基于多语体语料的英语双及物结构研究——以give为例

A Corpus-based Multi-genre Study of English Ditransitive Construction: A Case Study of Give

文章以最典型的双及物动词give为例,通过调用英国国家语料库中口语、小说、报纸和学术期刊语料分库,分析和统计双宾语结构和与格结构的例句中接受者和客体的定指性、代词性和成分长度,从结构内部、结构之间和语体之间三个层面对比呈现了接受者和客体的上述特征。研究发现,就双宾语结构而言,诸语体中接受者和客体的语序基本体现了信息流对语序的制约。然而,就与格结构而言,接受者和客体的信息特征在上述语体中表现各异,信息因素对其语序及双及物结构句式使用的制约力度在不同语体间存在差异,部分语体中甚至存在与前人的发现不一致的现象。在此基础上,文章计算了联系各个因素预测上述不同语体中双及物结构的句式使用的准确度。结论是,从信息角度解释和预测双及物结构的句式使用还应考虑语体差异。

Taking the most typical ditransitive verb give as an example, the present paper retrieves four sub-corpora of the British National Corpus, namely, Spoken English, Fiction, Newspaper and Academic Journals, and analyzes definiteness, pronominality and length of recipients and themes in tokens of double object construction and prepositional dative construction. Three-fold contrasts between recipients and themes in terms of the above variables are made and demonstrated within a construction, across constructions and genres. It is found that for double object constrnction the ordering of the recipients and themes generally observes the constraint of informational flow. However, for prepositional dative construction, the genres vary from one to another in the informational status of recipients and themes and in the constraint of informational variables on the ordering and hence on the use of ditransitive construction, and moreover there are some language phenomena inconsistent with previous studies in certain genres. Furthermore, the paper calculates the percentages of the constructional use predicted correctly in the above different genres when each variable is examined. It is concluded that genre variation should be taken into consideration in explaining and predicting the use of ditransitive construction from informational perspective.