a study on the forms and meanings of lexical verb get and vietnamese equivalents nghiên cứu hình thái và ngữ nghĩa của động từ get và những tương đương trong tiếng việt

However, its meaning depends on what kind of words comes after it; such as: noun, pronoun, adjective, adverb, past participle, object, infinitive, etc … I just try to focus on the seven

FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES

*****************

ĐẶNG THỊ THÙY VÂN

A STUDY ON THE FORMS AND MEANINGS OF LEXICAL

VERB ‘ GET ’ AND VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

( NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ HÌNH THÁI VÀ NGỮ NGHĨ A CỦA ĐỘNG TỪ ‘

GET ’ VÀ NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆ T )

MINOR M.A THESIS Field : English Linguistics

Code : 602215

A STUDY ON THE FORMS AND MEANINGS OF LEXICAL

VERB ‘ GET ’ AND VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

( NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ HÌNH THÁI VÀ NGỮ NGHĨ A CỦA ĐỘNG TỪ ‘

GET ’ VÀ NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆ T )

MINOR M.A THESIS

TABLE OF CONTENTS Page

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

ABBREVIATIONS vii

PART I INTRODUCTION 1 1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Research questions 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Methodology of the study 3

6 Design of the study 3

PART II DEVELOPMENT 4 CHAPTER 1 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 4 1 Clause patterns and elements 4

1.1 Verb 4

1.2 Subject 5

1.3 Object 5

1.3.1 Direct object 5

1.3.2 Indirect object 5

1.4 Complement 5

1.5 Adverbial 6

2 English Verbs 6

2.1 Forms of verbs 6

2.2 Major grammatical categories 7

2.2.1 Tense and aspect 7

2.2.2 Voice 8

2.2.3 Mood 8

2.3 Classifications of English verbs 9

2.3.1 Classified by their functions 9

2.3.2 Classified by their meanings 9

2.3.3 Classified by the number of constituents 9

2.3.4 Classified by their complementation 10

2.4 Verb phrases in English 10

2.4.1 Finite and non-finite verb phrases compared 10

2.4.2 Simple finite verb phrases 11

2.4.3 Complex finite verb phrases 12

2.4.3.1 Intensive verbs 12

2.4.3.2 Transitive verbs 12

2.4.3.3 Monotransitive verbs 12

2.4.3.4 Ditransitive verbs 12

2.4.3.5 Complex transitive verbs 13

3 Vietnamese Verbs 14

3.1 Classification 14

3.2 Verb phrases in Vietnamese 15

4 Contrastive analysis 17

CHAPTER 2 THE OCCURRENCES OF LEXICAL VERB ‘ GET ’ IN ENGLISH WITH VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS 18 1 Communicative functions expressed via the lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVO 18

1.1 to receive or obtain something 18

1.2 to fetch something 20

1.3 to catch illness 20

1.4 to use form of transportation 21

1.5 to have revenge on somebody 21

1.6 to buy something 22

1.7 other meanings 22

2 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVOO 23

3 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVC 24

3.1 Some common adjectives as Complement 24

3.2 Some common participles as Complement 25

4 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVOC 27

5 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVA 29

6 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SVOA 30

7 The lexical verb Get in clause pattern SV 30

CHAPTER 3 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 32 1 Similarities and differences in the lexical Get in English versus Vietnamese equivalents 32

1.1 Similarities 32

1.2 Differences 33

2 Errors and mistakes commonly committed by Vietnamese beginners of English and some possible solutions 34

1.1 Get as a linking verb ( copula verb ) 34

1.2 Get used with a past participle ( in pattern SVC ) 34

1.3 Get used with a past participle ( in pattern SVOC ) 35

1.4 Got / Gotten alternation 35

PART III CONCLUSION 36 1 Conclusions 36

2 Recommendations for further research 37

APPENDICES

active in meaning

meaning

PART I INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Nowadays, English is regarded as the language of modernization and technological advancement all over the world Learning English is also problematic for native speakers

in general and foreign learners in particular because they are affected by their mother tongue during the process of studying grammar, vocabulary, spelling, pronunciation, etc

On the part of grammar, Verbs have always been one of the most complex classes

of words, which have most widely used and consequently, have played an important role

in any language system so far Among English verbs, Get is one of the commonest words

and is used in many different ways

Conducting the minor thesis entitled “ A Study on The Forms and Meanings of

Lexical Verb ‘GET’ and Vietnamese Equivalents ” arose as a result of difficulties that

the author face in her daily teaching related to the usage of this verb The problem she has

to wrestle with involves various questions that elementary-level students ask concerning

the usage of get in different clause patterns and in different context

For the above reason, this thesis has been made with an attempt to contribute the author‟s own knowledge and experience in dealing with the problems of Vietnamese beginners It‟s also hopeful that this minor thesis will be of some help to those who are interested in this aspect of English grammar

2 Aims of the study

The thesis is to be focused on:

* Different forms and meanings exhibited by Get and Vietnamese equivalents

* Similarities and dissimilarities in terms of meaning between English and Vietnamese

* Common mistakes likely committed by Vietnamese beginners of English and some possible solutions

3 Research questions

To fully achieve these aims, the study should answer the following questions:

(ii) How are they similar and different in terms of meaning between English and Vietnamese ?

(iii) What are common mistakes likely committed by Vietnamese beginners of English and how to solve them ?

4 Scope of the study

most common lexical verb in any one register, it is viewed as a broad subject to discuss However, its meaning depends on what kind of words comes after it; such as: noun, pronoun, adjective, adverb, past participle, object, infinitive, etc … I just try to focus on

the seven basic clause patterns in which get occurs and its polysemy; therefore, occurrence

of get in idiomatic multiword phrases as „get away with‟ or „get rid of ‟ will not be treated

much here

5 Methodology of the study

In order to deal with the subject effectively, a flexible combination of methods is employed

- The study is carried out basically through the descriptive and contrastive analysis The descriptive method is utilized to give in depth and detailed description of forms and

meanings of get Then examples which are provided to illustrate the description will be

derived from the grammar materials and reference books written by contemporary influential linguists in English as well as bilingual written publications available in Vietnam The sources of data also comprise various genres: novels, stories, advertisements, leaflets, notices, signs and the like Besides, the translational equivalence will be chosen to serve as tertium comparationis for the contrastive analysis The pair of sentences are juxtaposed in order to show the contrast between the two languages All the

examples in the thesis will be translated word by word so that the features of get will be

- To collect relevant data and rearrange systematically

- To synthesize meanings of get from various sources

- To analyze and contrast so that the similarities and differences will be seen through the way this verb get parceled out correspondingly in Vietnamese

6 Design of the study

This minor thesis consists of 3 main parts based on the following arrangement: Part I entitled „INTRODUCTION‟ outlining the background of the study in which brief account of relevant information such as the rationale, aims, research questions, scope, methodology and design of the study are provided

Part II , the „DEVELOPMENT‟ is subdivided into 3 chapters Chapter 1 supplies the general fundamental and essential theoretical concepts involving the subject under consideration Chapter 2 presents and describes concrete cases related to the lexical verb

get in a contrastive analysis with the Vietnamese translation equivalents, together with the

transfer rules identified in formulas Chapter 3 is about the findings and discussion resulting from the study

Part III is the „CONCLUSION‟ offers the overview of the major conclusions on each of the objectives set forth as tasks assigned to the research, which is followed by some suggestion for further research

REFERENCES come at the end of the paper, closing with Appendix

PART II DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1 Clause elements and clause patterns

The clause is the key unit of syntax, capable of occurring independently The following list presents examples of the basic clause patterns

The child was laughing

a fool

Clause elements are phrases that serve syntactic roles in the clause According to Quirk et al ( 1972 : 35-40 ), there are five elements of clause ( or sentence) structure which are normally obligatory: Subject (S), Verb (V), Complement (C), Object (O), and Adverbial (A)

1.1 Verb

The term Verb (V) stands for a verb phrase in a sentence The verb phrase ( or

„predicator‟ ) is the central element of the clause, because it expresses the action or state to

which other elements relate, and it controls the other kinds of elements and meanings that

can be in the clause The VP was described in ( 2 English Verb ) of this chapter, so

nothing further needs to be said here

1.2 Subject

The second most important element is the subject Syntactically, the Subject (S) can be a noun phrase or a clause nominal function It occurs before the verb phrase in declarative sentences and immediately after the operator in interrogative sentences Moreover, it determines the number of the VP, depending on whether the subject is singular or plural Semantically, it denotes the most important participant in the action or state denoted by the verb With transitive verbs, this is generally the „doer‟ or agent of the action Besides, it generally represents the topic, i.e the entity that the clause is about But sometimes English requires a subject, even if the subject has no actual meaning

e.g It is warm in here ~ Sarah and Michael disappeared

1.3 Object

The Object is a noun phrase or a clause with nominal function It normally follows the verb and only occurs with transitive verbs By the passive transformation, it assumes the status of subject There are two kinds of objects: direct and indirect

1.3.1 Direct object ( O d )

A direct object generally follows immediately after the verb, except where an indirect object intervenes Its most common semantic role is to denote the entity affected

by the action or process of the verb

1.3.2 Indirect object ( O i )

An indirect object occurs after ditransitive verbs such as give / tell / …, and comes

before the direct object It conforms to the other criteria for objects, including the formation of passives As for their semantic role, indirect objects generally denote people receiving something or benefiting from the action of the verb

1.4 Complement

The Complement ( subject or object ) is a noun phrase, an adjective phrase, or a clause with nominal function It follows the subject, verb phrase, and ( if one is present )

object Unlike the object, the complement does not become subject through passive transformation

1.5 Adverbial

The Adverbial is an adverb, adverb phrase, adverbial clause, noun phrase or prepositional phrase Some verbs take an adverbial in order to complete their meaning,

known as obligatory adverbial It can occur with two patterns: copular and complex

transitive It usually express place or direction although it can also express time or manner meanings

The other kind, optional adverbial, add additional information to the clause,

covering a wide variety of meanings, such as place, time, manner, extent, and attitude Therefore, it may be added to or removed from a sentence without affecting the acceptability of the sentence In terms of position, it is generally mobile, i.e it is capable

of occurring in more than one position in the clause

2 English Verbs

In this part, the following areas will be taken into account: forms of verbs, major grammatical categories and classifications of English verbs

2.1 Forms of verbs ( lexical verbs )

As Radndolph Quirk & Sidney Greenbaum (1973:26) put it:

„Many English verbs have five forms: the base, the –s form, the past, the –ing participle and the –ed participle.‟

Example of these forms are given in the table below:

V-ing

play plays played playing played

steal steals stole stealing stolen

get gets got getting got / gotten

cut cuts cut cutting cut

Some of the verb forms have more than one use / function

Imperative Subjunctive The infinitive

You play very well ~ They call every day

Play tennis with me

He demanded that she call and see him I‟d like to play ~ He may call

-s form 3rd person singular present Simon plays very well

-ing participle Progressive aspect

In –ing participle clauses

He‟s calling in a moment

Calling early, I found her at home

-ed participle Perfect aspect

Passive voice

In –ed participle clauses

He has played back the film

The film was played back

Called early, he had a quick breakfast

2.2 Major grammatical categories

The English verb has main grammatical categories such as: tense – aspect – voice – mood Firstly, something should be discussed about time Time is a universal concept with three divisions:

×

2.2.1 Tense and aspect

Tense is the relationship between the form of the verb and the time of the action or state it describes Many modern grammarians claim that in the English language, verbs

have two tenses: the present tense, which normally refers to present time and the past

tense, which refers to past time For example:

She is quite well today ~ Yesterday she was sick

There is no obvious future tense in English corresponding to the time Instead,

there are a number of possibilities of denoting the future time

- Auxiliary verb construction is used to express an action happening in the future :

She will be here in half an hour

- „Be going to + infinitive‟ is used to denote future intentions : When are you going

to get married ?

- The simple present is used in the subordinate clause of conditional sentence: If you

leave now, you will never regret it

- The present progressive refers to a future happening anticipated in the present Its

basic meaning is „fixed arrangement, plan or program‟: The orchestra is playing Mozart

With reference to aspect, there are four: simple, perfect, progressive and perfect progressive Tense and aspect are combined to form a system of eight tenses as presented

in the following table:

Present

V / V-s Be: is, am, are

have / has + V-ed

am/ is / are + V-ing

have / has + been + V-ing

Voice is the way in which a language expresses the relationship between a verb

and the noun phrase which are associated with it It is voice that makes it possible to view the action of a sentence in two ways without change in the facts reported However, there may be a change in emphasis and one type of sentence may be more appropriate For

example, in: „The wind damaged the fence‟ „The wind‟ is the subject of the verb

„damaged‟, which is in the active voice; while in: „The fence was damaged by the wind‟

„the fence‟ is the subject of the verb „was damaged‟, which is in the passive voice

Verb types not employed in passivization include intensive verbs, monotransitive

verbs, verbs of suiting ( fit, suit, … ), verbs of resemblance ( look like, … ) and verbs of possession ( possess, have, own, … )

2.2.3 Mood

In English, there are three moods: indicative, imperative and subjunctive, which

are illustrated in the following table:

Indicative by the form of the verb in declarative sentences or

questions

She sat down

Are you coming ? Imperative by the form of the verb in imperative sentences Be quiet !

Subjunctive by the form of the verb often used to express

uncertainty, wishes, desires, …

I demand that he come

at once

2.3 Classifications of English verbs

There are many different ways to classify English verbs, maybe according to functions, forms, meaning, complementation or the number of constituents Due to the scope of this minor thesis, some ways to classify English verbs will be exhibited more clearly as follows:

2.3.1 Classified by their functions

From V.D.Quang‟s view in „Lectures on English Grammar‟ (2006:16), Verbs are

classified according to the functions performed by the elements in the verb phrase:

Modal : will, would, shall, should, may, might, ought to,

must, can, could

2.3.2 Classified by their meanings

Distinctions between verbs need to be drawn in relation to whether they themselves admit the aspectual contrast of „progressive‟ and „non-progressive‟ When verbs ( either

habitually or in certain uses ) will not admit the progressive, they are called Stative; when they admit it, they are called Dynamic It is normal for verbs to be dynamic and even the

minority that are almost always stative can usually be given a dynamic use on occasion For instance:

The girl is now a student at a large university

2.3.3 Classified by the number of constituents

One-word verbs

Phrasal-prepositional verbs : verb + particle + preposition

e.g. We learn English every day ( one-word verb )

2.3.4 Classified by their complementation

Current : be, seem, remain, keep, …

Verbs

Her face went red ( resulting intensive ) Mary sings well ( intransitive )

Mary beat Tom hard ( monotransitive )

I gave Tom a book ( ditransitive ) Tom made me angry ( complex transitive )

2.4 English Verb Phrases

In Longman Dictionary of Applied Linguistics (1985:306), the verb phrase is defined as the part of a sentence which contains the main verb and also any object(s),

complement(s), and adverbial(s) For example, in Tom gave a watch to his son all the sentence except Tom is the verb phrase

verb or primary verb as their head ( i.e their main verb ) The main verb can stand alone

or be preceded by one or more auxiliary verbs The auxiliaries further define the action, state or process denoted by the main verb Morphologically, verb phrases are divided into the finite verb phrase and the non-finite verb phrase

2.4.1 Finite and non-finite verb phrases compared

According to V.D Quang (2006:17), the five forms of the verb phrase are

express grammatical time relations

Ø

be With other lexical verbs, there is a contrast

Ø

simple present or past tense form

consist of one or more finite forms of the verb They often occur as S, O, C or A in main clause

non-Let‟s compare two sets:

It is useful to have studied English

To smoke like that must be dangerous

I found him working

Having been offended before, he was sensitive

2.4.2 Simple finite verb phrases

The finite verb phrase is simple when it consists of only one verb, which may be imperative, present or past For example:

Work harder ! ~ He works hard ~ He worked hard

2.4.3 Complex finite verb phrases

The complex verb phrase consists of two or more verbs in which the lexical verb follows the auxiliary verb(s) The lexical verb is the verb phrase head As the introduction

in 2.3., there are five classes of lexical verbs Different kinds of verbs make different verb phrases and also the range of combinations

2.4.3.1 Intensive verbs

The intensive verbs, or copula verbs, are used to join a noun, a pronoun, an

adjective to the subject for a sentence, such as: be, feel, look, seem, remain, appear,

become, turn, grow, fall, get, go, come … They can only be in the active voice form, and

noun phrases following them are never objects The NPs are complement and have different semantic functions The sentence patterns of these verbs are SVC and SVA

She gets older ~ He was in the house

2.4.3.2 Intransitive verbs

An intransitive verb cannot take an object and make complete sentences by itself ( although there can be noun phrase or prepositional phrase after it, they are not object because these can be shifted ) The sentence pattern is SV

The man was waiting ( at the side of the road ) ~ They arrived ( the next day )

object and indirect object The orders are:

2.4.3.5 Complex transitive verbs

These verbs following by two noun phrases look as if they are ditransitive but in fact, they are not They take the pattern SVOC or SVOA

The group elected him president ( SVOC ) They left the room in a good mood ( SVOA )

If we relate the structure of the non-finite verb phrase to that of the finite verb phrase, we can tabulate them as follows:

to have been examining

to have been examined

to be being examined

to have been being examined

having examined

* being examining being examined having been examining having been examined

* being being examined

* having been being examined

The last two non-finite verb phrases ( to have been being examined and having

been being examined ) are rarely used

3 Vietnamese Verb

are shown chiefly through word order and function words (grammatical words) Also, Vietnamese words have the same forms in different positions in sentences As a result, several grammatical structures are similar in form-organization but different in grammatical meanings And Vietnamese verbs are not out of question

Hôm qua tôi đi làm bằng xe máy ( Yesterday I went to work by motorbike )

refers to an action, a behavior, an idea or an emotion, a state or a development of a state

parts of speech In other words, they are not affected by number, person, gender, mood, voice and tense In addition, when functioning as central component of a verb phrase, verb can combine with other modal auxiliary components before it to indicate scope of the

action or activity such as cũng, đều, cứ, etc ; to indicate continuation like còn, vẫn, etc ; to indicate tense, aspect such as sắp, đang, sẽ, đã, etc ; to indicate advice or prohibit such as

hãy, đừng, chớ and so on Also, as Nguyen Kim Than ( 1977:178 ) states that đã, đang, vừa, mới, sẽ, … are words indicating aspect – time It means that they are used to show the

carrying out or completion of an action in a certain time and the use of adverbs of time

belongs to the area of sentence structures Besides, such words as bị, chịu, được, … which

may be considered a sign of the passive voice by some other grammarians are independent

verbs ( động từ độc lập )

3.1 Classification

According to D.Q.Ban and H.V.Thung (1992:91), they classify Vietnamese verbs into two

kinds: independent verbs (động từ độc lập) and dependent verbs (động từ không độc lập)

In each major type, he subdivides them basing on several factors They are summarized in the following table:

Classification of verbs Examples Meanings conveyed

bị, được, mắc phải, chịu, … passive

Relation

Dependent

by Adjunct followed

viết, đánh, đi, nói, nghe, action yêu, ghét, thích, mê, …

thấy, cảm thấy, …

state

by Notional words followed

ngồi, đứng, nằm, lăn, … ngủ, thức, cười, … cằn nhằn, hậm hực, …

action ( notional words needn‟t be required )

(  intransitive verbs ) đánh, trồng, học, …

cho, tặng, gửi, lấy, … sai, bảo, khiến, …

ra, vào, lên, xuống, …

đi, chạy, bò, lăn, … kéo, đẩy, xô, …

action ( notional words are usually required )

(  monotransitive verbs or ditransitive verbs )

Source: Diep Quang Ban & Hoang Van Thung, Vietnamese Grammar, p100

3.2 Verb Phrases in Vietnamese

The Vietnamese verb phrase is the enlargement of the verb related to other components to get a specific function in a sentence According to Nguyen Tai Can (1996), the verb phrase is divided into three parts:

Another Vietnamese linguist, Diep Quang Ban (1989), agrees that the verbal phrase in Vietnamese consists of three parts: operators ( Op ), the main verb ( main V ) and complementation ( C )

a verb, an adjective or an adverb

Initial component

( phần đầu )

Centre ( trung tâm )

Ending component ( phần cuối )Verb phrase

4 Contrastive analysis

From Richards‟ view (1992), Contrastive Analysis ( CA ) is „the comparison of the

linguistic systems of two languages, for example the sound system or the grammatical system‟

CA describes similarities and differences among two or more languages at such levels as phonology, grammar, pragmatics and semantics The execution of CA involved two steps which are description and comparison in this order With regard to the criteria for comparison, the tertium comparationis (TC) utilized in this paper are the translationally equivalent sentences which according to James (1980:175) are synonymous with sameness

which, no matter how they diverge superficially, are semantically and pragmatically equivalent‟ As a result, all translation equivalences chosen as TC for the CA in this study are those satisfying James‟ requirements mentioned The formulation of the translationally equivalent sentences allows the similarities and differences of clause patterns containing

the lexical verb get in the two languages to be detected On the basis of the contrastive

analysis done, predictions of certain difficult areas Vietnamese learners may meet when learning these structures are made During the process of comparison, there may happen some cases where they are interpreted by means of communicative translation