Developing your Language Detective Skillsi

A good language learner is a linguistic detective, an effective language researcher who searches
for and interprets evidence on how the language works. Note that:
This is the way we learned, and continue to learn, our first language.
This is not the way many of us were taught a foreign language at school.
Students who are effective detectives are likely to make the best use of their time in
Birmingham.

Some of our work in EISU is based on evidence about how the English language works, found by
using computers to look at large collections of texts called corpora. This work leads to the
conclusions that:

Much of the structure of English has not been described adequately, and what is taught in
conventional courses and grammars is often misleading.

There is a close relationship between the grammar of English (the patterns in which words
are used) and its vocabulary (the words that are used in those patterns).

These open access classes will have succeeded if you can learn to notice for yourself more
about the academic English grammar and vocabulary you read and hear while studying your
own subject.

The Kibbitzers developed by Tim Johns feature many more academic English grammar,
vocabulary, and discourse problems all brought to us by Birmingham students:
http://lexically.net/TimJohns/index.html
In some of our lectures the examples are presented in the form of a KWIC (keyword-in-context)
citation, or example. A KWIC citation is the result of a computerised search of a large database of
several million words from many different sources, such as journal articles or newspapers. The
computer program displays a line of 100 characters (e.g. letters or numbers) with the keyword (the
interesting word or phrase) in the middle. The line very often does not contain a full sentence, and
often cuts words in half at both ends. However, 100 characters will show enough of the other words
near the keyword for you to understand how the keyword is used.

Lets have a look at examples from three tricky areas of English to help you develop your own
language detective skills.

1. Articles: the or not?

There are no simple rules about this complicated area of English. We will help you with articles in
future classes but suggest you try and notice how the is used in the English Language that you
read during your studies. Try and work out your own rules.
Task 1
a. In the following exercise the keyword the is left out. However, sometimes it was not there
to begin with. Fill in the where necessary, but do not check your answers until you have
done b.
1. they would all get jobs in ________ British industry. Still more alarmist about the flow of
2. ne lead-free fuel. And ________ British car industry, in the face of mounting environmental
3. ith the huge expansion in ________ chemical industry that took place after the Second World
4.

and on Hunts knowledge of ________ modern industry, It is lavishly illustrated, partly in

5.

research on new ideas in ________ European industry. One of the major aims of the shake-up

6.

for storage heaters). ________ electricity industry does not intend to make a habit of cut

7. o seek firm proposals from ________ private industry to take over the governments remote-s
8. olie work. Glucose is used by ________ food industry mainly in the manufacture of confectio
9. ree used to be the centre of ________ heavy industry. For 100 years after 1830, when the Ca
10.ical profession and ________ pharmaceutical industry has tottered from crisis to crisis now
11. management, such as ________ manufacturing industry, local authorities, reclamation and re
12.left ________ French information-technology industry in a mess - at least compared with Ame

b. Observation and Deduction

A. Study the following 6 examples of the structure the ________ industry.
1) Should the motor industry discard the internal combustion engine once and for all, or keep the
engine but change the fuel?
2) The dilemma facing the semiconductor industry is whether to throw all its efforts into
developing optical lithography.
3) ITV, which provides technical expertise to the French wine industry, is about to launch a
research programme to find out what is happening in these vats.
4) Years after the battle over home video formats was won, chaos still reigns in the world of
professional video formats for the broadcasting industry.
5) The American Mining Congress has said that to describe the mining industry as ravaging the
Earth is a gross distortion of the truth.
6) Mechanical handling devices have been used by the offshore drilling industry before, but only
in a piecemeal manner.

B. Now study the following examples of (zero article) ________ industry:

7) The Governments internal inquiry into the financing of British industry is to be scrutinised by a
Commons select committee.
8) Apart from all the other problems of the German economy, it does not look as if German
industry will be able to compete next century with the US, Japan or indeed China.
9) Look at the process of making a television set and delivering it to the shop, and you can see why
the emphasis in manufacturing industry is on organisation.
10) Heavy industry, which will in future cover cars, chemicals and services, including financial
services, is the other main sector.
11 ) The industrial group Zeta, which she inherited from her first husband and then expanded,
covers agriculture, food, media and light industry and has earned her the title Queen of Costa
Rica.
12) But local businessmen and politicians, who are anxious to expand local industry as well as
meet the needs of farmers, insist that a link to the Zambezi, the greatest river in southern Africa, is
the only long-term solution.
Do you notice anything interesting about how the is used (and is not used) with industry?
Now look back at exercise 1a to see if you want to make any changes.
For more on this topic, look at Collins Cobuild English Guides 3: Articles by Roger Berry,
(available from the Main Library and bookshops) and

2. Verb patterns with that

Task 2
a) Look at examples 1-12 below from a KWIC (keyword-in-context) concordance of that. Do
you notice any similarities between the examples?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12

ackbench fears, it was proposed

ky crony. This time he proposed
nel charges. The paper proposes
governors accepted the proposal
ed last year, which recommended
ket. The report also recommends
1 Palace. The court recommended
n context of the recommendation
actionaries, few have suggested
or years it has been suggested
especially one which suggested
orous debate by his suggestion

that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that

a universal letters service should be guaranteed by

Bulgaria should be expanded to absorb parts of Roman
the Court of Appeal should apply a new test of wheth
schools programming should be transferred for one ho
a third of diet should consist of fruit end vegetabl
financial appraisals should be conducted with due re
he should be given work which made use of his skills
average exposures should not be more than 5ppb and s
Clause Four should be taken as a serious guide to ac
the capital should be moved west to Kansai, the regi
only the knowledgeable should be permitted to comment
cannabis should be legalised, that Scotland suffers

b) Now study examples 13-24. How are they similar to examples 1-13? And how are they
different?
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24

s measures. Wandsworth proposes

meless Campaign, which proposes
look at a new British proposal
ut rejected Dr Berrys proposal
Nolan committee is to recommend
Croydon Crown Court recommended
had cancer. Doctors recommended
intedly, by its recommendations
hound me for daring to suggest
lied a halt to it and suggested
Sunday Times Scotland suggested
Peter Lilleys suggestion

that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that
that

the young mothers family be given the duty to house

owners of long-term empty properties be legally obli
the US play a more active role in the search for a n
his bill go to the Lords, where Mr Scott could table
an independent ombudsman oversee the conduct of MPs.
he be given work which made use of his skills and he
he donate sperm before starting chemotherapy, which
the physical punishment of children be prohibited by
he learn English before writing any more delightfull
it be outhoused via the CBI, which led to the format
victims be offered consultation on sentencing. Justi
ministers be paid more and backbenchers less is one

c) Can you find any explanation for the difference between examples 1-12 and 13-24?

3. any and some

Textbooks and grammars often contain a statement such as the following:
some is used in positive statements such as I have some money while any is used in negative
statements such as I dont have any money and in questions such as Have you any money?

Task 3
Study the following KWIC examples for any. Which of them demonstrate the statement
above?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

into infinite time. There is no evidence for

found a family. The court, without offering
appening in your life at the time? Are there
d similar factors are of vital importance in
eficiency virus. What is quite clear is that
, clearly legal redress will be available to
ent is that the driver either failed to give
lier game). The maximum possible score that

any
any
any
any
any
any
any
any

repetition of the cycle. In later Zoroas

reasoned argument, decided that the righ
themes you can pick out? Look at your pa
study of humanity. Social psychologists,
success will rest on the basic sciences
patient who suffers harm as a consequenc
thought to the possibility of such a ris
strategy could achieve was 15,000 (200 r

The word any or some has been removed from the following KWIC examples. Now decide
whether the missing word is most likely to be any or some in the following KWIC examples.
9

does it stay off? Do you reward yourself in ________ way for your success? Do you punish yo

10 fear that the unscrupulous would manipulate ________ law permitting mercy killings, end
11 is not too hot or cold. We are all aware to ________ degree of the daily rhythms of nature
12 lishments. The therapist should also reward ________ positive charges by expressing satisfa
13 elected in 1668. Though Locke did go in for ________ experimental work, his main contributi
14

experiments are rare. A Swedish study went ________ way towards achieving this aim by usin

15 , but it is doubtful whether they will make ________ significant contribution to the protec
16there tend to be fewer males than females in ________ local community. The excluded males ra
17.thy diet into a good one. You need to learn ________ basic facts about nutrition end the ba
18.loens. This is the reality which would face ________ government seeking funds for technolog
19By now it might be wondered whether there is ________ satisfactory way to measure mental per
20en this apparently simple principle requires ________ clarification before we go further. It

Are there any lines where the other word could have been used? If there are, how would the
meaning have changed?
To make it easier to find your own examples, here are two concordancing websites you can access
on the internet:
a) The Compleat Lexical Tutor website is a student friendly interface with online
concordancers: http://www.lextutor.ca/conc/
b) The British National Corpus is a 100 million word collection of samples of written and
spoken language, and provides up to 50 randomly-chosen sentence examples for your
keyword. http://www.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/(type your query in the LOOKUP box).

Key
Task 1
a. 1.- 2. the 3. the 4. 5.- 6. the 7. 8 the 9. 10. the 11. 12. the
b. patterns:
A. The + type + industry
Specific type of product or service is being mentioned
B. Zero article + country or large category + industry
Task 2
a) Propose/recommend/suggest + that + should + infinitive (without to)
often + past participle (i.e. passive construction)
b) propose/recommend/suggest + that + infinitive (without to)
often + past participle (i.e. passive construction)
c) The difference is that should is left out in the examples in b. The reason that should is optional is that the verbs
that are used here already contain the meaning of should. However, there is an explanation for the difference: in
formal contexts, particularly in writing, we often leave out should. (We call this form the present subjunctive.) It
is true that there are formal contexts in both series of examples, which demonstrates that there is no real difference in
meaning and either construction can be used. The writers choice of the form with or without should gives you an
indication of how formal they perceive the situation to be.
Task 3
The first 3 agree with the statement above, as there are 2 negative statements and 1 question. The rest do not.
Other reasons why any could be used:
A- before plural or uncountable nouns in questions about existence (know any good jokes?)
B- after negative forms of the verb regarding non-existence (she wont know any jokes)
C- when any is stressed is can refer to unrestricted quantity or unlimited choice (just tell me any joke)
D- with singular uncountable nouns and in affirmative sentences (Ill eat any bread)
Here, the examples all appear to suggest unlimited choice.
9. any 10.any 11. some 12. any 13. some 14. some 15. any 16. any 17. some 18. any 19. any 20. some
some can refer to
1- indefinite quantity but not large amounts (I have some money)
2- new information (She has got some money, (not: the money)
3- before uncountable and plural nouns, usually in positive statements (Ill have some food first. Ill have some beans.)
4- in offers and requests (do you want some money?)
5- something vague, without saying precisely what you mean (some man asked if he could come in).

Although it is unlikely as far as the meaning is concerned, in the following sentences there were options:
9. some: vague (see 5 above)
12. some: small number, a few (see 1)
13. any : unrestricted choice (see C)

Tip: for more information of these and other uses of some and any, consult any (unrestricted choice!)
Advanced Learner dictionary.

Key added by EVG. Worksheet amended by RN in 2016.