1. From collocation to colligation
类联接
From collocation to colligation
Jiajin XU
Beijing Foreign Studies University

2. Key points Colligation Aspects of English colligation
From ‘c’ to ‘g’
Aspects of English colligation
From Firth to Hoey
Colligator: A colligation query tool

3. Colligation: From ‘c’ to ‘g’
Both collocation and colligation tell about the co-occurrence or co-selection.
Firth (1957: 182) sees collocation as ‘actual words in habitual company’, and colligation as ‘the interrelation of grammatical categories in syntactical structure’ (ibid: 183). L5 L4 L3
decision L1
make R1 R3 R4 R5 L5 L4 L3
NN1 L1
VV0 R1 R3 R4 R5
Linear units of meaning

4. Colligation: From ‘c’ to ‘g’
E.g. ‘I watched him’
a [1st person sing. pron.] + [past tense of a transitive verb] + [3rd person sing. pron. in the objective form] (Firth 1957: 181).
[Pron.] + [Verb] + [Pron.]
Colligation is also applied to phrases or words (Baker et al. 2006: 36).
E.g. the word window tends to colligate with prepositions.

5. Once upon a time, in conclusion, the paper examines…
Firth (1957): Interrelation between grammatical categories ↓
Hoey (2005): Textual colligation
Lexico-grammar categories are colligated with textual positions.
Once upon a time, in conclusion, the paper examines…

6. Colligation research: an overview
Colligational patterns can be summarised by looking at concordance lines.
Free hand and Naked eye
More often, colligation can be studied with PoS-tagged texts.

7. Colligation research: an overview
Relevant studies
1. Tag sequences/POSgrams & overall patterning:
(Aarts & Granger, 1998; Tono, 1999; Hunston & Francis, 2000; 濮建忠, 2003b);
2. Focusing on a particular word class, e.g. verb
(e.g. Francis, Hunston & Manning, 1996,1998; Mindt, 1995, 2002; 濮建忠，2003a; 孙海燕, 2004; 孙海燕、陈永捷, 2006);

8. Colligation research: an overview
3. Focusing on a specialised category,
e.g. Biber & Reppen (1998) on complement clause,
Gabrielatos (2007) on if conditional,
张军、李文中 (2004) on verb noun colligation, and
梁茂成 (2008) on modal sequences.
4. Hoey (2002): Textual colligation
as a special kind of lexical priming (see also Hoey & O’Donnell )
He argues that some lexis has a preference for certain textual functions.
Time nouns (e.g. years, days) tend to appear at the beginning part of a text.
“It is reported” structure

9. The case of ‘I think’

10. This poses a question as to whether we can examine the different layers of colligational pattern of expressions like “I think” all at a time.
This is the primary motivation of our colligation tool—Colligator.

11. Lexico-grammatical choice & chain
Syn-
Para-
By doing so, we have actually expanded our observation of syntagmatic patterning to both syntagmatic and paradigmatic patterning.

12. Tasks China in the media: A colligation analysis
It is ADJ that: A CIA design
Modal colligation of CN EFL learners
A quasi-replication of Liang’s study

13. References
Aarts, J. & S. Granger Tag sequences in learner corpora: A key to interlanguage grammar and discourse. In S. Granger (ed.). Learner English on Computer. London: Longman.
Baker, P., A. Hardie & A. McEnery A Glossary of Corpus Linguistics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Biber, D., & R. Reppen Comparing native and learner perspectives on English grammar: A study of complement clauses. In Granger, S. (ed.). Learner English on Computer. London: Longman,
Firth, J. 1957/1968. A synopsis of linguistic theory, Studies in linguistic analysis (Special Volume of the Philological Society), Reprinted in F. Palmer. Selected Papers of J. R. Firth London and Harlow: Longmans, Green and Co., Ltd.,
Francis, G., S. Hunston & E. Manning Collins COBUILD Grammar Patterns 1: Verbs. London: HarperCollins.
Francis, G., S. Hunston & E. Manning Collins COBUILD Grammar Patterns 2: Nouns and Adjectives. London: HarperCollins.
Gabrielatos, C If-conditionals as modal colligations: A corpus-based investigation. In M. Davies, P. Rayson, S. Hunston & P. Danielsson (eds.). Proceedings of the Corpus Linguistics Conference: Corpus Linguistics Birmingham: University of Birmingham.
Hoey, M. & M. O’Donnell Lexicography, grammar, and textual position. International Journal of Lexicography 21:
Hoey, M Textual colligation: A special kind of lexical priming. In K. Aijmer & B. Altenberg (eds.). Language and Computers, Advances in Corpus Linguistics. Papers from the 23rd International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora (ICAME 23), Göteborg May Amsterdam: Rodopi,
Hunston, S. & G. Francis Pattern Grammar: A Corpus-driven Approach to the Lexical Grammar of English. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

14. References
Mindt, D. A corpus-based grammar for ELT. In B. Kettleman & G. Marko (eds.). Teaching and Learning by Doing Corpus Analysis. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2002.
Mindt, D An Empirical Grammar of the English Verb: Modal Verbs. Berlin: Cornelsen,.
Tono, Y A corpus-based analysis of interlanguage development: Analysing part-of-speech tag sequences of EFL learner corpora. In B. Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk & P. Melia (eds.). PALC’99: Practical Applications in Language Corpora. Frankfurt: Peter Lang,
许家金、熊文新，2009，基于学习者英语语料的类联结研究：概念、方法及例析，《外语电化教学》，(3): 18-23。
孙海燕、陈永捷，2006，中国英语学习者名词类联接的发展特征——基于赋码语料库的研究. 《外语教学与研究》，(4): 。
孙海燕，2004，基于语料库的学生英语形容词搭配语义特征探究，《现代外语》，(4): 。
张军、李文中，2004，COLEC中动名搭配模式及失误分析，《外语教学》，(4): 30-32。
梁茂成，2008，大学生英语笔语中情态序列的使用特点研究，《外语教学与研究》，(1): 51-58。
濮建忠，2003a，《学习者动词行为：类联接、搭配及词块》。开封：河南大学出版社。
濮建忠，2003b，英语词汇教学中的类联接、搭配及词块，《外语教学与研究》，(6): 。

15. Thank You!
Xu Jiajin