Expressions of gratitude in corpus and DCT data:
Abstract
Our study explores the similarities and differences between a discourse completion task (DCT)
and corpus data and discusses potential implications for using the two in a pedagogic context.
The DCT has traditionally been used an instrument for the study of interlanguage pragmatics while
both spoken and written corpora have mainly been used to facilitate language description. Corpora
also have a place in the language-teaching context as they can provide the learner with patterns of
language use in social interactions some of which are not open to intuition. By contrasting native
speakers’ expressions of gratitude elicited by a DCT with those found in a five million word corpus
of spoken English, we examine the advantages and disadvantages of both data sets with regard to the
language-teaching context. The results suggest that a combined use of both instruments might aid
the teaching of formulaic sequences in the classroom.http://forum.corpus4u.org/upload/forum/2006041414090694.pdf
Abstract
Our study explores the similarities and differences between a discourse completion task (DCT)
and corpus data and discusses potential implications for using the two in a pedagogic context.
The DCT has traditionally been used an instrument for the study of interlanguage pragmatics while
both spoken and written corpora have mainly been used to facilitate language description. Corpora
also have a place in the language-teaching context as they can provide the learner with patterns of
language use in social interactions some of which are not open to intuition. By contrasting native
speakers’ expressions of gratitude elicited by a DCT with those found in a five million word corpus
of spoken English, we examine the advantages and disadvantages of both data sets with regard to the
language-teaching context. The results suggest that a combined use of both instruments might aid
the teaching of formulaic sequences in the classroom.http://forum.corpus4u.org/upload/forum/2006041414090694.pdf