Chapter published in:
Formulaic Language: Volume 1. Distribution and historical changeEdited by Roberta Corrigan, Edith A. Moravcsik, Hamid Ouali and Kathleen Wheatley
[Typological Studies in Language 82] 2009
► pp. 97–116
The aim is to analyze NP
The function of prefabricated chunks in academic texts
Elma Kerz | RWTH Aachen University
Florian Haas | Free University of Berlin
In the present study we investigate the use and function of prefabricated chunks in academic writing by focusing on what we will term “research predicates”, i.e., high-frequency lexical items designating the research process with its key stages. We conducted a manual analysis of these predicates in the academic subcomponent of the British National Corpus and extracted a set of partially lexically filled constructions. Adopting a usage-based constructionist approach and examining its ability to study prefabricated chunks in the register of academic writing, we show that research predicates are part of more complex partially substantive constructions which commonly occur in the register of academic texts and have a acquired a more or less formulaic status. The function of these constructions is to mirror the key phases of an idealized research process.
Published online: 20 May 2009
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.82.05the
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.82.05the
Cited by
Cited by 3 other publications
Sadler, Misumi
Wray, Alison
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 01 april 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.