Chapter 7
Complex prepositions of analogy and contrast in English
A corpus-based analysis
Complex prepositions of the form [P (Det) N P] and [(P) ADJ to] (e.g., in addition to,
with respect to, in accordance with, due to, pursuant
to) undoubtedly belong to formal registers that Basil Bernstein calls “elaborated code” and that John
Lucy refers to as “intellectualized language” – they are much more frequent in written than in spoken language and
they are more frequent in formal non-fiction writing (bureaucratic, academic and technical texts) than in informal
non-fiction (newspapers) or fiction writing, and they (seem to) construct more explicit, complex and decontextualized
relationships than simple prepositions, in line with the functional pressure on such registers to give preference to
accuracy over communicative economy. As such, it is interesting to study the types of relations they express, and,
crucially, the types of distinctions they make with regard to these relations. Among these relations, we find
contrast (as opposed to, in contrast with/to, contrary to) and, less frequently,
analogy (similar to, in comparison with, by analogy with/to). This offers an opportunity
to study the way in which these relations, which are implicit in linguistic construal in a wide range of constructions
and processes, are used explicitly to structure knowledge – if that is, in fact, what complex prepositions do. My
chapter focuses on complex prepositions of contrast and analogy and use a wide range of corpus data to show what
communicative functions these serve and whether and how the distinctions made possible by the existence of alternative
forms and variants are exploited both in formal and informal language.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Background: Complex prepositions as constructions
- 3.Literature review: Survey of dictionaries
- 3.1Complex prepositions of analogy
- 3.2Complex prepositions of contrast
- 3.3Preliminary summary and research questions
- 4.Empirical studies
- 4.1Complex prepositions of analogy
- 4.1.1[by/in analogy with/to]
- 4.1.2Case study: [analogous to]
- 4.1.3Summary: [by/in analogy with/to] and [analogous to/with]
- 4.2Complex prepositions of contrast
- 4.2.1[in/by contrast to/with]
- 4.2.2[contrary to]
- 5.Conclusion
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Notes
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References