A Corpus-Based Contrastive Study On English And Non-English Majors’ Acquisition Of Phrasal Verbs In Written English

Phrasal verbs are a very important language feature in English.It includes two parts: the verbs and the particles.Phrasal verbs are various in kinds,complex in structure and abundant in meanings.It has always been a difficult language point in English.Therefore,it is very meaningful to study phrasal verbs both for language learning and teaching.Based on the theories of interlanguage,error analysis and language transfer,this thesis attempts to make a detailed study of the use of phrasal verbs in Chinese English majors and non-English majors’ written language by using Chinese students’ corpus of written English.It mainly studies the ten verbs that are most likely to form phrasal verbs,discusses whether there are great differences in the frequency of usage between English and non-English majors,compares and analyzes common errors,and summarizes the deep reasons.The conclusion of this study is: firstly,in terms of the overall frequency of phrasal verb usage,the frequency of English major learners is higher than that of non-English major learners.However,there is no significant difference in the frequency distribution of phrasal verbs between the two groups.Secondly,as for the overall error rate,the error rate of English majors is lower than that of non-English majors,but the gap is not large.The two groups remain consistent in the error rate distribution.Finally,this paper analyzes four common errors and summarizes the reasons for the differences and similarities between English and non-English major learners’ use of phrasal verbs: interlingual interference,the complexity of phrasal verbs and improper teaching methods.The inspiration of this study is that in English teaching and learning,teachers should pay more attention to the use of phrasal verbs,enrich teaching methods and strengthen metaphor awareness.For English learners,they should make more use of corpus to localize their language.