Abstract
The authors of this study looked at 49 samples of English writing from 14 Chinese students enrolled in College ESL. Adverbial placements were recorded, categorized, and analyzed. Although some types of adverbials have different positioning in Chinese than in English, the authors found that this was not a primary factor in the students’ English writing. Students greatly favored sentence-initial and post-verbal placement of adverbs and made extensive use of modality adverbs. Reasons for their placements and usage are possibly: ease of transfer, explicit instruction, and a perception of prestige.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Faculty Supervisor
Ettien Koffi
Recommended Citation
Zhang, Borui and Koller, Theresa
(2015)
"Adverbial Phrase Placements in L1-Chinese ESL Learners' Writing,"
Linguistic Portfolios: Vol. 4, Article 9.
Available at:
https://repository.stcloudstate.edu/stcloud_ling/vol4/iss1/9
Author Bio
Borui Zhang is a current graduate student in the MA Linguistics program at the University of Minnesota. She is also earning a MA Degree in the TESL/Applied Linguistics program at St. Cloud State University. Her area of interest is computational syntax, phonology, and semantics. She can be reached via email at: zhan3829@umn.edu or breezhang8160@gmail.com.
Theresa Koller is a graduate student in the MA TESL program at St. Cloud State University. She has taught EFL in a variety of contexts around the world, from kindergarteners in Mongolia to secondary and tertiary students in Hong Kong. Her interest is pedagogical practices that foster autonomous learning. She can be reached via email at: koth1202@stcloudstate.edu.