Chapter 6  Use of Words——Collocation1

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Collocation

     1. Co-occurrence

     Co-occurrence refers to the permitted syntagmatic combination of words. Firth uses a less technical expression for this term - "the mutual expectancy of words". He once argued that "You shall know a word by the company it keeps." His familiar example was that of ass which occurred in You silly ass, Don't be such an ass and with a limited set of adjectives such as silly, obstinate, stupid, awful and egregious (occasionally). This keeping company Firth called collocation.

      2. Association and collocation centering on a given subject
     Before we center association and collocation on a given subject, it is highly important to take into account association and collocation between word-classes. English is known as a noun-based or verb-based language. Thus in most cases association and collocation occur with either a noun or a verb acting as a central word around which other word-classes are arranged. Here we will restrict ourselves to the associative and collocative relationship between nouns and verbs, nouns and adjectives, and verbs and adverbs.
     A. Nouns and verbs
     The English language has very many turns of expressions in which from long usage certain nouns and verbs almost invariably occur together. For instance, one may acquire knowledge, achieve success, attain one's end, cultivate acquaintance, exercise his gifts, fight a battle, harbour ulterior motives, gain a reputation, develop one's talents, profess principles, relieve distress, grant a request, offer services, seek advice, etc.
     A wide range of words can be used with either a noun or a verb by means of association and collocation. Both nouns and verbs, if acting as stimuli, can elicit a set of responses. For instance, one may raise, create, cause, confront, overcome solve, clear away, get around a difficulty. Again water flows or runs, freezes, boils, fills a vessel, nourishes plants, extinguishes fire, moistens the soil. Conversely, verbs may also yield a large number of nouns in the stimulus-response process. For instance, the word deserve always occurs with such words as praise, credit, a reward, thanks, punishment, blame, good or bad treatment. Again one may follow an example, a precedent, a leader, a guide, a track, the fashion, a trade, etc.
     To acquire a sophisticated command of English, special attention must be directed to those word combinations that are far removed from the way of thinking on the part of non-native speakers. Some collocations occur quite naturally in English but seem to be rather unusual or unlikely in one's mother tongue. For example, in Chinese we can hardly ever find equivalents for English collocations like beat a retreat, place an order, lift a seige, inflict an injury, make good a loss, exert an influence, etc.
     B. Nouns and adjectives
     Collocations each consisting of an adjective and a noun are difficult to classify. Obvious word combinations like a broad subject, an open window will be ignored in favour of those that are particularly difficult for non-native speakers, e.g. a broad hint, an open question. By difficult adjective-noun phrases we mean those whose meaning or collocational possibility is not easily predictable. "An open question" refers to a question for discussion and not yet decided. Investigation has shown that as a stimulus the word hint will, in most cases, elicit clear or obvious as responses instead of broad. Here we propose to take up and explain such difficult phrases.
     Some adjective-noun groups are idiomatic expressions' e.g. a capital crime (a crime legally punishable with death), a close shave (a narrow escape), a drawn game (a game from which both parties withdraw without either having won the victory), a fair copy (a neat legible copy as opposed to a rough copy or first copy), good offices (intervention or recommendation to be sought in one's favour), gratuitous contract (a contract for the benefit of the person for whom it is made, with a reciprocal promise of benefit to the maker), a left-handed compliment (a compliment of doubtful sincerity, or ambiguous meaning), an open verdict (a verdict given when the guilt of the accused is left undetermined through lack of evidence), proud flesh (flesh which grows an excrescence in a wound or sore), red tape (excessive official formality).
     Some adjective-noun phrases are culturally bound and characterized by a great richness of literary and historical associations, e.g. a blue stocking (a term applied colloquially to a literary lady. It was applied originally to literary society comprising both men and women), the golden rule (the rule Jesus Christ gave to men, "Do unto others as you would wish them to do to you), a utopian scheme (Utopia was the name given by Sir Thomas More to an imaginary island which had an ideally perfect government. Hence the term utopian has come to be applied generally to an admirable scheme or project that is fanciful, chimerical, incapable of accomplishment), Augean stables (According to Greek mythology, Augeus, King of Elis in Greek, had a stable occupied by three thousand oxen, which had not been cleansed for thirty years. Hercules cleansed it in one day by turning two rivers through it. Hence to cleanse the Augean stables is to correct a great abuse, or to remove a nuisance or scandal which seemed irremovable).
     C. Verbs and adverbs
     Certain verbs when followed by adverbs become phrasal verbs bearing a new signification, such as to cry up (to praise), to give up (to abandon). This will be dealt with in detail in the following chapter. What we are concerned with here is the free and normal combination of a verb and an adverb, such as to walk quickly, to hit hard. But the obvious collocations will be avoided to give prominence to those that seem to be unusual to non-native speakers. For example, to criticize roundly may be said to be "subtle" as compared with the obvious combination to criticize severely, for the adverb roundly is not so easily united to the verb criticize by means of association as the adverb severely. Further examples of this "subtle" collocation are: guard (one's rights) jealously, fondly hope, smile broadly, think aloud, view widely, judge judiciously, etc.
     Sometimes different verbs collocate with different adverbs though these adverbs contain more or less the same meaning, for example:
     He sweated profusely.
     Blood flew copiously.
     He drew heavily on the book.
     From the analysis of the above collocations, we will now proceed to the subject of association and collocation centering on a given idea. To tie in to one package words and expressions that belong to a particular subject is a systematic approach to vocabulary-building. This is also a never-failing source of knowledge acquisition. Take for example the subject: Calling a Meeting.
     To call a meeting is easily associated with to attend a meeting, to chair a meeting, to adjourn a meeting, to resume a meeting, to close a meeting. At a meeting one is expected to address oneself to a certain subject or to make suggestions or to propose a motion. If one is involved in a debate, one has to present one's arguments to fortify (or support) one's position on a certain problem. If people fail to arrive at an agreement, they will put a question to the vote. When votes are counted and found to be nearly equal, for and against, it is said there has been a close vote.
     A mere listing of words and expressions related to a given subject will not put you on the way to mastery of a language. To ensure accuracy of usage and facilitate verbal communication, one must properly handle the syntactical and collocational relationship between words in a sentence. For instance, to break up can be used either intransitively or transitively, e.g. The meeting broke up at noon. The police tried to break up the protest meeting. When the word move means "make a formal request (at a meeting)" or "put forward for discussion", it is followed by the preposition for or an object clause, for example:
     He moved for a reconsideration of the measure.
     He moved that the measure be reconsidered.
     Words and expressions should not be memorized in isolation from the linguistic contexts. The safest approach is to make sentences in which individual words and expressions may occur. Take the word vote for example.
     We will take a vote on the bill.
     We will put the bill to the vote.
     We propose an open vote on the bill.
     We will cast votes in favour of the bill.
     If possible, words and expressions belonging to a given subject should be incorporated into a single paragraph, for example:
     I order goods from a shopkeeper, i.e. I let him know either orally or by letter or through someone else that I want such and such articles. He fills up the order and sends me the goods. He makes out his bill or invoice or account and sends it also to me. I send him back the bill and the amount of it in money, whereupon he receipts the bill and returns it to me. I file the receipted account, so that if, through the shopkeeper's mistake, a bill is ever presented for these goods again, I shall be able to produce the receipted account to show that they have been paid for.