Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. Vol. 2. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 26)

Book reviews - Endre Abkarovits: Collins COBUILD Grammar Patterns. Volumes 1 and 2.

present review cannot be some kind of summary of accumulated experience in using them. Instead, I would like to write about the motives and intentions of the editors of these books; why they decided to compile them and how they see the potential in using such books when teaching or learning English. It cannot be expected that reference books with such a new approach will be immediately used by a great number of language teachers and learners. In my opinion what is more likely is that first people with some academic interest will study the books, and only their gradual introduction to language teaching can be envisaged. Though the idea of using grammar patterns is not completely new (the older generation of English teachers will remember Hornby's 'A Guide to Patterns and Usage in English' (OUP, 1954)), the present volumes are revolutionary in at least two ways. One is that they are the first comprehensive surveys of English verb, noun and adjective patterns based on the most complete analysis ever undertaken. The other is that the correlation of pattern with meaning is made obvious through computer evidence for the first time. As the mastermind behind the whole COBUILD project, John Sinclair sees it, it is very likely that continuing research will bring meaning and pattern closer and closer together. (CCGP 2: IV) Since Hornby's book, however, grammar patterns have gone out of fashion and the editors of the new COBUILD books have had to convince the readers again that it makes sense to use patterns. They define 'pattern' in the following way: '...a pattern is a description of the behaviour of a lexical item, or one of the behaviours of that item, as evidenced in a record of large amounts of language use. This evidence is most readily obtained from a large, electronically-stored corpus.' (Hunston and Francis, forthcoming) The patterns described in these books are usually of the complementation type, i.e. in most cases - especially with verbs - they show what follows the word, but with nouns it is often important what comes before the word, so modification can also be part of the pattern. The authors prefer their approach to be called 'corpus-driven'. It means the observation of a large number of electronically-stored data, which does not mean simply a quantitative change in the raw material, but it consists of data (words, shown in their environment by concordance lines) that have actually been used in the written or spoken language and not invented by some linguist. This fact makes it possible to draw more reliable conclusions than it was the case in the past, and this new approach might lead to questioning old beliefs and inspiring new theories. The compilers hold the view that lexis and syntax are both important when describing a word, so 'grammar' should give information about both. The phenomenon that want is often followed by to would be difficult to 186