thị Ngọc Nguyên (2007) investigated collocations of only two adjectives (hard, happy) in English The major findings of this research are various distinguished senses of hard and happy in different collocations and the students’ restricted collocation competence on the two adjectives in particular and on English lexemes in general Indeed, they are all great useful referential works for researchers, teachers and students who are going to investigate the issue of collocation in English

However, a detailed investigation into the collocations of the verb set has

not been taken There has neither been any works that gave the insights to the comparison between English collocations and Vietnamese ones In the frame of

an M.A thesis, the author would like to contribute a very minor investigation

focusing on the collocation Verb + noun (lexical collocation) with the verb set

in order to facilitate students when dealing with these combinations of words Also, the Vietnamese equivalents are given to compare and contrast

2.2 Theoretical background

In order to get the aims, English collocation and overview of verbs in English need to be made clear

2.2.1 English collocation

2.2.1.1 The origin of the word collocation

The term collocation was first introduced by Firth (1957), a British linguist

He was the first person to look lexis at its syntagmatic, left-to-right unfolding of language According to Firth (1957), the collocation is defined as a combination

of words associated with each other, for example to take a photo, to do homework, to play football The term collocation has it origin in the Latin verb collocate which means to set in order/to arrange

definition that collocations are words in habitual company This is a quite

general definition Collocation, then, refers to expressions in which individual

words habitually go together In the case of verb, for instance, the verb make goes with some words and the verb do with other words:

We made an agreement (NOT did an agreement)

I did my homework (NOT made my homework)

(Quirk R et al.)

The definition of collocation will be made clearer by his followers - Sinclair (1966) and Halliday (1966) For Halliday, collocations are examples of word combinations; he maintains that collocation cuts across grammar boundaries Sinclair (1966) introduces the following terminology: an item whose

collocations are studies is called a node; the number of relevant lexical items on each side of a node is defined as a span and those items which are found within the span are called collocates

We can also find the definition of collocation in any dictionary In the Oxford advanced learner’s dictionary of current English (1995), Hornby gives

examples of the words thick and dense We can talk about both thick fog and dense fog The meaning is the same But we do not talk about a person having dense hair This combination just does not sound right, even through it would easily be understood Dense do not collocate with hair We can only talk about

somebody having thick hair For him, collocation is the regular combination of words

Runcie (2002) gives general definitions of collocation that collocation is the way words combine in a language to produce natural-sounding speech and writing Benson, Benson & Ilson (1986) understand and use this term:

In English, as in other languages, there are many fixed, identifiable, idiomatic phrases and constructions Such groups of words are called recurrent combinations, fixed combinations, or collocations Collocations fall into two groups: grammatical collocations and lexical collocations

Thus, for him, collocation is defined as specified, identifiable, idiomatic, recurrent combinations Two kinds of collocations: grammatical and lexical ones will be analyzed in the near following part This definition is clearer with some properties and types of collocation

non-2.2.1.3 The distinction between compounds, idioms and collocations

To attain a clearer understanding of collocations, it is helpful to try to

distinguish them from idioms on the one hand and from free combinations on

the other Apparently, collocations, free compounds and idioms share one important feature in their form, that is to say they all refer to combinations of words that go together very often However, the case is that they differ from each other in both meaning and form

In terms of form, McCarthy (1990) claims that collocation items can be separated by several words while words of a compound are always syntactically

bound to one another Such is the case, for example, in make a decision We

could separate make and decision with some words:

He made an extremely important decision

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

On the contrary, as for compounds, we could never make any manipulation

to change its word order as in workshop Workshop could not be separated by a

word of any kind We can see that compounds function as a single unit while collocations remain a combination of words even if these words go together with very high frequency The collocational relationship, according to McCarthy, could appear in a variety of syntactic realizations as shown in the following examples:

They reject my appeal

The rejection of his appeal was a great shock

(McCarthy M & O’Dell F, 2005)

Looking at idioms, Bolinger (1975) argues that some idioms are virtually unchangeable; others follow a limited amount of manipulation McArthur (1992) agrees with Bolinger when he makes the point that idioms are often fixed in

form It can rain cats and dogs but never dogs and cats According to them,

collocations are looser groupings than idioms Collocational items can be

contiguous as with head and ache in headache or proximate to each other as with cat and purr in The cat was purring

In terms of meaning, Benson, Benson & Ilson (1986) use combinations with

the noun murder to illustrate the main distinguishing features of the three categories The least cohesive type of word combination are the so-called free combinations The noun murder, for example, can be used with many verbs (to analyze, boast of, condemn, discuss, (etc.) a murder), and these verbs, in turn, combine freely with other nouns Idioms, on the other hand, are relatively frozen

expressions whose meanings do not reflect the meanings of their component

parts An example containing the noun murder would be to scream blue murder

(to complain very loudly) Between idioms and free combinations are loosely

fixed combinations (or collocations) of the type to commit murder The main

characteristics of collocations are that their meanings reflect the meaning of their constituent parts (in contrast to idioms) and that they are used frequently, spring

to mind readily, and are psychologically salient (in contrast to free combinations)

2.2.1.4 Classification of collocation

There are many different ways to classify the collocation The classification

in terms of frequent use, of structure and of strength is described as follows:

In terms of frequent use, Sinclair (1991) divides collocation into two

categories: the upward and downward collocations The first group consists of words more frequently used in English than they are themselves, e.g back collocates with at, down, from, into, on, all of which habitually collocate with words that are less frequent than they are, e.g words arrive, bring are less frequently occurring collocates of back Sinclair makes a sharp distinction between those two categories claiming that the elements of the upward

collocation (mostly prepositions, adverbs, conjunctions, pronouns) tend to form

grammatical frames while the elements of the downward collocation (mostly

nouns and verbs) by contrast give a semantic analysis of a word These two terms are called respectively significant and casual collocations

In terms of structure, Benson, Benson & Ilson (1977) divide collocations into two groups: grammatical and lexical collocations The first category consists of

the main word (a noun, an adjective, a verb) plus a preposition or to-infinitive or that-clause and is characterized by eight basic types of collocations:

The first type of collocation is noun plus preposition For example:

blockade against, apathy towards

The second type is noun plus to-infinitive See the following examples:

He was a fool to do it

They felt a need to do it

(McCarthy M & O’Dell F, 2005)

The third is noun plus that-clause For example

We reached an agreement that she would represent us in court

He took an oath that he would do his duty

(McCarthy M & O’Dell F, 2005) The fourth type is preposition plus noun For example: by accident, in agony

The fifth type is adjective plus preposition For example: fond of children, hungry of news

Adjective plus to-infinitive is the next type of collocation:

It was necessary to work

It’s nice to be here

(McCarthy M & O’Dell F, 2005)

The next type is adjective plus that-clause See the following example:

She was afraid that she would fail

It was imperative that I be here

(McCarthy M & O’Dell F, 2005)

The last type of collocation is different verb patterns in English, such as

verb plus to-infinitive: they began to speak, or verb plus bare infinitive: we must work and other

Lexical collocations do not contain prepositions, infinitives or relative clauses but consist of nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs This group is of seven types as follows:

Firstly, verb (which means creation/ action) plus noun/ pronoun/

prepositional phrase For example: come to an agreement, launch a missile

Secondly, verb (which means eradication/cancellation) plus noun For

example: reject an appeal, crush resistance

Thirdly, [adjective plus noun] or [noun used in an attributive way plus

noun]: strong tea, a crushing defeat, house arrest, land reform

The next type is noun plus verb naming the activity which is performed by

a designate of this noun, such as: bombs explode, bees sting

Quantifier plus noun is the next type For example: a swarm of bees, a piece

In terms of strength, it is worth noting that it is not reciprocal, which means

that the strength between the words is not equal on both sides, e.g blonde and hair Blonde collocates only with a limited number of words describing hair colour whereas hair collocates with many words, e.g brown, long, short, and mousy It happens very often that the bond between the words in unilateral, e.g

in the phrase vested interest, vested only ever collocates with interest but interest

collocates with many other words

According to Lewis (2000), there are very few strong collocations and he makes a distinction between strong collocation e.g avid reader, budding author; common collocation which makes up numerous word combinations, e.g fast car, have dinner, a bit tired and medium strong one, which in his view account for the largest part of the lexis a language learner needs, e.g magnificent house, significantly different Sharing the view with Lewis, Hill (1999) adds one more category - unique collocation In his article, Hill (1999) divides collocations into

four kinds: unique collocations; strong collocations; weak collocations and

medium-strength ones To foot the bill, shrug one’s shoulders are the examples

of the unique collocations These are unique because foot (as a verb) and shrug

are not used with any other nouns

2.2.1.5 Characteristics of collocation

In discussion of the nature of collocation, the author bases on her knowledge with reference to the linguists’ works to generalize what characteristics collocation has in common Generally, collocation has three major features as follows

Collocations are arbitrary, a question often raised by speakers of English as

a foreign language is what underlies native speakers’ choice of words or why they choose one word among a list of possibilities to combine with another so often that they become collocation Lewis (1997) points out that collocation is not determined by logic or frequency but is arbitrary, decided only by linguistic convention In the first characteristic, words are not often combined with each other at random Collocation cannot be invented by a second language user A native speaker uses them instinctively

According to Gairns & Redman (1986), a statement on collocation is never absolute As they maintain, lexical items may co-occur simply because the combination reflects a common real world state of affairs Such is the case, for

instance, pass and salt which collocate since people want others to pass them the

salt However, they added, there may exist in collocation an element of linguistic convention or native speakers’ habitual preferences in their choice of words among a number of possibilities It is because lexical collocations bear linguistic convention that joining together semantically compatible parts does not always produce a typical collocation A native English speaker, for example, would say

the lion roared rather than bellowed

Sharing the point of view with Gairns & Redman, McCarthy (1990) states

that knowledge of collocation is a question of typicality The notion of typicality

is important, for without it we could not recognize untypical collocations, which are part of the creativity and the imaginative dimension we find in literature Definitely, there is no rule of collocation and it is difficult to group items

by their collocational properties Thus, they are best dealt with isolation as they arise or depending on notion of typicality to decide what acceptable and unacceptable collocations are

Collocations are language-specific, as discussed earlier, the thing mat

matters is that the way words are chosen to combine together is conventional and lexical collocations in English bear their own linguistic convention Larson (1984) describes that English, like other languages, interprets the physical worlds in its own way and has it own convention; therefore, it governs different collocability of words Therefore, learners have difficulties when acquiring

knowledge of collocational appropriacy in cases where collocability is language-specific and does not seem solely determined by universal semantic constraints (McCarthy, 1990) English collocations are therefore specific to the

English language itself The fact is that what is perfectly acceptable collocation

in one language may be unacceptable in another Take the case of the verb làm

in Vietnamese as an example Vietnamese speakers say làm bánh and làm bài tập with the same verb làm but their equivalent meanings in English are make a cake and do the homework by using two different verbs do and make Then, phrases such as do a cake and make the homework is unacceptable Also, instead

of saying ride bicycle, Vietnamese learners sometimes says go bicycle because

đi xe đạp is totally correct in Vietnamese

In brief, an acceptable collocation is not always made by joining semantically compatible parts The ability of a word to combine with another is

restricted by linguistic convention specific to the English language itself which

is highly unlikely to totally overlap with any other languages

Collocations are not necessarily adjacent According to McCarthy (1990), collocations can be contiguous or proximate, not necessarily adjacent He presents that the collocational relationship still applies, even though several words may separate the collocating items The following extracts from a newspaper report concerning a planning application for a new shopping centre

who collocation at work over clause-boundaries:

The study of planning appeals for similar centres in the past, most of which were rejected, suggests that the furniture is more hopeful for developers Now

that the Secretary of State for the Environment has said that applications should

be approved unless there are good reasons against them, many more should

Similarly, according to Crystal D verb is a word class, which is

traditionally defined as a doing or action word A verb can be formally

identified in many languages as an element displaying contrast of tense, aspect, voice, mood, person and number

According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (2005), verb is a

group or a group of words that expresses an action, an event, or a state

For general definition, words that express the idea of an action or being that affirm that a person, or a thing is, does, suffers something are called verbs Verb is the most important part of the speech in the great majority of the sentences

2.2.2.2 Multi- word verbs

According to Randolph Quirk et al (1985), there are four types of word verb

multi-The first type is intransitive phrasal verb

Intransitive phrasal verb consisting of a verb plus an adverb particle as

exemplified in:

The plane has just touched down

The prisoner finally broke down

She turned up unexpectedly

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) Such phrasal verbs are usually informal

The particle functions like a predication adjunct, and usually cannot be

separated from its lexical verb:

The news made him reel distractedly back

There are also syntactic signs of cohesion In free combinations, it is often

possible to place a modifying adverb right (or sometimes straight) between the

adverb particle and the verb:

Go right/straight/on Drink right up Walk straight in

Another sign of a free combination is the possibility of placing the adverb before the verb with subject-verb inversion (or without inversion where the subject is a pronoun):

Out came the sun

Up you come

On we drove into the night

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) But with phrasal verbs this is not possible:

Up blew the tank

Up it blew, [exploded]

Out he passed, [fainted]

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) However, in this as in other criteria, there is an unclear boundary between

phrasal verbs and free combinations With They chattered away the inversion is very marginally acceptable: Away they chattered Some examples are more

acceptable if the particle is reduplicated according to the pattern of iterative coordination:

On and on he went about his wife and family

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) And where the phrasal verb makes metaphorical use of spatial adverbs,

inversion seems quite acceptable:

Down came the prices, and up went the sales

There was a gust of wind, and out went the light

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

The second type is transitive phrasal verb

Many phrasal verbs may take a direct object, and may therefore be described as transitive

We will set up a new unit

Someone turned on the light

I’ve handed in my registration

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

With most transitive phrasal verbs, as with free combinations of the same pattern, the particle can either precede or follow the direct object:

They turned on the light

They turned the light on

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) Bearing in mind the adverbial status of the particle, we would indeed expect the latter order (SVOA) to be the more usual, even though it means a separation

of the particle from its verb When the object is a personal pronoun, the S V O

A order is in fact the only one allowable:

They switched it on

They switched on it

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

As before, phrasal verbs have to be distinguished lexically from free syntactic combinations of verb and prepositional adverb Contrast:

She took in the box.[brought inside] [FREE COMBINATION]

She took in her parents [deceived] [PHRASAL VERB]

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

As in intransitive combinations, so in transitive verb-adverb combinations the adverb may be semantically equivalent to a reduced prepositional phrase, from which the complement has been omitted:

They pulled the cart along ['along the road, etc’]

Move the furniture out ['out of the house, etc’]

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) These are clearly free combinations, not phrasal verbs

The third type is prepositional verbs

A prepositional verb consists of a lexical verb followed by a preposition with which it is semantically and/or syntactically associated The preposition, as

is to be expected, precedes its complement:

Look at these pictures

I don’t care for Jane’s parties

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985)

In these examples, the lexical verb is followed by a particle which is unequivocally a preposition

In using the term prepositional verb we indicate that we regard the second

noun phrase in the following sentence like as the complement of the preposition

at and not as the direct object of a verb look at:

Many people looked at the pictures

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985) The last type is phrasal-prepositional verb

There is a further major category of multi-word verbs which will be called phrasal- prepositional verbs, because they contain, in addition to the lexical verb, both an adverb and a preposition as particles These combinations are largely restricted to informal English:

We are all looking forward to your party on Saturday

He had to put up with a lot of teasing at school

Why don’t you look in on Mrs Johnson on your way back?

He thinks he can get away with everything

The prepositional passive with such verbs is not too common, and is liable

to sound cumbersome Examples such as the following, however, are normal and acceptable:'

These tantrums could not be put up with any longer [‘tolerated’]

They were looked down on by their neighbours [‘despised’]

First, SV structure For example:

Someone was laughing

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) SVA is the second type For example:

I have been in the garden

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) Third, SVC structure For example:

The country became totally independent

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) Fourth, SVO structure See the following example:

My mother enjoys parties

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721)

Fifth, SVOA structure See the following structure:

You must put all the toys upstairs

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) The sixth type is SVOC structure For example:

Most people consider these books rather expensive

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) The last type is SVOO structure See the following example:

Mary gave the visitor a glass of milk

(Quirk, Randolph, 1985: 721) This set of patterns is the most general classification that can be usefully applied to the classification of sentence patterns of the order verb group in English

1.4 Sumary

This chapter has provided us with the theoretical background for the contrastive analysis of syntactic and semantic features of the verb Set in English collocations and their equivalents in Vietnamese It covers an overview of

s y n t a c t i c , semantic features, a brief introduction about verbs in English and

in Vietnamese We have also discussed two types of word meanings: grammatical and lexical meanings Moreover, a short description of collocations as well as the distinction among free word combinations, idiomatic expressions and collocations is also mentioned Based on this theoretical foundation, we will commence chapter 3 to choose the suitable research orientations and research methods for this study

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research- governing orientations

3.1.1 Research questions

This study aims at pointing out the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents So, this study has three questions need to be studied:

1 What are the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set?

2 What are the similarities and differences to their Vietnamese in term of syntactic and semantic?

3 What are implications and suggestions for teaching and learning the English collocation containing the verb Set?

3.1.2 Research setting

With the experience of having taught English for more than five years, I realize that my students often make mistakes when they learn and use the English collocation containing the verb Set Therefore, this study intends to be carried out through dictionaries, novels, stories and internet to help my students more clearly about syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set

3.1.3 Research approaches

The research approaches for the study will be as follows:

- Collecting and classifying data, the research approaches help the study process simple and find the result easily and correctly In this method, the English collocation containing the verb Set and their Vietnamese equivalents is

collected, then only statistics on the number of the English collocation containing the verb Set

- Analyzing data: arrange, classify the English collocation containing the verb Set according to certain criteria of symbolic meaning and the aspects of syntactic

- Descriptive is an important method is used in this thesis It helps to show the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set

- Comparing and Contrastive: these methods are used to find out the similarities and differences between English and Vietnamese in using the English collocation containing the verb Set

- Putting forward some implications for teaching and learning English with the English collocation containing the verb Set, and giving suggestions for further researches

3.1.4 Principles/ criteria for intended data collection and data analysis

The data used in the study is collected from dictionaries; English- English dictionary, English- Vietnamese dictionary, English- Vietnamese novels, English- Vietnamese stories and the internet

After reading the materials collected, the study focus on the English collocation containing the verb Set and their Vietnamese equivalents All of the collocation containing the verb Set are selected from dictionary, novel and stories, so they are reliable for research results

3.2 Research methods

3.2.1 Major methods and supporting methods

 Major methods:

- Descriptive method is used to describe the syntactic and semantic feature

of the English collocation containing the verb Set

- Contrastive and comparative methods are used to find out the similarities and differences between English and Vietnamese in using the collocation containing the verb Set

 Supporting methods: Some techniques such as quantitative and qualitative are used as data collection and data analysis

3.2.2 Data collection techniques

The data collection is the most important step in any research This procedure consists of two main stages

Firstly, a large number the English collocation containing the verb Set were collected in order to make the corpus of this thesis

Secondly, statistics on the number of the collocation containing the verb

Set Classifying them into the group means, group structures And then

determining the frequency of occurrence of each collocation containing the verb Set

3.2.3 Data analysis techniques

In this study, from 187 English collocations containing the verb Set and their Vietnamese equivalents, we choose the most interesting and noticeable one which can clearly illustrate syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set and their Vietnamese equivalents

After collecting 187 English collocations containing the verb Set and their Vietnamese equivalents, we categorize them into syntactic features and semantic features Then the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set are presented through clear and understandable examples After that the finding and discussions are carried out in order to state the differences and similarities in English and Vietnamese

3.3 Summary

This chapter indicates research orientations and research methods The data used in the study is collected from dictionaries, bilingual novels and stories After collecting and classifying data, analyzing data should be done This study uses four main methods, they are descriptive, contrasitive, quantitative and qualitative to point out the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents in the following chapter

CHAPTER 4 SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF THE ENGLISH COLLOCATION CONTAINING THE VERB SET WITH

REFERENCE TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

4.1 Syntactic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set

After investigating, the data is expressed as the following table:

Table 1: Syntactic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set

Syntactic features of the collocation containing the verb Set are expressed

through the following seven types of clauses They are SV, SVO, SVC, SVA,SVOA, SVOC and SVOO:

1 Type SV

This clause structure is shown in the following examples:

The sun is setting

The jelly hasn’t set yet

(OAL’ED, 2005)

In these cases, set are intransitive verbs goes after the subject The sun and The jelly and has no object after

2 Type SVA

Set is used as a transitive verb It goes after the subject some kinds of cocrete, her eyes, the narrow windows and it is followed by the adverbs more quickly, very close together, in the wall in the following examples:

Some kinds of concrete set more quickly than others

Her eyes are set very close together

The narrow windows are deeply set in the wall

(Wuthering Heights,2)

3 Type SVC

Set plays the role of a transitive verb in:

Her bracelet was set with emeralds

This dictionary is set in Nimrod

(OAL’ED, 2005) Here, the verb set go with a subject complement with emeralds in the first example and in Nimrod in the second one It goes after the verb Her bracelet and This dictionary

4 Type SVO

Who will be setting the French exam?

The surgeon set her broken arm

Schubert set many of Goethe’s poem

(OAL’ED, 2005)

In these examples, the transitive verb set is used It goes after the subject who in the wh-question and the subject The surgeon and Schubert It goes before the object the French exam, her broken arm and many of Goethe’s poem

Set is also a transitive verb in a phrase verb set aside It is also after the subject

and before the object, as in the following example:

Let’s set aside my personal feelings

(OAL’ED, 2005)

5 Type SVOA

Set is a transitive verb + noun+ preposition phrase in the following

examples:

The revolution set the country on the road to democracy

We set food and drink before the travellers

(OAL’ED, 2005) Here, set goes after the subject The revolution, We, goes before the direct object the country, food and drink and the preposition phrase on the road to democracy or before the travellers

Or in the next examples, set is also a transitive verb + noun+ preposition phrase

He set a post in the ground

She set a tray down on the table

6 Type SVOC

This structure is expressed in the following examples:

The sudden noise set the dog barking

The hijackers set the hostages free

She set the dog loose

In these cases, set is used as a transitive verb It follows the subject the sudden noise, the hijackers and she And it is followed by direct objects the dog, the hostages and object complements barking, free, loose

7 Type SVOO

This structure is expressed in the following examples:

She’s set himself a difficult task

4.2 Semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set

After investigating, the data is described in the following table:

Table 2: Semantic features of the English collocation containing the verb Set