Schedule 18. Sprachwissenschaftliche Tagung für Promotionsstudierende

There is extensive research on adult L2 learners of English with various linguistic backgrounds tackling the question which issues they face when confronted with phrasal verbs as the review of Jahedi and Mukundan (2015) shows. They quote Dagut and Laufer (1985) who argue that Hebrew speaking learners of English struggle with phrasal verbs because there is no such phenomenon in the Hebrew language, which is why they suppose it is mainly due to the incomprehensible structure of the verb. Hulstijn and Marchena (1989), however, examined Dutch speaking learners of English to see whether they encounter no issues as the Dutch language does have phrasal verbs too. They found that Dutch speakers also face troubles regarding phrasal verbs. Thus, they argue that not only the structure of phrasal verbs, but their semantics too cause problems for learners.

This project aims to examine whether adult L2 learners of Welsh show signs of troubles when confronted with Welsh phrasal verbs. To achieve this goal, firstly, the term phrasal verbs will be defined. Following, Dagut’s and Laufer’s (1985) and Hulstijn’s and Marchena’s studies will be adapted, to first examine the behaviour of Welsh native speakers concerning Welsh phrasal verbs and to then collect data of Welsh adult learners, to inspect whether learners produce similar behaviour as native speakers or explicitly avoid phrasal verbs. Because Dutch speakers showed behaviour of avoidance concerning English phrasal verbs, English speakers learning Welsh are expected to show similar behaviour, if it is the semantics of the phrasal verbs that cause confusion amongst learners.

Both steps, the definition of the term and the adaptation of the studies, bare difficulties. The majority of literature and research of phrasal verbs focuses on the phenomenon in English or other Germanic Languages, often ignoring that similar patterns also exist in other European languages but might have slightly different properties following the underlying structure of its respective language. Therefore, composing a definition that also describes the special properties Welsh phrasal verbs encompass, is difficult, as many Welsh dictionaries or grammars disregard them (Asmus 2001 and Rottet 2005). Additionally, the adaptation of the studies requires a different set of one-word and phrasal verb pairs, because Welsh does not have ones for certain meanings. However, finding Welsh phrasal verbs as replacement is difficult, as I am a Welsh learner myself and thus, have to consult native speakers to find a set of verbs that occurs naturally in speech.

References

Asmus, S. 2005. Revisiting Welsh Word Classes. In Celtic Forum, pp. 5 – 14.
Bolinger, D. 1971. The Phrasal Verb in English. Cambrigde, MA: Harvard University Press.
Celce-Murcia, M. and Larsen-Freeman, D. 1983. The Grammar Book – An ESL/EFL Teacher’s Course. Rowley, London, Tokyo: Newbury House Publisher, Inc.
Dagut, M. and Laufer, B. 1985. Avoidance of Phrasal Verbs – A Case for Contrastive Analysis. In Studies in Second Language Acquisition Vol. 7 No.1, pp. 73 – 79.
Hulstijn, J. H. and Marchena, E. 1989. Avoidance: grammatical or semantic causes? In Studies in Second Language Acquisition, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 241 – 255.
Iacobini, C. 2009. Phrasal verbs between syntax and lexicon. In Rivista di Linguistica Vol. 21 No. 1, pp. 97 – 117.
Jahedi, M. and Mukundan, J. 2015. A Review on Studies of Phrasal Verb Constructions in ESL Context. In Advances in Language and Literary Studies Vol. 6 No. 1, pp. 157 – 162.
Rottet, K. J. 2005. Phrasal verbs and English influence in Welsh. In Word Vol. 56 No. 1, pp. 39 – 70.

Info

Day: 2021-09-24
Start time: 11:50
Duration: 00:40
Room: Don Giovanni

Language: en

Links:

• iCalendar