Chinese EFL Learners' Use Of Manner Verbs:A Corpus-based Study

This thesis investigates Chinese EFL learners' use of English manner expressions.Manner expressions refer to linguistic expressions that contain manner information.Manner verbs,manner adverbs and manner descriptions(phrases and clauses)are examples of manner expressions.Given that typological and contrastive studies have found Chinese and English to be different in their preferences in expressing manner information,it is logical to expect some effect of L1 influence in Chinese EFL learner's use of manner expressions.This thesis,therefore,carries out a corpus-based study and a sentence translation to answer the following research questions.1.What are the similarities and differences between the ways Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers use manner expressions?2.What kind of manner expressions would Chinese EFL learners use if given the manner information in Chinese?Does the explicit knowledge of the typological difference between Chinese and English regarding the expression of manner information have an influence?The investigation and analysis of CLEC(Chinese Learner English Corpus)and LOB(as a reference corpus representing native speakers' use of English)reveal the following features of Chinese EFL learners' use of manner expressions:First,Chinese EFL learners use much less conflated manner verbs than native English speakers in terms of both quantity and variety.Second,compared with their use of manner verbs,Chinese EFL learners' use of"verb + adverb" constructions and manner adverbs are closer to that of the native speakers.The frequency of manner adverbs between Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers is similar.It seems that Chinese EFL learners tend to express manner information separately in adjuncts.The heavy use of manner adverbs also causes semantic repetition,which should be noticed in L2 acquisition.We also notice that higher-level English proficiency might facilitate Chinese EFL learners to use more conflated manner verbs.The sentence translation test was designed to investigate how Chinese EFL learners attempt to convey manner information in English when they are given such information.Three groups of students are asked to translate 15 Chinese sentences into English.These sentences contain manner information expressed separately in Chinese linguistic forms but conflated in English manner verbs.The first two groups of students(44 second year English major students and 40 second year non-English major students)are taught about the typological difference between English and Chinese with respect to the expression of manner information.The third group contains 52 second year English majors who are not taught about the relevant typology.The total frequency of manner verbs used by three groups in the study is relatively low.They are inclined to use first-tier manner verbs with the modification of adverbials and other ways of description to express the manner information as what has been revealed in the corpus-based study.There is a statistical significance between students with and without explicit knowledge in respect to the use of conflated manner verbs.The findings reveal that many Chinese EFL learners have noticed the typical features of English manner expressions,yet they still cannot overcome L1 interference when expressing manner information.The study broadens the scope of research on the expression of manner information to other semantic domains and has both theoretical and pedagogical implications.