The Use of ANDDM in Tertiary Chinese EFL Learners’ English
Compositions: A Relevance Theory Perspective
by
Nie Yuefang
Under the Supervision of
Professor Chen Xinren
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of Master of Arts
English Department
School of Foreign Studies
Nanjing University
October 2005
Declaration
I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my
knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by
another person or material which has to a substantial extent been accepted for the
award of other degree or diploma at any university or other institute of higher learning,
except where due acknowledgement has been made in the text.
Signature: _________
Name:
Nie Yuefang
Date:
2006-4-8
Abstract
The Use of ANDDM in Tertiary Chinese EFL Learners’ English Compositions: A
Relevance Theory Perspective
Nie Yuefang
The present study investigates the use of the discourse marker “and” (hereafter in
this thesis ANDDM) by advanced Chinese EFL learners, as compared with its use by
mature English writers (those who have had their English written work published).
Specifically, two research questions are addressed in this study: (1) Are there any
significant differences in the use of ANDDM between tertiary Chinese EFL learners
and mature writers of English in their writing? (2) Does tertiary Chinese EFL learners’
use of ANDDM in their writing vary significantly with their English proficiency? It
was hypothesized in this study that tertiary Chinese EFL learners significantly overuse
“and” as a discourse marker, and their use of ANDDM does not vary significantly with
their English proficiency, as it is decided by the learners’ pragmatic awareness instead
of their L2 proficiency.
The learners corpus employed is a collection of some timed essays written by
English majors from four grades respectively in a famous university in Jiangsu
province, China, while the mature English writers corpus is a collection of academic
essays randomly selected from some international academic journals like TESOL and
The Journal of Pragmatics. All the data were tagged according to the different
functions they served and then sorted out with help of the tool of WordSmith and
finally processed with SPSS to see whether the significance reached the significant
level to answer the last two research questions.
Under the framework of Relevance Theory, the corpus-based study reveals that
compared with mature English writers, tertiary Chinese EFL learners significantly
overuse the bare form of ANDDM, but substantially underuse the complicated form of
ANDDM (ANDDM used together with some conjunctive adverbials such as “therefore”,
“however”, and “so”), though the latter helps to make more explicit the logical
relationships between segments in cases when the former is too general and
consequently ambiguous. With respect to the four cognitive effects that ANDDM helps
to indicate, that of strengthening and that of contextual implication were significantly
overused by the learners; that of the topic transition was substantially overused; and
there is almost no difference between the learners and mature writers in the use of
ANDDM marking contradiction. Considering that advanced Chinese EFL learners’
English compositions display a great many features such as the general overuse of
ANDDM, the overuse of ANDDM indicating the logical relationship of condition and
transition, which are all typical of oral English, it is argued their overuse of ANDDM
results from their transfer of orality features into their written work. It is also found in
this study that advanced Chinese EFL learners’ English proficiency does not show
positive correlation with their use of ANDDM in their writing, which suggests that
their pragma-cognitive awareness does not necessarily improve with the development
of their English proficiency.
The present study has important theoretical as well practical implications.
Theoretically speaking, the present study may help us understand the pragmatic
functions of ANDDM, hence contributing to the theory of discourse markers. In
addition to that, it can also enrich research in SLA in that the present research
suggests that SLA research is not confined to learners’ acquisition of linguistic
features. Practically, the present study contributes to lexicology, in that it reveals that
what pragmatic meanings of discourse markers can be included in dictionary
compilation. Besides, it has some pedagogical implications for both language teachers
and learners. Language teachers need to give their students pragmatic information
about discourse markers as well as their linguistic meanings and help to develop their
students’ pragmatic awareness in speaking and writing alike. Meanwhile, students
should also pay attention to such words as “and” as discourse markers as well as mere
conjunctions.
中文摘要
中国高水平大学生英语书面语中话语标记语 AND 的语用分析
聂月芳
本研究调查了中国高水平英语习得者使用话语标记语 and（ANDDM）的情况，
并把此情况和老练的英语写作者使用 ANDDM 的情况进行对比分析。论文主要回
答了以下两个问题：
（1）在 ANDDM 的使用上中国高水平英语学习者与老练的英
语写作者是否存在显著差异？（2）中国高水平英语学习者对 ANDDM 的使用是
否随着其英语水平的提高而有显著改善？我们的假定研究结果是中国高水平英
语习得者在英文写作中会滥用 ANDDM，而且这种情况不会随着其英语水平的提
高而显著改善，因为我们怀疑对 ANDDM 的使用是否得当是由其英语语用水平而
不是英语语言水平决定的。
在关联理论的框架下，本研究采用了语料库文本分析的方法，对中国高水平
英语习得者使用话语标记语的情况进行了定量分析。学习者语料由南京大学外院
英语专业四个年级学生的２４０篇限时作文，老练英语写作者语料则来自一些国
际知名语言学学术期刊上的学术论文。研究时我们首先通过对语料库文本的分析
对研究对象即 ANDDM 进行标注，并利用统计软件 WORDSMITH 收集数据，然
后我们又把所有收集数据在统计软件 SPSS 中处理以回答以上研究问题。
研究结果显示，中国高水平英语学习者在写作中对 ANDDM 的使用显著高于
老练的英语写作者，存在着滥用的现象。由于 ANDDM 本身具有笼统和模糊的特
点，因此英语本族语语言使用者常使其与其它连接副词连用以使其逻辑关系更为
明朗，但这种复合使用在中国学生的习作中明显不足。另外，通过考察各种具体
的逻辑关系发现，中国学生经常使用 ANDDM 来提示条件关系（前一分句为祈使
句）和转移话题的关系，而这两种情况在英语中通常只在口语中出现。鉴于以上
的发现以及 and 作为话语标记语的口语性特征，我们认为中国学生很有可能在写
作中没有考虑到语体的差别，把 ANDDM 在口语中的用法想当然地带入了写作中，
从而造成了 ANDDM 的滥用。另外，调查发现，中国高水平英语学习者对 and 的
使用情况和他们的英语水平没有显著关系。这进一步证明了我们的假设：他们对
ANDDM 的滥用是由于语用而不是语言能力的欠缺，因而不会随语言能力的提高
而有明显改善。
本研究具有一定的理论意义和教学实践价值。理论上，把话语标记语 and 的
功能研究放在语用能力中进行探讨，有助于我们理解 ANDDM 语用功能，因而可
以丰富标记语理论；另外，该研究告诉我们二语习得研究不应该只局限于学习者
对语言现象的习得，还应该关注学习者语用能力的发展，因而对二语习得研究也
有一定的贡献。实践上，本研究对词典教材编撰者、英语教师及广大英语学习者
皆具有一定的指导意义。
Acknowledgements
I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to those who have
offered me all kinds of help in completing this thesis.
Firs of all, my deepest gratitude goes to my supervisor, Professor Chen Xinren,
who has not only imparted to me the profound knowledge on pragmatics and general
linguistics but also offered me great assistance and supervision for this study. I am not
only impressed by his competence as a professor, but by his attitudes toward
knowledge, life and people around him. Without his patient and consistent assistance,
encouragement and guidance, this thesis could not have taken the present shape.
Great thanks should also be extended to Professor Ting Yenren, Professor Wen
Qiufang, Professor Wang Wenyu, Professor Zhang Ren and Professor Don Snow,
whose instructions in their courses gave me great insight into the world of linguistics
and benefited me a lot not only in this thesis writing but also in my further study.
I owe my thanks to all my classmates who helped me solve problems in the
planning of the study and the research design in the thesis seminar. My special thanks
goes to Li Min, who gave me patient instruction on how to use the tool of WordSmith;
and to Wang Xueyu, Ren Yuxin, Chen Hairong, Qian Jingyue, He Sha and Xu
Fangfang, who offered me great help in deciding the data I was not so sure about.
Last but not least, I want to express my thanks to my parents, who released me
from the housework during my thesis writing and my postgraduate studies, and my
husband, who not only took the burden of bringing up our son but also helped me in
the design of all the tables needed in this study.
Nie YF
Table of Contents
C HA P T E R ON E IN T R OD U C T I ON . … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … 1
1.1 Need for the Present Study …………………………………………………….1
1.2 Objective of the Present Study ………………………………………………...3
1.3 Significance of the Study………………………………………….………..…..3
1.4 Overview of the Thesis………………………………………………….…………………4
CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW …………………………………..……5
2.1 Discourse Ma rke rs ……………………………………………………………..5
2.1.1 Definition of discourse markers ………………………………………….5
2.1.2 Functions of discourse markers ………………………………………… 6
2.1.3 Classification of discourse markers ……………………………………….8
2.2 Empirical Studies on Discourse Markers and AND DM ………………………..10
2.3 Attributes and Pragmatic Functions of AND DM …………………………………11
2.4 Summa ry ………………..……………………………………………………… 13
CHAPTER THREE THE CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK……………...………14
3.1 Relevance Theory and Its Interpretation of Discourse Markers………………..14
3.2 Relevance-based Classification of the Discourse Markers……...………………16
3.3 Summary………………………………………………………………………………..….20
CHAPTER FOUR METHODOLOGY …………………………………………… ..21
4.1 Research Questions……………………………………………………………..21
4 . 2 H yp o th e sis … …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… …… 22
4. 3 C o rpu s… …………… ………… ..… …………… ……………… ………… …… . 22
4.4 Data Collec tion ………………………………………………………………… 23
4.5 Data Analysis ………………………………………………………………… ...28
4 . 6 S u mma r y… … … … … … … … … … … … …… … … … … … … … … …… . . … … … 2 9
CHAPTER FIVE RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ………………………………....30
5.1 Use of AND DM by Mature English Writers…………………………………….30
5.2 Use of AND DM by Chinese EFL learners at College Level…………………….32
5.3 Differences between Mature English Writers and Chinese College
EFL Learners in the Use of ANDDM……………………………………………...………..34
5.4 Comparison of the Use of ANDDM by Chinese College EFL learners
with Different L2 Proficiency Levels ………………………………...………40
5. 5 Su mma ry… … ……… ………… .……………… ……………… ………… …… . .4 2
C HA P T E R S IX C ONC L U S ION S … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … 4 3
6.1 Summary of the Present Study………………………………………………….43
6.2 Major Findings from the Research………………….…………………………..44
6.3 Implications of the Study…………………..……………………………………45
6.4 Limitations of the Study………………..……………………………………….46
6.5 Recommendations for Future Research…………………………………………47
R E F E R EN C E S … … …… … … … … … … … … … … … … … . . … … … … … … … … … … 4 9
List of Tables
Table 4-1: Description of corpora ………………………………………………..... 22
Table 5-1: Raw and normalized frequencies of the ways ANDDM used in MEWC ....31
Table 5-2: Respective proportions of the ways ANDDM used in MEWC ………… 31
Table 5-3: Raw and normalized frequencies of the ways ANDDM used in CCELC . .32
Table 5-4: Respective proportions of the ways ANDDM used in CCELC ………...... 33
Table 5-5: Difference between CCELC and MEWC in the frequencies
of the cognitive functions of ANDDM ……..………….……………….. 35
Table 5-6: Differences between CCELC and the MEWC in the proportions of the
cognitive functions of ANDDM in its entire discourse marker uses …... 37
Table 5-7: Differences between two groups of Chinese college students in the
frequencies of the cognitive functions of ANDDM ......................................41
Table 5-8: Differences between two groups of Chinese college students in the
proportions of different cognitive functions of ANDDM ............................41
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
This chapter briefly introduces the need and objectives of the present study. An
overview of the whole thesis will also be provided.
1.1
Need for the Present Study
In a sentence like “I am individual and the only thing I do in my life and be
confined into earn my life and enjoy it,” three and’s are used, but unfortunately, none
of these three and’s is appropriately used: we cannot see any logical relationship
between any of the two segments linked by the discourse marker and (hereafter in this
thesis ANDDM). This is not unusual for EFL learners like him. The author’s pilot study
of how Chinese college EFL learners use ANDDM reveals that it is often very hard to
decide the logical relationships between segments linked by ANDDM in Chinese
college EFL learners’ written work, largely because of their overuse of ANDDM. This
thesis reports a corpus-based study aimed at exploring more systematically Chinese
college EFL learners’ use of ANDDM, to see to what extent Chinese college EFL
learners overuse ANDDM and how they may differ from mature English writers. To
put it more specifically, we attempt to find what kinds of logical relationships that can
be made explicit by other discourse markers (DMs for short) are more or less
obscured by the use of ANDDM in Chinese college EFL learners’ writing, anticipating
some implications to Chinese EFL teachers in their teaching of discourse markers.
According to research within the theoretical framework of Relevance Theory,
discourse markers (discourse connectives in some other scholars’ terms) impose
constraints on comprehension – giving instructions about how to manipulate the
conceptual representation of the utterance, and guiding the search for intended
contexts and contextual effects. In other words, the function of DMs is to help to
make explicit logical relationships between segments. In practice, however, it is not
easy to use DMs appropriately to serve this function, because, as Dijk (1977, pp. 58 –
59) puts it, “One of the problems in the semantics of natural connectives (DMs in this
essay) is their possible ambiguity: the same connective may express different types of
connection. Typical in this respect is the conjunctive connective and” (parenthesis
inserted by the present researcher). Unlike other discourse markers, ANDDM has a
large variety of functions, suggesting a large variety of logical relationships between
segments in different contexts. Consequently, the readers/listeners have to decide one
from that many choices, which is often time- and effort-consuming, and which is
particularly difficult when the logical relationship between the very two segments is
not clear enough. Fortunately, here again Dijk (1977, p. 60) gives us some suggestions
to find a way out when we find our use of DMs cannot serve their purposes, “Should
two possible interpretations conflict in such a case, the connection would be made
more explicit by the use of other connectives.” Quirk, et al (1973) suggests another
way out when the logical relationships are obscured by the use of ANDDM; that is, the
ambiguity can be cleared by adding a conjunctive adverbial such as therefore,
however after ANDDM, since these adverbials are not ambiguous in meaning. However,
Chinese college EFL learners seem to lack such ability because they tend to be
over-dependent on ANDDM in their writing as suggested by some researchers (R. X.
Chen, 2001; X. R. Chen, 2002; Dong, 1999).
Previous studies and the present researcher’s pilot study show that Chinese EFL
learners even at college level have problems with their use of ANDDM in their writing.
Remarkably, Chinese college EFL learners tend to overuse ANDDM in their writing,
depending too much on ANDDM to suggest all kinds of logical relationships between
segments, which often fails to serve their purposes. Such overuse of ANDDM can be
dangerous, because the general and neutral character of ANDDM will inevitably blur
logical relationships between segments, leaving readers with difficulties in
understanding or even cause them to misunderstand what they read, which obviously
goes against the writers’ intention. Tomiyama (as cited in Celce-Murcia &
Larsen-Freeman, 1983, p. 323) found that ESL learners’ misuse of connectors
(discourse markers in this thesis) can be so dangerous that even native speakers were
unable to correct the errors, because the connector errors distorted the intended
message so much that even native speakers were unable to reconstruct the clausal
relationship the author/speaker had attempted to convey.
Based on these previous studies on ANDDM, our issue here is defined as follows:
What are the differences between Chinese college EFL learners and mature English
writers (those who have had their written work published) in the use of ANDDM in
their writing?
1.2 Objective of the Present Study
The present thesis is undertaken to study Chinese college EFL learners’ use of
ANDDM in writing. It aims to find out whether there is any significant difference
between Chinese college EFL learners and mature English writers in the use of
ANDDM in writing, and what the possible reasons are for such difference if there is
any. It is hypothesized that Chinese college EFL learners significantly differ from
mature English writers in the use of ANDDM in writing, and that the causes for this are
more of pragmatic awareness than of L2 competence. It is hoped that the study can
draw EFL learners’ attention to the pragmatic features of discourse markers like and
and arouse SLA researchers’ interest in EFL learners’ development in pragmatic
competence.
1.3 Significance of the Study
The present study is significant in that it has important theoretical as well
practical implications. Theoretically, the present study may contribute to the theory of
discourse markers by providing the pragmatic functions of ANDDM, and enrich SLA
research in that it suggests that SLA research is not confined to learners’ acquisition of
linguistic features. Practically, the present study contributes to lexicology, by
revealing what pragmatic meanings of discourse markers can be included in
dictionary compilation. Besides, it has some pedagogical implications for both
language teachers and learners, by drawing their attention to pragmatic information
about discourse markers as well as their linguistic meanings and students’ pragmatic
awareness in speaking and writing alike.
1.4 Overview of the Thesis
The organization of the thesis is as follows. Chapter 1 deals with the motivation
of the present study and the structure of the thesis. Chapter 2 introduces previous
studies on the definition and functions of discourse markers in general and some
general features of ANDDM in particular. Based on the literature review, the present
researcher will point out that study on the use of ANDDM in written work, which is
neglected in previous studies, is as important as that in oral work. It will also be
pointed out that comparative studies on the use of ANDDM by mature English writers
and Chinese college EFL learners in their written work are illuminating for Chinese
EFL writing teachers and Chinese college EFL learners in order for the latter to write
more native-like. The conceptual framework—Relevance Theory—is briefly
introduced in Chapter 3. What is focused here is a relevance-based categorization of
discourse markers. In Chapter 4, the focus shifts to the methodology. In this part,
research questions and hypothesis are introduced, followed by the operationalized
definition of the pragmatic functions ANDDM suggests, and the design of the present
research. The design focuses on what corpora are employed, why these corpora are
employed, how the corpora are made use of to answer the research questions, in other
words, how the data are collected and analyzed. The researcher discusses in Chapter 5
the results obtained from the data analysis. The last chapter summarizes the present
research. Meanwhile, some limitations of the present research and suggestions for
further research are also discussed in this chapter.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter attempts to give a brief review of what has been studied by previous
researchers and what questions still remain unanswered regarding the topic of this
study, hence establishing the necessity of the present study. The chapter is composed
of four sections. The first section is about the definition, functions and classification
of discourse markers. It is followed by a presentation of some empirical studies on the
linguistic expressions. The third section discusses the general features and pragmatic
functions of ANDDM. The final part presents the unanswered question, to indicate
what is going to be explored in the present research.
2.1 Discourse Markers
2.1.1 Definition of discourse markers
Till now, there is no consensus on the definition of discourse markers. Therefore,
it is necessary to review some different definitions to find some common features,
which may provide some theoretical support for our operationalized definition of
ANDDM.
Levinson regards discourse markers (“discourse particles” in his terms) as those
words or phrases that
indicate the relationship between an utterance and the prior discourse.
Examples are utterance-initial usages of but, and, therefore, in conclusion, to
the contrary, still, however, anyway, well, besides, actually, all in all, so, after
all, and so on. It is generally conceded that such words have at least a
component of meaning that resists truth-conditional treatment. What they
seem to do is indicate, often in very complex way, just how the utterance that
contains them is a response to, or a continuation of, some portion of the prior
discourse (1983, pp. 87-88).
Schiffrin analyzes such items as or, well, but, and, or, so, because, now, then, I
mean, y’know as discourse markers, defining discourse markers as “sequentially
dependent elements which bracket units of talk” (1987, p.31).
Fraser defines discourse markers as
a pragmatic class, lexical expressions drawn from the syntactic classes of
conjunctions, adverbials, and prepositional phrases. With certain
exceptions, they signal a relationship between the segment they introduce,
S2, and the prior segment, S1. (1999, p.950)
He gives a long list of discourse markers, such as but, however, in contrast,
conversely, instead, despite (doing) this/ that, and, above all, I mean, analogously, be
that as it may be.
From the above definitions given by three salient scholars, we would propose our
operational definition of discourse markers: discourse markers are such expressions as
are drawn from the syntactic classes of conjunctions, adverbials, and prepositional
phrases, used to link clauses and sentences, and served to indicate logical
relationships between these clauses and sentences. Besides, we can see from the
above mentioned definitions that and is a typical discourse marker, which is
mentioned by all the three scholars.
2.1.2 Functions of discourse markers
The previous literature reveals that discourse markers are used for coherence sake
from the viewpoint of the speaker (writer), while from that of the listeners (readers),
they provide constraints on as well as guidance to the interpretation of the utterance.
Levinson (1983) and Risselada and Spooren (1998) analyze the primary function
of discourse markers from the part of recipients; that is, how discourse markers
contribute to interpretations of the segment following them.
Levinson suggests discourse markers are significant in that they provide
constraints on the interpretation of the second segment. He regards discourse markers
(“discourse particles” in his terms) as
‘maxim hedges’ that indicate for recipients just how the utterance so
prefaced matches up to co-operative expectations (Brown & Levinson,
1978: 169ff). For example, R. Lakoff (1973) has pointed out that one
might characterize at least one sense of well as follows: well serves notice
that the speaker is aware that he is unable to meet the requirements of the
maxim of Quantity in full. Hence the typical occurrence of well in partial
answers like the following: A: Where are my glasses? B: Well, they’re not
here. (1983, p. 162)
Since discourse markers are also used between a context and a segment (the
exceptions mentioned above by Fraser), Risselada and Spooren (1998) view the
primary function of discourse markers as facilitating the process of interpreting the
coherence relation(s) between a particular unit of discourse and other, surrounding
units and/or aspects of the communicative situation.
Schiffrin (1987) views the functions of discourse markers from the part of both
speakers/writers and audience/readers, by suggesting that discourse markers provide
contextual coordinates (by looking forward to a new context and looking back on the
prior one) for utterances. According to him, discourse markers are used just because
they can serve the function of indexing an utterance to the local contexts in which
utterances are produced and in which they are to be interpreted.
Fraser (1999) discusses the functions of discourse markers from the
relevance-based theoretical framework, suggesting that instead of displaying a
relationship (as Schiffrin, 1987 would have it), a discourse marker imposes on S2 a
certain range of interpretations, given the interpretation(s) of S1 and the meaning of
the discourse marker. In her opinion, discourse markers “have a core meaning, which
is procedural, not conceptual, and their more specific interpretation is ‘negotiated’ by
the context, both linguistic and conceptual” (1999, p. 950).
Sperber and Wilson (2001) make similar comments on the functions of discourse
markers. According to them, discourse markers such as so and and, which are
procedural and non-truth-conditional, encode procedural constraints on implicatures.
To conclude, all the researchers agree that discourse markers are mainly used to
convey logical relationships between segments or between a context and a segment,
hence constraining and facilitating interpretation by encoding constraints on
implicature. It follows that if used properly, discourse markers can facilitate
recipients’ interpretation of the segments linked by them; therefore, whether
speakers/writers would employ discourse markers in their verbal communication and
whether they can use them appropriately depends on whether they would put
themselves in their recipients’ shoes, namely, their pragmatic consciousness, and their
pragmatic competence.
2.1.3 Classification of discourse markers
In the literature, there are various categorizations of discourse markers, based on
different criteria. Some scholars, like Rey, categorize discourse markers as belonging
to such different categories as:
-simple adverbs: finally, thus, obviously,…
-prepositional adverbs: in addition, of course, as a matter of fact,…
-coordinating conjunctions: but, and, or,…
-subordinating conjunctions: although, though, if, …
-prepositions + noun: notwithstanding, despite,…
(1997, p. 177)
Other researchers, such as Fraser (1999), contend that Rey’s categories are just
the syntactic classes from which discourse markers are drawn from, although she
expresses these syntactic classes in a more general way: conjunctions, adverbs, and
prepositional phrases. She categorizes discourse markers, according to the
information they relate, roughly into two main classes: those relating messages and
those relating topics. Under the first main class there are three main subclasses and a
number of very minor subclasses, as shown below:
(1) Discourse markers which relate messages
a. Contrastive markers: but, however, (al)though, conversely, on the
other hand,…
b. Collateral/ elaborative markers: furthermore, above all, similarly, I
mean, correspondingly,…
c. Inferential markers: thus, under those conditions, so, accordingly,
consequently, because of this/that, hence,…
d. Additional subclasses (those markers that do not belong to any of
the categories she classified): after all, since, because
(2) Discourse markers which relate topics: incidentally, to return to my
point
Working under a relevance-theoretic framework, Blakemore (1992) proposes
three categories of discourse markers based on the three cognitive effects proposed by
Sperber and Wilson (2001). A discourse marker may
(1)
allow the derivation of a contextual implication (e.g., so,
therefore);
(2)
strengthen an existing assumption by providing better evidence
for it (e.g., after all, moreover, furthermore);
(3)
contradict
as
existing
assumption
(e.g.,
however,
still,
nevertheless, but)
This categorization seems most appealing: according to Relevance Theory,
hearers (readers) interpret every utterance in the smallest and most accessible context
that yields adequate cognitive effects for no unjustifiable effort. Therefore, if a
speaker (writer) wishes to constrain the interpretation by a hearer (reader), he must
constrain the hearer’s (reader’s) choice of context. Since discourse markers can
function to ensure correct selection of context at minimal processing cost, they can be
regarded as an effective means to help to achieve certain cognitive effects.
However, Blakemore’s (1992) classification of discourse marker is not an
exhaustive one, as she has admitted. Some discourse markers are excluded from her
three classes of discourse markers, that is, those indicating the role of the utterance in
the discourse in which it occurs (for example, anyway, incidentally, by the way,
finally), and those indicating that kind of contextual implicatures the hearer is
expected to derive (e.g. too, also).
So far, there is not a satisfying categorization of discourse markers. Rey (1997)
categorizes discourse markers according to their syntactic classes instead of their
functions in discourse. Although both Fraser (1999) and Blakemore (1992) try to
categorize discourse markers according to their functions in discourse, they cannot
provide a systematic categorization since they both list a category of exceptions,
which reveals that they are unable to deal with certain discourse markers under the
theoretical framework used.
2.2 Empirical Studies on Discourse Markers and
ANDDM
While theoretical studies on English DMs are mainly focused on definition,
functions and classification of them, empirical studies are mostly about their
application in language learning and how they are used by native and non-native
speakers of English in their verbal communication.
Geva’s (1992) experimental study reveals that conjunctions can be used to
facilitate text comprehension by L2 learners, while Zhu (2001) argues for attention to
the importance of discourse markers in listening comprehension for EFL learners.
Both studies show that discourse markers can be used to facilitate language learning,
in that they can facilitate reading comprehension and listening comprehension.
Trillo (2002), based on a corpus-driven analysis of discourse markers, describes
the phenomenon of “Pragmatic Fossilization” as one of the main problems that
non-native speakers of English face in their learning process. Li’s (2004) study
reveals that Chinese EFL learners have the same problem, probably owing to learners’
inadequate input, output, and feedback. Schleppegrell (1996) compares strategies for
conjunction in spoken English and ESL writing, and then suggests ESL learners’
infelicitous use of the discourse marker “because” is a result of their inadequate
awareness of the pragmatic differences of discourse markers in different registers such
as in speech and in writing. R. X. Chen (2001) made a corpus-based study of the use
of sentence-initial and (part of the use of ANDDM) by native speakers of English and
Chinese EFL beginners (corpus from college entrance examination), concluding that
Chinese EFL beginners have great difficulty in the use of sentence-initial and in their
writing.
Although X. R. Chen (2002) and Dong (1999) noticed in their studies that
Chinese college EFL learners tend to overuse some simple discourse markers like
ANDDM in their writing, there is no study in the literature on how and to what extent
ANDDM is overused by Chinese college EFL learners in their writing. The present
study is intended to fill this gap.
2.3 Attributes and Pragmatic Functions of ANDDM
And is one of the most frequently used words in both spoken and written English.
It ranks third among all English words in Brown corpus and Lob corpus, following
the functional words of the and of (Gui, 1998). According to Dijk (1977), ANDDM has
both a general and neutral character in comparison with other discourse markers.
Consequently, it often causes ambiguity in discourse interpretation, and makes it
difficult to use it appropriately.
ANDDM is general and neutral because it conveys a large variety of logical
relationships between segments. According to Quirk, et al. (1985, pp. 930-932),
ANDDM can make explicit the following eight types of logical relationships:
1. The second clause is a “pure” ADDITION to the first, the only requirement
being that the two statements are congruent in meaning.
1) He has long hair and (also) he often wears jeans.
2. The second clause is CONSEQUENCE or RESULT of the first:
2) He heard an explosion and he (therefore) phoned the police.
3. The second clause is chronologically SEQUENT to the first, but without any
implication of a clause-result relationship:
3) I washed the dishes and (then) I dried them.
4. The second clause introduces a CONTRAST:
4) Robert is secretive and (in contrast) David is candid.
5. The second clause is felt to be surprising in view of the first, so that the first
clause has a CONCESSIVE force:
5) She tried hard and (yet) she failed.
6. The first clause is a CONDITION of the second:
6) Give me some money and I’ll help you escape.
The implication of the sentence is shown by the paraphrase:
6’) If you give me some money (then) I’ll help you escape.
7. The second clause makes a point SIMILAR to the first:
7) A trade agreement should be no problem, and (similarly) a cultural
exchange could be easily arranged.
8. The second clause adds an appended COMMENT on or EXPLANATION of
the first:
8) They dislike John -- and that’s not surprising in view of his behavior.
9) There’s only one thing to do now – and that’s to apologize.
Quirk, et al. (1985) made great contributions to the analysis of the pragmatic
functions ANDDM serves, but their classification cannot explain the following uses of
ANDDM:
10) I cannot keep these plants alive and I have watered them well, too.
11) Yang Mei: I have some difficulty in pronouncing some of the words in
English.
Sara: No, you’re doing fine. And when do you take your next exams?
12) There are a great many American Indian words. For example, to howl
means to cry. And cookbook is a German word.
The use of ANDDM in 10) cannot be explained by the function of concessive force
listed by Quirk, et al. (1985), because in this sentence, the first clause is felt to be
surprising in view of the second. It may be more appropriate to say that such a usage
indicates the logical relationship of concession, while the one proposed by Quirk, et al.
(1985) suggests that of conflict, a function suggested by Huang (1988).
R. X. Chen (2001), based on his corpus-based study on ANDDM, helps to explain
the uses of ANDDM in the next two sentences by suggesting two more types of logical
relationships that ANDDM can serve: TRANSITION to explain the use of ANDDM in
11) in that ANDDM here suggests that the speaker is going to introduce a new topic,
and ENUMERATION to explain that in 12) since the two clauses linked by ANDDM
are employed together to elaborate a certain point.
Despite the great efforts made by all the scholars, there are still some cases that
cannot be explained by the previously mentioned categorizations, as shown in 13):
13) Emphasis changes with each work, and although figures of authority are
particularly oppressive in works such as Like Water for Chocolate and The
Color Purple, other minority works are featured in the heroines’ enthusiastic
attitude toward life in spite of the threat of death.
The operationalized definition of the pragmatic functions of ANDDM is based on
the logical relationships it indicates between segments and Chen’s categorization of
DMs, as is presented in Chapter 4.
2.4 Summary
The reviewed literature shows that there has been a roughly set idea of what
discourse markers are, what general features they have, what functions they serve in
discourse. As far as ANDDM is concerned, a general picture has been formed of the
features of ANDDM and the types of logical relationships it conveys. The literature
also reveals that Chinese college EFL learners may have difficulties in their use of
ANDDM in their writing. However, no empirical study has been done to confirm such
assumptions, and people have no idea of what kinds of logical relationships Chinese
EFL learners are incapable of making explicit with ANDDM and what kinds of logical
relationships are improperly conveyed by ANDDM in their writing.
The present study is intended to fill the gap, that is, to see whether Chinese
college EFL learners really have difficulties in their use of ANDDM in their writing, as
is assumed by previous researchers and the present researcher’s teaching experience;
what the difficulties are; and what are possible causes for such incompetence, hoping
the present study can have some implications for dictionary compilers, and EFL
teachers and learners as well, in order to help EFL learners secure a comprehensive
acquisition of discourse markers such as ANDDM.
CHAPTER THREE
THE CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
The present research is undertaken to investigate the use of ANDDM in Chinese
college EFL learners’ English composition from the perspective of Relevance Theory.
In this chapter, therefore, a brief introduction of the theory will be given with
particular reference to the functions of discourse markers, followed by a
categorization of discourse markers under the theoretical framework adopted.
3.1 Relevance
Theory and
Its
Interpretation of
Discourse Markers
According to Relevance Theory (Sperber & Wilson, 2001), every ostensive
utterance communicates a presumption of optimal relevance (revised), that is
(a) The ostensive stimulus is relevant enough for it to be worth the
addressee’s effort to process it.
(b) The ostensive stimulus is the most relevant one compatible with the
communicator’s abilities and preference.
(2001, p. 270)
In the theory, relevance is defined in terms of cognitive effects and processing effort.
Cognitive effects are achieved when the newly-presented information interacts with a
context of existing assumptions by strengthening an existing assumption, by
contradicting and eliminating an existing assumption, or by combining with an
existing assumption to yield a contextual implication (that is, a conclusion deducible
from new information and existing assumptions together, but from neither new
information nor existing assumptions alone). The greater the cognitive effects, the
greater the relevance will be.
Cognitive effects, however, do not come free: it costs some mental effort to
derive them, and the greater the effort needed to derive them, the lower the relevance
of an utterance will be. In order to achieve the greatest cognitive effects, the hearer
(reader) must process the utterance in the right, i.e. the intended context. The selection
or construction of context is governed by the search for optimal relevance. As far as
the communicator is concerned, she may have reason to believe that the hearer will
choose the appropriate contextual assumptions and draw the appropriate conclusions
without any extra help from her, or she may decide to direct the hearer towards the
intended interpretation by making a certain set of assumptions more easily accessible.
Discourse markers fulfill just this role.
Blakemore (1987, 1992, 2002) and Wilson and Sperber (1993) approach
discourse markers within the relevance-theoretic framework. In particular, Blakemore
(1987) reanalyzes Grice’s discourse connectives (discourse markers in the present
research thesis) using a distinction between conceptual and procedural encoding. She
proposes that discourse markers do not have a conceptual meaning, but have only a
procedural meaning, which consists of instructions about how to manipulate the
conceptual representation of the utterance. Wilson and Sperber (1993) also argue that
discourse connectives are procedural and non-truth-conditional: they encode
procedural constraints on implicatures. They help to provide utterance of optimal
relevance, by guiding the search for intended contexts and cognitive effects, which
saves a lot of processing efforts; consequently, the intended interpretation can be
achieved much more efficiently.
In other words, in the relevance-theoretic framework, discourse markers encode
procedural information, that is, information to constrain or guide the inferential
process of comprehension by restricting the number of hypotheses the hearer needs to
consider in order to arrive at an optimally relevant interpretation, and thus to facilitate
his understanding. Discourse markers can achieve this purpose because they are seen
as displaying or making explicit logical relations between successive discourse
segments.
3.2
Relevance-based
Classification
of
Discourse
Markers
As the classification of discourse markers proposed by Blakemore is not
exhaustive although it is the most appealing one of all, and as we need a neater
categorization of discourse markers in order to propose our operationalized definition
of the pragmatic functions of ANDDM, we suggest here a neater relevance-based
categorization of discourse markers.
According to the assumption of optimal relevance, the hearer assumes that the
speaker of a given utterance has aimed at optimal relevance. It is not surprising,
therefore, that the hearer will assume that the utterance which is part of a text or
discourse can be interpreted as somehow following on from the preceding utterances.
Since discourse markers are linguistic elements used to connect segments and
constrain and facilitate interpretation, they inevitably help to achieve the three
cognitive effects discussed by Sperber and Wilson (2001). Based on this idea,
Blakemore (1992) classifies discourse markers according to the three cognitive effects:
those that introduce contextual implicatures (such as so and therefore), those
concerned with strengthening (such as moreover, besides, furthermore and
utterance-initial also), and those that introduce denials (such as however, nevertheless,
but). However, some expressions are excluded from this categorization, as is admitted
by Blakemore (1992), as they serve none of the three cognitive functions. The
expressions are: those indicating the role of the utterance in the discourse in which it
occurs (for example, anyway, incidentally, by the way, finally); and those indicating
what kind of contextual implications the hearer is expected to derive (for example,
also—excluding utterance-initial “also”, too).
Since every relevant ostensive stimulus has certain cognitive effect in that context
according to Relevance Theory, and since discourse markers are assumed to be
relevant in that their main function in discourse is to constrain or facilitate the hearer’s
interpretation, any discourse marker should help to achieve one of the cognitive
effects. It follows that either Sperber and Wilson (2001) or Blakemore (1992) is hasty
in drawing their conclusion. In other words, if Sperber and Wilson are justified in
their conclusion that there are only three types of cognitive effects, all the discourse
markers should be categorized into those three groups accordingly, with no exception;
if Blakemore is justified in maintaining that there are more than three relevance-based
categories of discourse markers, there should be more than three cognitive effects.
According to Blakemore (1992), the expressions that cannot be grouped into the
three relevance-based categories of discourse markers are those indicating the role of
the utterance in the discourse in which it occurs (for example, anyway, incidentally, by
the way, finally) and those indicating what kind of contextual implications the hearer
is expected to derive (for example, also, too).
Let’s examine the second kind of expressions Blakemore (1992) found hard to
deal with:
(1) A: Simon cooked a chicken.
B: He also cooked a duck.
(2) A: Jane has a laser printer.
B: Simon has also got a laser printer. Or
B: Simon has got a laser printer too.
Blakemore (1992) says it is impossible that B’s utterances in (1) and (2) are
relevant by achieving any of the three cognitive effects. She holds that the use of too
and also indicates that the utterance should be processed in such a way as to yield the
same sort of contextual effects as were derived from the previous utterance. It may be
true if the conversations are processed independently, not taking into consideration
any wider context. However, it can never happen in real communication. The
conversations should be located in certain context, and consequently we need to
process them in that very context. Let’s assume that the context for (1) is that A and B
are persuading C into going to Simon’s party: A is tempting C by saying that there is a
big dinner waiting for them, while B provides more evidence for the appeal of the
dinner by saying there is something else delicious. In this context, therefore, the new
information introduced by also strengthens the previous contextual assumption: going
to Simon’s party is worthwhile. Now let’s assume the context for (2) is that A is
comparing Jane with others (including Simon) in, for instance, the advancement of
working equipment: A is trying to convince others that Jane is superior to others in
that she has a laser printer, but B is refuting A by providing counter-evidence that Jane
is not the only person there to have laser printers. Consequently, in this context, the
new information introduced by also and too contradicts or denies the previous
contextual assumption that Jane is superior to others. Therefore, we can draw a
conclusion for this kind of expressions that they not only indicate what kind of
contextual implications the hearer is expected to derive, but help to yield some
cognitive effect, by modifying or reorganizing the previous contextual assumption.
What should be noted here is that the cognitive effects these expressions help to
communicate depend on the context of the communication.
Now, let’s turn to the first kind of expression excluded in Blakemore’s
categorization of discourse markers. If we examine these expressions carefully, we
may find that they are generally employed to convey the logical relationship of topical
transition, that is, to end the present topic and then to raise a new one. Obviously, this
new topic does not strengthen or contradict with or derive contextual implications. To
put it briefly, it does not contribute to any of the three cognitive effects. However, we
cannot say this new topic is irrelevant since the communicator purposely raises this
new topic, for, according to Sperber and Wilson (2001), relevance may be achieved
by expressing irrelevant assumptions, as long as this expressive behavior is itself
relevant. This point is easier to illustrate in the ending part of a conference. The
chairperson would make a summary of what have been discussed, and then ending the
conference with a declaration that the conference is a great success. This declaration
contributes to none of the three cognitive effects suggested by Sperber and Wilson
(2001), but it is obviously relevant to the old information in one way or another since
the chairperson purposely made the declaration, hence having some cognitive effect.
Therefore, we are justified to argue for a fourth cognitive effect. Since the new topic
is parallel to the old one, by adding a new topic, we propose a cognitive effect of
transition of topics; that is, the new assumption is parallel to the foregoing contextual
assumptions. Take for example, the following sentences:
(1)
The airlines charge half-price for students. Incidentally, I have already
bought my ticket to New York.
(2)
……Finally, I would like to say that the party is a great success.
The segment in (1) initiated by “incidentally” contributes to none of the three
cognitive effects suggested by Sperber and Wilson (2001), but it does not follow that
the second segment is irrelevant. The communicator puts it in a relevant behavior; that
is, the communicator just introduces a new topic, which is indirectly related to the
previous topic. The new topic does have some cognitive effect here. It is a cognitive
effect of transition of topics proposed above. The discourse marker “finally” also
suggests the ending of the previous topics and the introduction of a new topic.
So far, we have argued for a fourth type of cognitive effect, the cognitive effect of
transition of topics. Consequently, there are four categories of discourse markers in
the relevance-theoretical framework: those introducing contextual implications, those
suggesting strengthening, those introducing denials, and those indicating transition of
topics.
Based on the relevance-based classification of discourse markers made by X. R.
Chen (2002), and the above-discussed categorization, we categorize all the discourse
markers into four groups, the first three of which are almost directly borrowed from X.
R. Chen (2002), with certain revisions: the sub-category of instantiation is proposed
as indicating strengthening, because these discourse markers introduces examples to
further illustrate the previous contextual assumptions, hence marking strengthening.
The new added category, that is, those concerned with transition of topics, includes
discourse markers that convey the logical relation of transition.
For clarity sake, the four categories of discourse markers are summarized below:
a. Those indicating strengthening, including
i.
Addition, e.g. and, also, in addition, besides
ii.
Reinforcing, e.g. furthermore, moreover
iii.
Elaboration, e.g. namely, that is, I mean, in other words
iv.
Equation, e.g. likewise, similarly, in the same case
v.
Instantiation, e.g. for instance, for example
b. Those introducing denials, including
i.
Converseness: but, yet, however, nevertheless, despite (this)
ii.
Concession: anyhow, though (adv.)
iii.
Alternative: alternatively, or
iv.
Replacement: actually, in fact, as a matter of fact, instead of (...),
rather
v.
Contrast: on the other hand, by contrast
c. Those introducing contextual implications, including those that convey such
logical relations of
i.
Cause: because of this, for this reason, on account of this
ii.
Inference: so, then, thus, hence, therefore
iii.
Result: as a result, consequently, in consequence
iv.
Aim: for this purpose, to this end
v.
Summation: to sum up, in conclusion, in brief
d. Those suggesting transition of topics:
e.g. incidentally, by the way, finally (different from the one used to convey
the logical relationship of enumeration)
3.3 Summary
This chapter briefly introduces the conceptual framework we adopted in this
study with particular reference to the functions of discourse markers, and then
proposes a relevance-based categorization of discourse markers, based on the
previous studies of Blakemore (1992) and X. R. Chen (2002). The new categorization
is proposed because our operationalized definition of the pragmatic functions of
ANDDM will be based on this category as well as the different types of logical
relationships it communicates in our corpus.
CHAPTER FOUR
METHODOLOGY
There are five sections in this chapter, dealing respectively with research
questions, the researcher’s temporary hypothesis, description of the corpora employed
in this study, how to collect data, and how to analyze the data.
4.1 Research Questions
The present study attempts to answer two research questions:
1. Are there any significant differences in the use of ANDDM between Chinese
college EFL learners and mature writers of English in their writing?
1) How do Chinese college EFL learners use ANDDM in their writing?
2) How do mature English writers use ANDDM in their writing?
3) Are there any significant differences between Chinese EFL learners and
mature English writers in their use of ANDDM in their writing?
2. Does Chinese college EFL learners’ use of ANDDM in their writing vary
significantly with their English proficiency?
1) How do less advanced Chinese college EFL learners (freshmen and
sophomores) use ANDDM in their writing?
2) How do more advanced Chinese college EFL learners (juniors and
seniors) use ANDDM in their writing?
3) Are there any significant differences between the two groups of Chinese
college EFL learners in their use of ANDDM in their writing?
4.2 Hypothesis
There will be certain different patterns between Chinese college EFL learners and
mature writers of English in their use of ANDDM in their writing. The former tend to
overuse ANDDM in their writing. They may overrun certain usages of ANDDM while
show some deficiency in others. As far as use of ANDDM by Chinese college EFL
learners with different English proficiency is concerned, proper use of ANDDM comes
not necessarily along with their L2 proficiency.
4.3 Corpus
The Chinese College EFL learners Corpus (hereafter in this thesis CCELC) is a
collection of 240 argumentative essays randomly selected from 472 timed essays by
English majors from four grades respectively in a famous university in Jiangsu
province, China. Included in this corpus are 60 essays written by students from each
grade, of which half is under the title “Education as a lifelong process”, and the other
half under the title “The Impact of Internet on …” The word number of essays by
Chinese EFL learners at each grade is illustrated in Table 1.
Table 4-1: Description of corpora
Corpus
CCELC
MEWC
Number of Words
Freshmen
19,307
Sophomores
19,270
Juniors
18,375
Seniors
19,090
Total
76,042
68,590
Notes: CCELC – the Chinese College EFL Learners Corpus
MEWC – the Mature English Writers Corpus
Biber, et al. (2000b) arrange the different registers from the more oral-featured
ones to those more written-featured ones while examining use of English words in
different registers. The sequence is conversation, fiction, news, and academic writing.
From this we can see academic writing is believed to be typical of written work. We
employ their criterion in judging different registers. The Mature English Writers
Corpus (hereafter in this thesis MEWC) we build for this study is a collection of
academic papers from such famous journals as TESOL and The Journal of Pragmatics.
The writers for these papers are assumed to be mature English writers because they
are all language researchers and experts in linguistics. The word number in this corpus
is also listed in Table 4-1.
4.4 Data Collection
The use of and at phrase–level is excluded from our data. We only collect and
analyze those ands that link two segments, as this study only investigates the use of
ANDDM.
The data are collected according to the categories (relevance-based categorization)
and sub-categories (different logical relations) of the various pragmatic functions
ANDDM communicated. The operationalized definition of the pragmatic functions of
ANDDM is discussed below.
In Chapter Two (the literature review part), we briefly introduced the
classifications of ANDDM made by previous researchers (Quirk, et al., 1985; R. X.
Chen, 2001; Huang, 1998). We take all the logical relations they list in their research
into consideration, for the sake of comprehensiveness. To summarize, ANDDM can be
employed to convey the following logical relations: addition (including addition and
reinforcing in X. R. Chen, 2002), sequence (it goes to the category of strengthening,
as the second segment provides more information about the topic; further explanation
is made below in categorization), result, conflict/ contrast, concession, condition and
result, equation (it goes to the category of strengthening, as the second segment
provides similar evidences for the previous contextual assumption), comment (it also
goes to the category of strengthening, since according to Quirk, et al’s explanation, a
comment can be interpreted by an non-restrictive relative clause, which is to make the
previous point more explicit), and transition. Besides, as found in authentic data,
ANDDM is also used to make explicit the logical relation of instantiation, so this usage
is also taken into consideration. To examine the use of ANDDM in the
relevance-theoretical framework, we put all these functions of ANDDM and those we
found in our authentic data into the four categories, according to the four cognitive
functions ANDDM servers (examples are mostly from R. X. Chen, 2001, while those
specified are not):
a. ANDDM indicating strengthening, including those used to convey the
following logical relations:
i.
Addition, e.g.
I don’t think there are jobs which women don’t do. But there are more
men than women scientists. And more men than women are heads of
companies. (Here the writer tries to make explicit to the readers that
the segment introduced by and is a piece of further evidence to make
his point more convincing. In other words, the segment introduced by
and strengthens the previous contextual assumption that women are
not treated equal to men in reality even though they are born equal.)
ii.
Sequence, e.g.
We left for the farm early. And after an hour’s walk, we reached the
grassland. (Such utterances are mostly seen in narration. They do not
appear alone. The context for them is likely to be a story-telling about
one’s outing. The readers could only have a rough and incomplete
picture of the writer’s outing without the and sequence. The and
sequence tells the different periods of one activity, providing more
information about the same event; therefore, it strengthens the
previous contextual assumption: the leaving for the outing.)
iii.
Elaboration, e.g.
Finally, one afternoon, I received a call from the Indianapolis Police
Department and they wanted my husband and me to come downtown
and identify some of our property. (from authentic corpus) (The
segment introduced by and provides further information about the
“call”, hence strengthening the previous contextual assumption: the
robbers are finally arrested or our robbed goods are finally traced
back by the policemen, as is suggested by the discourse marker
“finally” and the fact that the call is from the police”.)
iv.
Instantiation, e.g.
Emphasis changes with each work, and although figures of authority
are particularly oppressive in works such as Like Water for Chocolate
and The Color Purple, other minority works are featured in the
heroines’ enthusiastic attitude toward life in spite of the threat of
death. (from authentic corpus) (The topic of the passage is that
different literature works concerned in that essay have different
focuses. The segment following and makes the opinion in the first
segment more convincing by giving examples to illustrate this point,
so it strengthens the contextual assumption achieved from the first
one.)
v.
Equation, e.g.
A: Look, what have I bought for you today!
B: Terrific! This material looks nice. And so does that one. (A
provided further evidence in the second segment to prove that what A
bought is really nice, hence strengthening the previous contextual
assumption: she appreciates what A bought.)
vi.
Comment, e.g.
They disliked John—and that’s not surprising in view of his behavior.
(a sentential relative clause, e.g.:… which is not surprising …can
replace the second clause here.) (from Quirk, et al. 1985) (As we
know, an infinitive relative clause is used to give some
complementary information about the previous segment, therefore it
can be stated safely that the second segment strengthens the
contextual assumption from the first one.)
b. ANDDM indicating denials, including
i.
Converseness, e.g.
She never pitied me; she never praised me unless what I did was as
good as that of the best of a normal person. And she encouraged me
when I made up my mind to go to college. (The cognitive effect we
get from the first segment is that “she is especially strict with me,
never saying anything nice to me”; however, the cognitive effect we
get from the and clause is contradictory to the former one. Therefore,
the and here introduces denials of the previous contextual
assumption.)
ii.
Concession, e.g.
I cannot keep these trees alive and I have watered them well, too.
(Huang, 1998) (It can be safely stated, according to the second
segment and our encyclopedical knowledge, that the trees should stay
alive because of my contribution. However, the result is, according to
the first segment, that it died. Hence, the second segment contradicts
with the contextual assumption from the first one.)
iii.
Contrast
Robert is secretive and David is candid. (Wang, 2001) (To make the
sentence easier to understand, we put it in a larger context. We
assume Robert and David are brothers. In this case, people will take
for granted that the two may have something in common. However,
what we get from the segments is contradictory to our previous
assumption, that is, the cognitive effect we get from the assumption
that the two are brothers. Therefore, the second segment introduces
denials to the previous contextual assumption.)
c. ANDDM indicating contextual implications, including those that convey the
following logical relations:
i.
Result, e.g.
The world is changing and our ideas about it should change with it.
(The first segment introduces the fact that the world is not what it was.
What follows naturally is that we need to change ourselves
accordingly to adapt to the changing world. The segment following
and is one of the contextual implications.)
ii.
Condition, e.g.
Give me some money and I’ll help you escape. (We know, according
to our encyclopeadical knowledge, we cannot ask anyone else to do
anything for you for no reason. People are destined or expected to be
rewarded or punished for anything they did for others. In the present
context, the speaker gives a command in the first segment;
consequently, the hearer may ask intuitively: “why?” Or “How should
I be rewarded if I do as you expected?” The second segment is one
kind of rewards the speaker promised to give the hearer for his
contribution – giving money.)
d. ANDDM indicating the transition of topics:
e.g. Yang Mei: I have some difficulty in pronouncing some of the words in
English.
Sara: No, you’re doing fine. And when do you take your next exams?
It is discussed in detail in Chapter Three how ANDDM in these cases functions as
indicating transition of topics.
Considering certain adverbial conjuncts like however, therefore are often used
after ANDDM to make more explicit logical relationship between segments, such
usage will be classified into a separate group – the category of ANDDM + ADV, as
parallel to ANDDM in its bare form we discussed so far. Investigation of the form of
ANDDM + ADV can give us more information about whether EFL learners is aware of
the fact that ANDDM is general and neutral and thus ambiguous, and whether they can
use ANDDM properly in their English writing, because such usage is often employed
by native speakers of English to eliminate the possible ambiguity a single ANDDM
often has.
To sum up, both ANDDM in bare form and in the form of ANDDM + ADV were
examined in the present study to see whether Chinese college EFL learners can
employ them properly in their writing. ANDDM in bare form was categorized into the
four groups according to the cognitive functions they serve, plus the group of ANDDM
linking two segments that do not seem to have any logical relationships.
To conclude, all the discourse marker usages were classified into two categories:
ANDDM in bare form and in the form of ANDDM + ADV. The bare ANDDM was further
classified according to the different types of logical relationships that ANDDM served.
As some logical relationships are not so easy to decide, all these cases were further
analyzed by at least five of our classmates till all of us reached a consensus on each of
them. After that, all the data on the bare ANDDM were further categorized into
different groups according to the four cognitive functions ANDDM served plus item of
misuse.
4.5 Data Analysis
WordSmith Tools were employed in the analysis of the two corpora to see how
mature English writers and Chinese college EFL learners use ANDDM in writing.
First, the two corpora were processed respectively in Wordlist Tool of WordSmith,
before tagging, to get the whole size of them.
Second, Concord Tool of WordSmith was employed to find out the raw frequency
of each logical relation ANDDM communicated in each corpus.
Third, the frequency of each category was calculated by summing up all its
subcategories according to our operationalized definition of the pragmatic functions
ANDDM communicated. For instance, the frequency of CONTRADICTION is the
total number of that of converseness, concession, and contrast.
Fourth, all the raw frequencies were converted into normalized frequencies,
because the two corpora are different in size. According to Biber, et al. (2000a) and
Yang (2003), raw frequencies should be converted into normalized frequencies in
order to make the statistics drawn from the corpora comparable when the corpora are
different in size. The normalized frequencies were worked out through dividing the
raw frequencies by the whole size of their respective corpus and then multiplying
10,000.
Fifth, the proportions of each category and subcategory in its overall discourse
marker usages were worked out.
Last, all the normalized frequencies and proportions drawn from the above five
steps were input into SPSS11.5. The various correlations of the pragmatic functions of
ANDDM between the two corpora and those between the two groups of subjects in
CCELC were carried out by implementing Chi-square analysis to see whether the
differences were significant.
4.6 Summary
In order to address the two research questions, that is, to find the difference
between Chinese college EFL learners and mature English writers in the use of
ANDDM in writing, we examined the ANDDM in two corpora – CCELC and MEWC.
All the data were tagged according to our operationalized definition of the pragmatic
functions of ANDDM, and then sorted out with help of the tool of WordSmith and
finally processed with SPSS to see whether the significance reached the significant
level.
CHAPTER FIVE
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
This chapter consists of five sections. The first two sections deal respectively
with the use of ANDDM by mature English writers and Chinese college EFL learners
in their writing. The data are compared in the next section to see to what extent
Chinese college EFL learners differ from mature English writers in the use of ANDDM
in their writing. The fourth section discusses the differences between Chinese college
EFL learners with different language proficiencies in their use of ANDDM in writing.
The last section summarizes what is discussed in the previous sections.
5.1 Use of ANDDM by Mature English Writers
What is discussed in this section is the use of ANDDM by mature English writers
in their academic writing, according to the data we collected from Mature English
Writers Corpus.
Table 5-1 presents the frequencies of different usages of ANDDM in Mature
English Writers Corpus. We can see from the table that ANDDM appeared for a total of
327 times in the academic paper corpus. Among those discourse marker uses, and was
employed 272 times in bare form, while only 55 times in the form of ANDDM + ADV.
Among the bare ANDDM usages, and strengthening the previous contextual
assumption occurred 214 times, that for introducing contextual implication 44 times,
that for introducing denials17 times, while there is no case of AND DM used to
introduce transition of topics.
Table 5-1: Raw and normalized frequencies of the ways ANDDM used in MEWC
Functions
ANDDM
Total
Frequency
Normalized
Frequency
Topic
Contextual
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
327
55
272
214
0
17
41
47.7
8.0
39.7
31.2
0
2.5
6.0
Frequencies
Raw
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
Transition
Contradiction
Implication
Table 5-1 also shows that and appeared nearly 48 times as a discourse marker in
every 10,000 words. For every 10,000 words, ANDDM appeared 40 times in the bare
form, and 8 times in the complex form. In the bare form cases, ANDDM was employed
about 31 times to strengthen the previous contextual assumption, 6 times to introduce
contextual implication, 3 times to introduce denials.
In brief, it can be seen from Table 5-1 that Mature English Writers generally used
and as a discourse marker in bare form, but also used it sometimes together with some
adverbial conjuncts to make more explicit logical relationships between segments. In
its bare form use, ANDDM was dominantly used to indicate strengthening. What’s
more, it was never used to introduce transition of topics.
Table 5-2 presents the respective proportions of the pragmatic functions of
ANDDM in its overall discourse marker usages in Mature English Writers Corpus.
Table 5-2: Respective proportions of the ways ANDDM used in MEWC
Function
Percentage
Percentage
(%)
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
16.8
83.2
78.7
Topic
Transition
0
Contradiction
6.3
Contextual
Implication
15.0
From the table, we can see that of all the ANDDM in MEWC the form of ANDDM
+ ADV occupied 16.8 percent. As far as the proportion of each pragmatic function is
concerned, the use of ANDDM in bare form to strengthen the previous contextual
assumption ranked first, accounting for 78.7 percent of the bare ANDDM usages; that
to introduce contextual implication came second, accounting for 15.0 percent of the
whole bare ANDDM usages. Together, these two functions together took up 93.7
percent of the whole ANDDM usages in its bare form. The use of ANDDM to introduce
transition of topics didn’t occur in this corpus.
It is clear that and was frequently used as a discourse marker in Mature English
Writers Corpus. It was not only used in bare form to indicate logical relationships
between segments, but also used together with adverbial conjuncts to make more
explicit logical relationships between clauses. Mature English writers mainly used
ANDDM to indicate that what follows ANDDM strengthens the previous contextual
assumption, or is just the contextual implication of what precedes it. Never did mature
English writers employ ANDDM in their writing to introduce a new topic. This seems
natural, since our corpora are composed of written work, which generally focus only
on one certain point due to their limited space. Thus, the use of ANDDM to introduce
transition of topics would most likely distract readers’ attention from the point being
discussed.
5.2 Use of ANDDM by Chinese EFL Learners at College
Level
Table 5-3 shows the frequencies of various functions of ANDDM found in Chinese
college EFL learners’ writing.
Table 5-3: Raw and normalized frequencies of the ways ANDDM used in CCELC
Functions
ANDDM
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
Total
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
Frequencies
Raw Frequency
Contextual
Contradiction
Transition
misuse
Implication
728
65
663
477
11
20
148
7
95.7
8.5
87.2
62.7
1.5
2.6
19.5
0.9
Normalized
Frequency
It can be seen from the table that in Chinese college students’ use of the word and,
ANDDM appeared 728 times, of which it was used 65 times together with adverbial
conjuncts, 663 times used alone to suggest cognitive effects that can be conveyed by
the segment following ANDDM. Of the bare ANDDM uses, ANDDM was employed 477
times to suggest that the following segment strengthens the previous contextual
effects, 148 times to indicate contextual implication, 20 times to introduce
contradiction, 11 times to indicate transition of topics, and there were also 7 cases of
misuse of ANDDM, because in those cases ANDDM does not help to introduce any
cognitive effect.
It is also clear from Table 5-3 that and appeared about 96 times as a discourse
marker in every 10,000 words. ANDDM appeared about 9 times as ANDDM + ADV and
87 times as bare ANDDM in every 10,000 words. With regard to bare ANDDM, for
every 10,000 words, ANDDM was employed 63 times to indicate the contextual effect
of strengthening, 20 times to suggest contextual implication. Only in two or three
cases in every 10,000 words, was ANDDM used to introduce such contextual effects as
contradiction and transition of topics. Besides, there was one case of misuse of
ANDDM in every 10,000 words in CCELC, while there is no such case in MEWC.
In brief, from Table 5-3 we can see Chinese college EFL learners employed and a
lot as a discourse marker; ANDDM was generally used in bare form, although it was
also sometimes used together with other discourse markers or adverbial conjuncts to
make more explicit logical relationships between segments. In the bare ANDDM uses,
ANDDM was predominantly employed in this corpus to introduce such contextual
effects as strengthening and contextual implication, while it was rarely used to
indicate the other two contextual effects; besides, Chinese college EFL learners
sometimes used ANDDM to link two segments that seem to have no logical
relationships at all.
Table 5-4 illustrates the respective proportions of the cognitive functions of
ANDDM in its overall discourse marker usages in CCELC.
Table 5-4: Respective proportions of the ways ANDDM used in CCELC
Function
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
Percentage
Contextual
Contradiction
Transition
Misuse
Implication
Percentage
8.9
91.1
71.9
1.7
3.0
22.3
1.1
(%)
From the table, we can see that in Chinese college EFL learners’ written corpus,
91.1 percent of ANDDM was used in bare form, while the complex form occupied only
8.9 percent. With regard to the proportion of each pragmatic function in those bare
form uses, the use of ANDDM to strengthen the previous contextual effects ranked first,
accounting for 71.9 percent of the bare form usages; the function of ANDDM to
introduce contextual implication came second, accounting for 22.3 percent of the
whole bare ANDDM usages. In all, these two functions together took up 94.2 percent
of the whole ANDDM usages. The use of ANDDM to introduce transition of topics and
contradiction, which accounted for only about 5 percent, was rare in CCELC. It also
needs to be noted that in Chinese college EFL learners’ written corpus, 1.1 percent of
ANDDM does not suggest any cognitive effect.
To conclude, and was frequently used as a discourse marker in Chinese college
EFL learners’ writing. Sometimes it was used together with other adverbial conjuncts
and discourse markers, but in most cases it was used in bare form. Bare ANDDM was
predominantly employed to introduce such contextual effects as strengthening and
contextual implication. What’s more, ANDDM was sometimes used in Chinese college
EFL learners’ writing to link segments which do not seem to have any logical
relationships at all, hence introducing no cognitive effect.
5.3 Differences between Mature English Writers and
Chinese College EFL Learners in the Use of ANDDM
This section is to discuss to what extent Chinese college EFL learners differ from
native speakers of English in their use of the various functions of ANDDM in their
writing. Since the two written corpora are different in size, the data presented in this
part are all normalized frequencies (the appearing times per 10, 000 words) in order to
make a comparable statistical comparison.
Table 5-5 presents the p-value of the differences between Chinese college EFL
learners and native speakers of English in their use of the various functions of
ANDDM.
Table 5-5: Differences between CCELC and MEWC in the frequencies of the cognitive
functions of ANDDM
ANDDM
Functions
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
Total
Frequencies
CCELC
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
Contextual
Contradiction
Transition
95.7
8.5
87.2
62.7
1.5
Misuse
Implication
2.6
19.5
0.9
MEWC
47.7
8.0
39.7
31.2
0
2.5
6.0
0
P-value
.000
.808
.000
.001
?
1.000
.006
?
Note: “?” here means chi-square cannot be performed, because there are not enough valid
cases available for processing.
From Table 5-5, we can see that in CCELC and was used 96 times as a discourse
marker, while in MEWC it only appeared 48 times, half as frequently as in CCELC.
The p-value for this difference in the two corpora is .000, well below the statistically
significance level (p=. 000<. 05); that is, Chinese college EFL learners significantly
overused ANDDM in their writing. When it comes to the functions of and as a
discourse marker, the frequencies of the form of ANDDM + ADV are almost the same
in the two corpora (8.5 and 8.0 respectively), and the p-value for this difference
is .808, well above the statistically significance level; that is, there is no significant
difference between the two groups of subjects as far as the frequencies of the form of
ANDDM + ADV are concerned (further examination of the detailed pragmatic
functions of this form proves that there is significant difference between the same two
groups of subjects in their use of ANDDM in the form of ANDDM + ADV, though, as
will be discussed later). ANDDM in bare form appeared 87 times in CCELC, while 40
times in Mature English Writers Corpus, with the p-value of the difference
reaching .000, suggesting Chinese college EFL learners significantly overused
ANDDM in its bare form. With regard to the pragmatic functions ANDDM in bare form
serves, the p-value of the difference in the strengthening usage is the lowest (p =.
001<. 05), that in the contextual implication usage the second lowest (p =. 006<. 05) –
both well below the statistically significance level, indicating Chinese college EFL
learners over-depended on ANDDM to serve the cognitive function of indicating
strengthening and that of suggesting contextual implication; by contrast, that in the
contradiction usage is the highest (p = 1.000>.05), indicating there is no significant
difference in mature English writers and Chinese college EFL learners in their use of
ANDDM to indicate the cognitive function of contradiction.
Since there was no case of ANDDM in MEWC to indicate the cognitive effect of
transition of topics, or to link segments that do not seem to have any logical
relationships at all, no statistics is computed on the difference in these two items
between Chinese college EFL learners and mature English writers in their use of
ANDDM. However, we can say safely that there is substantial difference in these two
usages, because such usages appeared in one corpus but not in the other.
In summary, Chinese college EFL learners significantly overuse and as a
discourse marker in writing. While there is no significant difference in their use of
ANDDM in the form of ANDDM + ADV, the difference in their use of it in bare form is
significant. As far as the pragmatic functions of bare ANDDM are concerned, the
learners significantly overused ANDDM in their strengthening usage and contextual
implication usage, and substantially overused it to indicate transition of topics and to
link unrelated segments. In a word, Chinese college EFL learners overuse ANDDM in
almost every pragmatic function of ANDDM except in that of contradiction.
The remaining part of this section discusses to what extent Chinese college EFL
learners differ from native speakers of English on the proportions of each pragmatic
function in the two written corpora.
Table 5-6 presents the differences between the corpora in the functional
distributions of the ways ANDDM is employed in writing. We can see clearly from the
table that the ranking of the four pragmatic functions of ANDDM was consistent in the
two corpora: the strengthening function ranked first, the contextual implication
function second, and the transition of topics last. This suggests that Chinese college
EFL learners were aware that ANDDM is generally employed to indicate the cognitive
function of strengthening and that of contextual implication, while seldom used to
introduce the other two cognitive functions in writing. The problem for them is that
they were so familiar with this word that they just could not help overusing it.
Table 5-6: Differences between CCELC and the MEWC in the proportions of the cognitive
functions of ANDDM in its entire discourse marker uses
Bare ANDDM
Functions
ANDDM
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
Proportions
CCELC
Contextual
Contradiction
Transition
8.9
91.1
71.9
1.7
Misuse
Implication
3.0
22.3
1.06
MEWC
16.8
83.2
78.7
0
6.3
15.0
0
p-value
.117
.544
.569
?
.317
.250
?
It is clear in Table 5-6 that there was no case of transition of topics usage and
misuse in Mature English Writers Corpus, and therefore chi-square test cannot be
performed as far as these two items are concerned. With respect to the other usages,
none of the differences reaches the significance level (all the p-values are bigger
than .05).
Of all the p-values in Table 5-6, that of the ANDDM + ADV is the lowest, which
suggests that when employing and as a discourse marker, mature English writers used
a larger proportion of ANDDM + ADV to make more explicit the logical relationships
between segments. The difference is substantial, though not significant, since the
frequency of ANDDM + ADV in MEWC is almost twice that in CCELC. This may
suggest that mature writers were more aware of the “general and neutral character” of
ANDDM, and thus they employ ANDDM + ADV to make precise the functions ANDDM
serves when necessary.
As the learners significantly overused bare ANDDM in their writing, it is most
probable that they did not know that ANDDM may fail to serve its purpose if used too
frequently or if ANDDM is a bit too weak to communicate certain types of logical
relationships between segments; otherwise, they would have tried to avoid using
ANDDM so frequently. The second possibility for the learners’ overuse of ANDDM is
their familiarity with the linguistic features (the different interpretation it can convey)
together with their deficiency in its pragmatic features (on what occasions it is used,
how it is used). They were so familiar with ANDDM that it just came readily. What’s
more, they might have took for granted that what they can understand in their writing
is understandable by their readers as well, not noticing that they were some
information gap between them and their readers, which was not filled in their writing.
Therefore, they would not take pains to replace their ambiguous ANDDM in their
writing with any other discourse markers which can make more explicit the logical
relationships between segments; in other words, they are not pragmatically conscious.
In a word, they overused ANDDM as a result of deficiency in pragmatic competence
and awareness.
In order to confirm our hypothesis of the possible causes for Chinese college EFL
learners’ significant overuse of ANDDM in their writing, we also examined the
difference between the two corpora in the detailed logical relationship ANDDM
suggests. As ANDDM introduced a large variety of logical relationships, and space
here is limited, what is reported here are only those we consider as illuminating to the
question.
Our data show that mature English writers never used ANDDM to introduce the
logical relationship of transition and that of condition, while these two usages
appeared 11 and 10 times respectively in CCELC. As has been discussed before, the
logical relationship of transition suggests the end of the present topic and the
beginning of the a new topic, which is rarely employed in writing because one essay
is generally focused on one topic because of the limited space; that of condition is
also oral-style-featured, because the first segment is generally a command, which can
only be given face to face. Besides, as is discussed by Biber, et al. (2000b),
sentence-level and (ANDDM in the present study) is characteristic of oral English,
while phrase-level and are more typical of written English; that is, and as a discourse
marker, is generally used in oral communication. Therefore, we can safely infer that
Chinese college EFL learners’ significant overuse of ANDDM in writing could be a
result of their transfer of oral style features into written communication.
It is found out from the data that ANDDM used together with ADV conveyed four
types of logical relationships in MEWC: converseness, result/effect, sequence, and
addition; while in CCELC, it indicated three types of logical relationships:
result/effect, sequence, and addition. The p-values indicate that Chinese college EFL
learners significantly overused ANDDM in the complex form to suggest the logical
relationship of addition (p =. 001<. 05), substantially underused it to make explicit the
logical relationship of result/effect (p =. 077, slightly above .05), and significantly
underused it to introduce that of sequence (p =. 000<. 05), while they didn’t use it at
all to introduce that of converseness.
According to Biber, et al. (2000b) and Fraser (1999), the core meaning of and is
addition, while the specific interpretation is negotiated by the context, which suggests
that the other interpretations are less explicit, and therefore need more help to be
made explicit. It follows that it is the other three types of logical relationships instead
of that of addition that need to be made more explicit, as was done by mature English
writers but obviously ignored by Chinese college EFL learners. Of all the left three
types of logical relationships, that of consequence and that of sequence are most
confusing. For instance, different readers may have different interpretations of the
logical relationship between the two segments in (1).
(1) He heard an explosion and he phoned the police.
(2) He heard an explosion and he therefore phoned the police.
Those who hold that there is a necessary cause-effect relationship would take the
event described in the second segment as an inevitable consequence of the
circumstance presented in the first segment, as Quirk, et al (1985, p. 930) does.
However, those who cannot see any cause-effect relationship between the two
segments can only see the chronological sequence of the two events presented in the
two segments, which exists whatever background knowledge is stimulated in the
readers’ mind in the process of interpretation. According to Quirk, et al (1985, p. 930),
if the two segments have the logical relationship of consequence, they inevitably
reflect chronological sequence. For instance, the first segment in (2) presents the
circumstances (frequently the circumstantial background) enabling the event
described in the second segment to take place. This entails that the order of the
segments also reflects chronological sequence. That is, it entails that “he first heard an
explosion, and then he phoned the police”. In a word, the logical relationship of
consequence and that of sequence are sometimes hard to decide, hence needing to be
made more explicit. Mature English writers were obviously aware of this, for 76% of
ANDDM in complex form in their writing were employed to make explicit these two
types of logical relationships. In contrast, Chinese college EFL learners only used
28% of ANDDM in complex form in their writing for this purpose, while they
employed 72% of it to introduce the logical relationship of addition.
Since the main pragmatic function of ANDDM is to make explicit logical
relationships between the segments linked by it, improper use of ANDDM means that
the speaker/writer does not know how to make use of it to serve this function. We
might say that they just do not have such pragmatic consciousness. In other words,
Chinese college EFL learners’ improper use of ANDDM is possibly a result of
deficiency in pragmatic consciousness in their writing, as is suggested by X. R. Chen
(2002).
In summary, compared with mature English writers, Chinese college EFL writers
significantly overused and as a discourse marker; they significantly over-depended on
ANDDM in bare form (which consequently made it difficult for their readers to find
the intended interpretation) to make explicit logical relationships between segments,
to the extent that they even linked illogical segments with ANDDM; they significantly
overused ANDDM to serve the functions of strengthening and contextual implication;
they still have problem in making use of ANDDM + ADV to avoid the possible
ambiguity of ANDDM in bare form. With respect to the functional distribution of
ANDDM in writing, there is no difference in Chinese college students and mature
English writers. Chinese college EFL learners’ improper use of ANDDM in their
writing possibly results from their pragmatic incompetence, such as deficiency in
pragmatic awareness and transfer of orality features into written communication due
to their ignorance of the different use of ANDDM in writing and speaking.
5.4 Comparison of the Use of ANDDM by Chinese
College EFL Learners with Different L2 Proficiency
Levels
This section is to examine to what extent the two groups of Chinese college EFL
learners differ from each other in their use of ANDDM in their writing.
Table 5-7 and Table 5-8 present respectively differences between the two groups
of Chinese college EFL learners in their use of ANDDM in writing with respect to the
frequencies and proportions of the pragmatic functions of ANDDM.
Table 5-7: Differences between two groups of Chinese college students in the frequencies of the cognitive
functions of ANDDM
ANDDM
Functions
Bare ANDDM
ANDDM
Total
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Contextual
Strengthening
Contradiction
Frequencies
Transition
Misuse
Implication
Freshmen &
105
10.4
94.6
66.9
1.3
2.9
23.1
0.5
86.2
6.7
79.5
58.5
1.6
2.4
15.7
1.3
.169
.467
.257
.476
.564
.655
.262
1.000
Sophomores
Juniors &
Seniors
p-value
Table 5-8: Differences between two groups of Chinese college students in the proportions of the cognitive
functions of ANDDM
Bare ANDDM
Functions
ANDDM
Topic
+ ADV
Total
Strengthening
proportions
Contextual
Contradiction
Transition
Misuse
Implication
Freshmen &
9.9
90.1
70.7
1.4
3.0
24.4
0.55
7.8
92.2
73
2
3.0
19.7
1.64
.637
.882
.868
.564
1.000
.564
.564
Sophomores
Juniors &
Seniors
p-value
From the two Tables we can see none of the differences of the items presented in
the two tables reaches the significance level (All of the p-values are much greater
than .05), or in other words, there is no significant difference between the two groups
of Chinese college EFL learners in their use of ANDDM in their writing with respect to
both the frequencies and the proportions of the pragmatic functions of ANDDM.
As the two groups of students are from the same major, the same school, we can
safely say the English proficiency of the freshmen and sophomores will reach the
same level as that of the more advanced ones one or two years later – when they are
juniors and seniors. Therefore, it can be stated in this section that Chinese college EFL
learners’ use of ANDDM does not vary significantly with their English proficiency. In
other words, Chinese EFL learners’ L2 proficiency does not influence their use of
ANDDM significantly in their writing so long as their English proficiency has reached
the advanced level.
In summary, Chinese college EFL learner’s English proficiency has no significant
effect on their use of ANDDM in writing. That they have difficulties with its use must
have resulted from something other than L2 proficiency. The most likely cause for
this may be their pragmatic incompetence, such as deficiency in pragmatic awareness,
as is suggested by X. R. Chen (2002), and transfer of orality features into written
communication due to their ignorance of the pragmatic functions of ANDDM in
writing and speaking.
5.5 Summary
Both of the two research questions are answered in this chapter. After examining
the way ANDDM is used by both mature English writers and Chinese college EFL
learners, we find that, compared with mature English writers, the learners
significantly overuse and as a discourse marker in their writing. They overuse ANDDM
in all the ways it is used except in that of contradiction. With respect to the second
research question, no significant difference is found between the two groups of
Chinese college EFL learners in their use of ANDDM in writing. In other words,
Chinese college EFL learners’ English proficiency does not significantly influence
their use of ANDDM in writing since their language proficiency has reached the
advanced level. What accounts for their failure in the use of ANDDM in writing is
probably their pragmatic incompetence, such as weak pragmatic consciousness and
transfer of oral style features into written tasks due to their ignorance of the register
sensitivity of certain pragmatic functions of ANDDM in writing and speaking.
CHAPTER SIX
CONCLUSION
This chapter is composed of five sections. It starts with a brief summary of the
present study. Then it summarizes in the second section the major findings from the
research. The third section discusses theoretical and practical implications of the
present study. The limitations of the study and directions for future research are
pointed out in the last section.
6.1 Summary of the Present Study
This corpus-based study was launched to examine Chinese college EFL learners’
use of ANDDM in their writing. The data from the CCELC were compared with those
from the MEWC to see whether the learners used ANDDM properly to serve the
pragmatic functions served in MEWC. Meanwhile, the use of ANDDM by the less
advanced Chinese college EFL learners was compared with that by the more
advanced Chinese EFL learners, to find out whether their English proficiency had any
effect on their use of ANDDM.
All the discourse marker usages were tagged and classified into two categories:
ANDDM in bare form and that in complex form: ANDDM + ADV. ANDDM in bare form
was further tagged according to the different types of logical relationships that
ANDDM served. Then the raw data were collected and sorted out by WordSmith Tools.
After that, all the data of the bare ANDDM were further categorized into groups
according to the four cognitive functions ANDDM served and the cases of misuse. All
the data were input into SPSS11.5 and run for statistical analysis.
Both the frequencies and proportions of the use of ANDDM by mature English
writers and Chinese college EFL learners were examined and further compared to see
whether there were any significant differences between the mature writers and the
learners in their use of ANDDM in their writing. The data from the two groups of
Chinese college EFL learners were processed in the same way to see whether the
learners’ L2 proficiency influenced their use of ANDDM in writing.
6.2 Major Findings from the Research
The present study turns out the following major findings:
(1) Chinese college EFL learners significantly overused and as a discourse
marker (ANDDM). In particular, they use it in bare form all too often. The fact that the
learners even employ it to link segments that do not seem to have any logical relations
also adds to the learners’ overuse of ANDDM. With respect to the four cognitive
functions ANDDM performs, that of introducing strengthening and that of suggesting
contextual implication were significantly overused by Chinese college EFL learners;
that of indicating transition of topics was substantially overused; and there was almost
no difference between the learners and mature English writers in that of showing
contradiction.
(2) Further examination of the detailed logical relationships ANDDM served to
indicate in the two corpora reveals that Chinese college EFL learners employed
ANDDM for 10 and 11 times respectively to indicate the logical relationship of
condition and that of transition, which is characteristic of oral communication, while
there was not one single such case in Mature English Writers Corpus. This finding,
together with the oral feature of ANDDM argued by Biber, et al (2000b), suggests that
Chinese college EFL learners’ overusing ANDDM in writing might have resulted from
their ignorance of the different pragmatic functions ANDDM served in different
registers – in writing and in conversation, hence their transfer of orality features into
written communication.
(3) Examination of the conjunctive adverbials used in the form of ANDDM + ADV
to remove the possible ambiguity revealed that there were significant differences
between mature English writers and Chinese college EFL learners as far as the use of
ANDDM in the complex form is concerned. Chinese college EFL learners mainly
employ this form to communicate the logical relationship of addition (occupying 72%
of all such use) – the core meaning of and, which can be interpreted most easily of all
types of logical relations it serves. In contrast, mature English writers mainly employ
this form to make more explicit the two types of the most confusing logical
relationships – that of consequence/effect and that of sequence (occupying 76% of all
such use). In other words, the learners did not use conjunctive adverbials together
with ANDDM to make explicit the possible ambiguous logical relationships of
consequence and that of sequence, but used them to make it more explicit the default
logical relationship of addition. This suggests that the learners were not pragmatically
conscious when they employed the form of ANDDM + ADV. They did not appear
pragmatically competent enough to remove the possible ambiguity in their writing.
(4) There was no significant difference between the learners with different
English proficiencies in their use of ANDDM in writing. In other words, Chinese
college EFL learners’ English proficiency did not significantly influence their use of
ANDDM in their writing.
In summary, Chinese college EFL learners significantly over-depended ANDDM
in writing to serve various pragmatic functions, which may confuse their readers.
Their failure in the use of ANDDM in writing has possibly resulted from their
pragmatic incompetence – not knowing how to put themselves in their reader’s shoes
to facilitate the latter’s understanding, or just not bothering to do so. Besides, they
failed in their writing to take into consideration the different pragmatic functions
ANDDM serves in different registers – in writing and in conversation, hence their
transfer of orality features into written ones. Finally, Chinese college EFL learners’
incompetence regarding the use of ANDDM was not significantly correlated with their
English proficiency.
6.3 Implications of the Study
The theoretical implication for this study is that it can help us understand the
composition of pragmatic competence, and the register awareness of certain discourse
markers such as oh, and, and well (oh and well are only employed in speaking, and
some pragmatic functions of and are also orality featured) , hence contributing to the
theory of discourse markers. In addition, the study can also enrich SLA research in
that the present research suggests that SLA research is not only confined to learners’
acquisition of linguistic features, but can be extended to learners’ development of
pragmatic competence.
Practically, the study has some implications for lexicography, in that it reveals
that dictionary compilers should also take pragmatic meanings of discourse markers
into consideration in dictionary compilation. The present study has some pedagogical
implications for both language teachers and language learners. Language teachers
need to make available to their students such pragmatic knowledge as the pragmatic
functions ANDDM serves and its features as well, such as how and where these
pragmatic functions can be served, so as to give students a comprehensive
understanding of ANDDM as well as other discourse markers. Meanwhile, language
teachers need to develop their students’ pragmatic awareness so that they could
employ various discourse markers to serve their purposes instead of making
ambiguous sentences by being over-dependent on certain simple markers. Likewise,
language learners need also to develop their own pragmatic competence in writing.
6.4 Limitations of the Study
The present study suffers from several limitations owing to the inadequacy of the
present researcher’s understanding as well as the pressure of research time.
First, the corpora are not large enough to examine the use of ANDDM by mature
English writers and Chinese college EFL learners. Besides, the MEWC, used in this
study, is not a ready corpus built by experts in this field, but by the researcher herself;
therefore it is likely to be weak in nature.
Second, the two corpora are not so parallel in that the essays in CCELC are timed
ones, while there is no such time limitation for those in MEWC. What’s more, those
essays in MEWC were likely edited again and again by the writers themselves and
editors.
Third, while the researcher wants to make her categorization comprehensive by
listing a large number of categories of the logical relationships ANDDM helps to make
explicit, the categorization seems to be too complex. On the other hand, as the
pragmatic functions ANDDM serves vary from context to context, some functions may
not have been observed. In other words, our categorization may not have been
exhaustive.
Finally, the tagging may not be accurate especially in CCELC, as the logical
relationships examined are sometimes really ambiguous due to Chinese college EFL
learners’ overuse of ANDDM, although the researcher often read between lines in a
large context and even asked for others’ help to decide the logical relationships
between the two segments linked by ANDDM. This may have a negative effect on the
data calculation.
6.5 Recommendations for Future Research
In spite of the various limitations of the present study, it may still shed some light
on future research.
First, despite the great trend in corpus-based and corpus-driven study, there are
not so many corpora available for such studies. Therefore, great effort need be made
to build more appropriate corpora.
Second, such study as examining the differences between native speakers of
English and EFL learners in the use of discourse markers such as and in writing
should be based on larger corpora in order to better generalize the findings.
Third, as different scholars have different understanding of the logical relations
ANDDM communicates, more studies should be done to examine the pragmatic
functions of ANDDM in native corpora – spoken and written.
Finally, it is often said that men are more sensitive as far as logics is concerned. Is
it possible that male learners outperform female ones in employing ANDDM to
communicate logical relationships between segments in writing? Future research may
take into consideration the factor of gender, examining the difference between male
and female students in their use of ANDDM in writing.
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