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A View of Research on English Polysemous Phrasal Verbs

2015; David Publishing Company; Volume: 5; Issue: 8 Linguagem: Inglês

10.17265/2159-5836/2015.08.010

2159-5836

LU Zhi, Sun Juan,

Translation Studies and Practices

Phrasal verbs, accounting for a large proportion in modern language, pose numerous challenges to foreign language learners of English, who usually view verb + particle combinations random.The issue of unpredictability is obviously a problem for English learners.Making things worse, many phrasal verbs are polysemous.For one thing, one phrasal verb may have multiple meanings; for another, several phrasal verbs may have the same or similar meanings.While the fast development of cognitive linguistics theory provides a new perspective for the study of English polysemous phrasal verbs.Researchers apply cognitive linguistic theory into second language acquisition and find that the multiple senses of phrasal verbs are actually systematic and motivated.The present study summarizes studies of polysemous phrasal verbs from the perspective of traditional approaches and cognitive approaches as well as the empirical studies based on it and analyzes the shortage of traditional approaches on phrasal verbs.Lastly, this paper illustrates some drawbacks of empirical study based on the assessment of Boers ( 2011) and points out some suggestions on further studies.