Chinese Multiword Expressions: Theoretical and Practical Perspectives

132 Pages·2020·1.708 MB·English

by  Shan Wang

Shan Wang
Chinese
Multiword
Expressions
Theoretical and Practical Perspectives
Chinese Multiword Expressions
Shan Wang
Chinese Multiword
Expressions
Theoretical and Practical Perspectives
Shan Wang
Faculty of Arts and Humanities
University of Macau
Macau, China
ISBN 978-981-13-8509-4 ISBN 978-981-13-8510-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8510-0
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Abstract
Language learning involves, roughly speaking, two types of tasks: to acquire vocab-
ulary and to learn how these units can be combined to form larger units such as
sentences. In terms of resources, we learn vocabulary by consulting dictionaries and
learn how to form syntactic units by consulting grammar. This somewhat simplistic
view, however, fails to directly address the learning of multiword expressions
(MWEs), which are typically not adequately covered by either dictionaries or
grammar.
Research on MWEs has burgeoned in recent decades. It has become clear to
linguists that strings of two or more words are often together, forming a useful lin-
guistic unit. However, on the one hand, these units are often not included in the lexi-
con for various reasons. On the other hand, their combination is not always fully
predicted by syntactic rules, and their meaning is not often the adding up of the
parts. This is why MWEs are often treated differently.
Learning and teaching MWEs have become a core and thriving topic in research
of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. There are, however, very few
systematic studies that have been carried out regarding Chinese MWEs. During
learning Chinese MWEs, learners often meet the phenomenon such as lǜsè shípǐn
‘(lit. green food) healthy diet’ whose meaning has nothing do to with the color of
the food, contrasting with MWEs like bǎohù huánjìng ‘protect environment’, whose
meaning is the combination of bǎohù ‘protect’ and huánjìng ‘environment’. These
examples make an easy argument for different degrees of compositionality.
This study aims to discover the unique characteristics of Chinese MWEs and
provide key knowledge of MWEs to support the community of teaching Chinese as
a second language. The main findings of this study are as follows: (1) It proposes
that the core attribute of MWEs is “prefabrication.” (2) It constructs The CSL
Textbooks Corpus, based on which the MWEs are manually identified. It then builds
The MWEs Corpus of CSL Textbooks and conducts a comprehensive analysis of
MWEs in different sets of textbooks. (3) It proposes a MWE classification system
composed of seven categories, including idioms (set phrases, institutionalized
expressions, and other types of idioms), polite formulas, parentheses, conventional-
ized expressions, high-frequency collocations, frame structures (phrase frames and
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vi Abstract
four character frames), and classifier phrases (nominal classifier phrases and verbal
classifier phrases). (4) It not only establishes the knowledge framework of MWEs,
including form, meaning, use, and compositionality, but also creates The MWEs
Knowledge Base. (5) It examines how textbooks of teaching Chinese as a second
language treat MWEs and suggests how to improve the contents of MWEs.
The outcomes of this book provide important insights into improving language
learning, editing textbooks, and compiling learners’ dictionaries. Moreover, the cor-
pora and findings arising from this research offer a valuable resource not only for
the field of language education, but also for psychology and natural language
processing.
Keywords
Multiword expressions (MWEs) · Chinese as a second language (CSL) · Textbooks
· Corpora
Contents
1 Introduction ............................................................................................... 1
1.1 Research Issues and Objectives .......................................................... 1
1.2 Impacts of This Research ................................................................... 2
1.3 The Structure of the Book .................................................................. 3
References ................................................................................................... 4
2 Definition and Criteria of Chinese Multiword Expressions .................. 7
2.1 Terms and Definitions of MWEs ........................................................ 7
2.1.1 Terms ...................................................................................... 7
2.1.2 Definitions .............................................................................. 8
2.1.3 The Nature of MWEs ............................................................. 10
2.1.4 The Definition of MWEs in This Study ................................. 11
2.2 Identification and Extraction of MWEs ............................................. 12
2.3 Criteria of Chinese MWEs in This Study .......................................... 15
References ................................................................................................... 20
3 Extract Multiword Expressions from Textbooks ................................... 23
3.1 Construction of The CSL Textbook Corpus ....................................... 23
3.1.1 Selection of Textbooks ........................................................... 23
3.1.2 Information of the Selected Textbooks .................................. 26
3.1.3 The Processing of Texts ........................................................ 28
3.1.4 General Information of The CSL Textbooks Corpus ............. 29
3.2 Construction of The MWEs Corpus of CSL Textbooks ..................... 29
3.2.1 Extracting MWEs from Textbooks ........................................ 29
3.2.2 Standardization of MWEs’ Variants ....................................... 30
3.2.3 Examples of the MWEs Corpus of CSL Textbooks ............... 33
3.3 MWEs in Four Sets of Chinese Textbooks ........................................ 35
3.3.1 MWEs’ General Information in Four Sets of Textbooks ....... 35
3.3.2 Analysis Based on Textbooks ................................................ 37
3.3.3 Analysis Based on Levels/Volumes ....................................... 38
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3.3.4 The Enlightenment to Teaching According
to the Distribution of MWEs .................................................. 38
References ................................................................................................... 40
4 Classification of Multiword Expressions ................................................ 43
4.1 Existing Classification of MWEs ....................................................... 43
4.2 Classification of MWEs in This Research ......................................... 45
4.3 Characteristics of Each Category of MWEs ...................................... 49
4.3.1 Idioms ..................................................................................... 49
4.3.2 Polite Formulas ...................................................................... 51
4.3.3 Conventionalized Expressions ............................................... 51
4.3.4 Parentheses ............................................................................. 52
4.3.5 High Frequency Collocations ................................................. 54
4.3.6 Frame Structures .................................................................... 56
4.3.7 Classifier Phrases ................................................................... 57
4.3.8 Summary of the Characteristics of Different
Categories of MWEs .............................................................. 58
4.4 Categories of MWEs in the Textbooks ............................................... 61
4.4.1 Distribution of Different Categories of MWEs
in Four Sets of Textbooks ....................................................... 61
4.4.2 MWEs’ Categories in Different Levels of Textbooks ............ 62
4.4.3 High Frequency MWEs in Textbooks .................................... 65
4.4.4 Enlightenments to Teaching from the Distribution
of MWEs ................................................................................ 68
References ................................................................................................... 69
5 The Knowledge Framework of Chinese Multiword Expressions ......... 73
5.1 Form ................................................................................................... 73
5.1.1 Pronunciation ......................................................................... 74
5.1.2 Orthography ........................................................................... 74
5.1.3 MWE Parts ............................................................................. 75
5.1.4 Form Standardization of MWEs ............................................ 75
5.2 Meaning.............................................................................................. 76
5.2.1 Semantic Features of MWEs .................................................. 77
5.2.2 Interpretation of MWEs ......................................................... 80
5.2.3 Semantic Relationships of MWEs ......................................... 82
5.3 Use...................................................................................................... 83
5.3.1 Grammatical Functions of MWEs ......................................... 83
5.3.2 Example Sentences................................................................. 85
5.3.3 Constraints on Use ................................................................. 87
5.4 Compositionality ................................................................................ 96
5.4.1 Semantic Transparency .......................................................... 96
5.4.2 Syntactic Analyzability .......................................................... 100
5.4.3 Non-literal Meanings ............................................................. 102
Contents ix
5.5 Construction of The MWEs Knowledge Base ................................... 104
5.5.1 Information of The MWEs Knowledge Base ......................... 104
5.5.2 Deep Knowledge Annotation to MWEs ................................. 105
5.6 Application of The MWEs Knowledge Base ..................................... 107
5.6.1 The Treatment of MWEs in Four Sets of Textbooks .............. 107
5.6.2 Suggestions for Improving MWE Content in Textbooks ....... 108
5.6.3 Application of The MWEs Knowledge Base ......................... 110
References ................................................................................................... 117
6 Conclusions and Future Work ................................................................. 123
6.1 Conclusions ........................................................................................ 123
6.2 Future Work ........................................................................................ 125
References ................................................................................................... 126
List of Tables
Table 2.1 Operational standards of MWE identification and selection ......... 17
Table 3.1 Four sets of comprehensive Chinese textbooks used
in this study ................................................................................... 24
Table 3.2 Number of journal papers and theses examining the four
sets of textbooks ............................................................................ 24
Table 3.3 General information of four sets of textbooks ............................... 29
Table 3.4 Examples of The MWEs corpus of CSL textbooks ....................... 34
Table 3.5 Examples of the MWEs corpus (Translated) ................................. 34
Table 3.6 Number of MWEs in four sets of textbooks .................................. 36
Table 3.7 Distribution of MWEs in each set of textbooks ............................ 38
Table 3.8 Distribution of MWEs in different volumes .................................. 39
Table 4.1 The classification system of MWEs .............................................. 46
Table 4.2 Summary of the study of conventionalized expressions ................ 53
Table 4.3 Characteristics of MWEs ............................................................... 59
Table 4.4 Distribution of different categories of MWEs in four
sets of textbooks ............................................................................ 62
Table 4.5 Category distribution of MWEs in each set of textbooks .............. 63
Table 4.6 The number and percentage of different categories
of MWEs in different levels or volumes ........................................ 64
Table 4.7 The distribution of the high frequency MWEs in textbooks ......... 66
Table 4.8 Examples of textbooks that MWEs appear ................................... 68
Table 4.9 16 classifier phrases (chosen from Table 4.7) ................................ 68
Table 5.1 Dictionary information and what is involved in knowing
a word (Nation, 2001).................................................................... 74
Table 5.2 Semantic features of each category of MWEs .............................. 77
Table 5.3 Syntactic analyzability of some categories of MWEs ................... 102
Table 5.4 Examples of The MWEs Knowledge Base (1) .............................. 112
Table 5.5 Examples of The MWEs Knowledge Base (2) .............................. 115
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