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1995
241 Gnutzmann Küster Schramm

Phrasal Verbs in Interlanguage: Implications for Teaching

121
1995
Gabriele Neumann
Ingo Plag
Phrasal verbs (PVs) constitute a notorious difficulty for second language learners of English. They are, however, extremely common and therefore useful to know for the learner. This article discusses the question of how PVs should be taught in the advanced second language classroom. It is shown, on the basis of interlanguage data, that the existence of a similar category of verbs in the mother tongue of German learners leads to frequent cross-linguistic influence: avoidance, semantic transfer, and phonic transfer. We argue that these facts cannot be ignored by the language teacher, but should be exploited through a systematic comparison of PVs with their German counterparts. Two examples of such a comparison are given for illustration.
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Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag Phrasal Verbs in Interlanguage: Implications for Teaching Abstract. Phrasal verbs (PVs) constitute a notorious difficulty for second language learners of English. They are, however, extremely common and therefore useful to know for the learner. This article discusses the question of how PVs should be taught in the advanced second language classroom. lt is shown, on the basis of interlanguage data, that the existence of a similar category of verbs in the mother tongue of German learners leads to frequent cross-linguistic influence: avoidance, semantic transfer, and phonic transfer. We argue that these facts cannot be ignored by the language teacher, but should be exploited through a systematic comparison of PVs with their German counterparts. Two examples of such a comparison are given for illustration. 1. lntroduction Phrasal verbs (PV s) are a notorious difficulty for second language (L2) learners of English (e.g. Comell 1985, Dagut/ Laufer 1985, Hulstijn/ Marchena 1989, McPartland 1989, Laufer/ Eliasson 1993). These structures are, however, extremely common1 especially, but not exclusively, in informal language (e.g. CDPV 1990: IV) -, and therefore useful to know for the learner. The publication of three different dictionaries of phrasal verbs (CDPV, ODPV, LDPV) in the recent past seems tobe indicative of the growing awareness of the problem of phrasal verbs in the teaching and learning of English. Given the shortcomings of learners as evidenced in the studies mentioned above, one could easily come to the conclusion that teaching these forms is a waste of time and energy because of the sheer number of items and the complexity of their semantics. 2 More optimistic people, like foreign language teachers, probably would rather like to know how, on the basis of the sobering results of second language acquisition research, they should teach this area of lexis. This article suggests that PV s should be taught contrastively with German learners, whose native language (Ll) features a similar dass of items, namely the so-called 'particle verbs' (Partikelverben). We will show that the existence of a similar category of verbs in the mother tongue of German learners leads to frequent cross-linguistic influence: avoidance (cf. the references above), semantic transfer, and phonic transfer. We The CDPV alone lists over three thousand phrasal verbs (CDPV 1990: V). 2 We will assume that the teaching of vocabulary, if done well, is useful. Scepticists are referred to Nation (1990: 1ff) for general arguments in favor of vocabulary teaching. In our view, the strongest argument for vocabulary teaching is that in any type of SL teaching one is constantly confronted with new words that, implicitly or explicitly, have tobe dealt with. FLuL 24 (1995) 94 Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag argue that these facts cannot be ignored by the language teacher, but should be exploited through a sytematic comparison of PVs with their Ll equivalents. Tue article is structured as follows. In the next section English PV s and German particle verbs are compared. This is followed by a discussion of the leamer's problems with these structures (section 3). In section 4 we will propose a model for the teaching of PV s, section 5 will summarize the results. 2. English and German compared For the purposes of this study we define phrasal verbs as structures involving a verb followed by a preposition or particle 3, which together form a semantic unit. This definition is rather vague but suffices for our present purposes. In German, particle verbs can be characterized by the incorporation of a preposition as a verbal particle, like in anziehen or aufgeben. Tue German infinitive forms feature a preverbal instead of a postverbal agglutination of the particle. All finite forms of particle verbs, however, show the separation of prefix and stem, so that the pertinent word order of German particle verbs and of English PVs is verb plus particle, as in ich gebe auf II give up, which makes German particle verbs and English PVs prime candidates for cross-linguistic identification, and thus for transfer. 4 lt has frequently been observed that there are PVs with a rather literal meaning, i.e. a meaning that can easily be analyzed as the sum of the literal, or most prominent, meanings of its parts. Come down, put in, take away (in their literal reading) exemplify this type of PV. On the other hand, there is quite a number of PVs (the vast majority, it seems) that are less transparent or even completely idiomatic. Call for and show oft may be cited as examples of the latter types, respectively. Tue idiomaticity of PVs is best described as a continuum with relatively transparent forms at the one end and completely opaque forms at the other. lt is, however, not always clear, which criteria are relevant in locating an item on this continuum. Notions like 'metaphoric extension' or 'transparency' are notoriously ill-defined and it seems that the decision about what is more or less idiomatic is sometimes a matter of individual preference instead of water-tight criteria. 3 There is considerable variation in the literature conceming the categorial nature of the preposition-like item following the verb. lt seems unclear whether the iteins following the verb (in English) should be characterized as particles, adverbs, or prepositions. In this article, we will ignore these distinctions and use the terms interchangeably, since nothing in our discussion hinges on this issue. 4 Syntactically, PVs differ from German particle verbs also in other respects. Thus, English PVs fall in three subcategories according to their syntactic behavior. (cf. e.g. Quirk [et al.] 1972: 815, 1985: 1152ff, Dirven/ Radden 1977: 182ff). Tue syntax of PVs and particle verbs is, however, of no concem in this article, which focusses solely on the semantic aspects. FLuL 24 (1995) Phrasal Verbs in Interlanguage: Implications for Teaching 95 In German, things are very similar. We are faced with extremely polysemous and idiomatic items on the one band (e.g. aufgeben (intransitive/ transitive) 'give up', aufgeben (transitive) 'send'), and quite transparent forms on the other (cf. wegweifen 'throw away'). 3. Some Problems for the Leamer In this section we will illustrate some of the problems a German learner of English has to deal with when faced with PV s. Previous studies of PVs in interlanguage, as the ones by Dagut/ Laufer (1985) [Hebrew learners], Laufer/ Eliasson (1993) [Swedish learners] and Hulstijn/ Marchena (1989) [Dutch learners] concentrate on the avoidance of PV s. In a nutshell, Hebrew learners seem to avoid PVs in their English altogether, because they lack an equivalent structure in their mother tongue, whereas Dutch and Swedish learners do not avoid PVs as a category, but only individual PV s. In Hulstijn/ Marchena's study these individual PVs were mainly figurative and the learners avoided them for reasons of Ll-L2 similarity or socalled idiomatic disbelief, i.e. the learners perceived them as being too Dutch-like or too idiomatic (Hulstijn/ Marchena 1989: 250; Laufer/ Eliasson 1993: 39). For Swedish learners, however, Laufer/ Eliasson (1993) found that they did not avoid figurative PVs more often than other PVs. They postulate that not only L2-complexity (semantic and structural), but a combination of both Ll-L2 similarity 5 (or dissimilarity, respectively) and L2-complexity, triggers avoidance. Therefore, the common assumption that in general highly idiomatized PVs are very difficult for the learner, needs to be modified. By way of illustration, let us consider the PV run out of, literally 'go quickly from the inside to the outside' . 6 Tue PV meaning 'have no more left' should be judged as quite idiomatic, and therefore one would predict this PV to be a problem for the second language learners. According to Cornell's experimental results (1985), however, this is not the case. In his study, Comell presents German learners with a cloze test, and presents a table of 'facility values', in which the PVs are ranked according to the number of correct responses. Run out of scores high on bis facility scale, i.e. it is in some sense "easy" for the learners in this study. In our view, there is a simple reason for this surprising fact: in the Ll of the learners tested, a similar metaphor can be found, namely German ausgehen 'run out of, literally 'go out'. Note that both the literal meanings and the metaphorical mean- 5 We are talking about real, not about perceived similarity of two languages. 6 The two readings correspond to different syntactic structures (PP vs. NP complement). This is, however, irrelevant for the point being made here. FLuL 24 (1995) 96 Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag ings of the German and English verbs roughly correspond. 7 For the German learners, the English metaphorical meaning can thus be easily accounted for by semantic transfer from Ll. Idiomaticity as such is therefore only one of the possible stumbling stones for the learner. Sometimes the would-be idiomaticity is the result of a more or less transparent metaphorization process, which enables learners to make out the correct meaning. Tue same holds for idiomatic uses that are completely non-transparent but identical in the two languages. 8 Hence, in our view, the central problem for a German learner of English is rather to sort out the similarities and dissimilarities in the semantics of German and English verb particle constructions. Let us take a look at the comprehension of PVs first. As suggested above, in many cases outright calquing into German is a successful learner strategy. English give up, or eat up can be directly related to German aufgeben and aufessen, respectively. Again, the fact that the particular meanings are highly idiomatic can be completely ignored since both languages use the same kind of expressions. In other cases, calquing may lead to undesired results. Close up, for example, expresses more or less the contrary of what is suggested by the combination of its German primary counterparts 9 schließen and auf Tue meaning of other PVs can be infetred by intra-lingual transfer. The.meaning of, for example, drink up parallels the one expressed by eat up, and can thus easily be deduced by the learner. Another type of PV consists of items where no allusion to the mother tongue can be made. Show oft is a case in point. If we turn to the production side, it seems that semantic transfer again plays a very important part. In our random collection of errors, learners often use relexifications of German complex verbs. This is true even for very advanced learners, as illustrated by the following data: (1) Downing's investigation sheds some light on the contextual influence on compound interpretation. But she does not show up why the semantic classes mentioned above must form the minimal set of possible interpretation strategies. 7 The syntax of the verbs, when used metaphorically, is different in the two languages: (i) He ran out of salt. (ii) Dem/ Ihm ist das Salz ausgegangen. What is a subject in English, surfaces as a Dative object in German, and what is the object in English, is the subject in German. The syntactic aspects will not be discussed any further. 8 This hypothesis is supported by Uhlenberg (1991), who shows that leamers heavily rely on L1 metaphorizations in choosing the correct L2 item in a cloze test. The leamers in her study tend to give the best results with PVs that are calquable (e.g. get through/ durchkommen) and/ or that are formed by the same kind of metaphorization (e.g. get over somethinglüber etwas hinwegkommen). 9 Fora discussion of the notion of 'primary counterpart' see section 4.3. FLuL 24 (1995) Phrasal Verbs in Interlanguage: Implications for Teaching 97 (1) is taken from a recent monograph written in English by a German linguist 10, and shows nicely the effect of calquing, on the basis of the German aufzeigen 'show, explain'. Learners apparently tend to take the individual elements of the German particle verb, translate them into English, join them, and expect that the resulting PV is semantically identical to the L1 item. Transfer may also happen on the phonological level, consider (2) and (3): (2) He picks up the pears 'He plucks off the pears' (intended nieaning) (3) I give up the paper tomorrow 'I hand in the paper tomorrow' (intended meaning) (2) is a learner's description of an event where a man picks pears from a tree and puts them·in bis apron; (3) was uttered by a different learner when talking to her teacher. (2) features a covert error, since the form pick up exists in English but cannot be used to denote the picking of a fruit from a tree. The learner obviously coined pick up on the basis of abpflücken 'pluck off, with the particle abbeing phonologically identical (in this learner's interlanguage) to the English preposition up. Pick, of course, translates into German pflücken. The cross-linguistic identification of up and abis a good example of the fact that especially learners at a lower level of proficiency tend to store similar-sounding words together (e.g. Henning 1973). Give up in (3) is analogously formed on the basis of German abgeben. To summarize our discussion of Iearner problems, we can say that German learners ofEnglish face mimerous semantic (and sometimes phonic) problems when trying to sort out the intricasies of the sirnilarities and dissirnilarities between German particle verbs and English PVs. The next section will focus on the implications this has for the teaching of PV s. 4. How Teach Phrasal Verbs? In this section we will argue that, on the basis of the interlanguage facts, the teaching of PVs should focus on their inherent systematicity in the target language on the one band, and on the systematic comparison of PVs to sirnilar structures in the mother tongue, on the other band. 4.1 Why Teach Phrasal Verbs, after all? Thinking about the difficulties of PVs outlined above, one could easily think it would suffice to teach the students roughly equivalent monomorphernic verbs, which are easier to keep apart. In general, vocabulary learning and teaching is 10 The exact reference is known to the authors of this article. FLuL 24 (1995) 98 Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag necessary and considered fruitful, if the following conditions (among others) are met (cf. e.g. Scherfer (1985: 413t)): high frequency, distribution across different text types, and high productivity in word formation processes. All of these hold for PVs in English (cf. also Saftien 1975: 219) and call for a teaching of PVs especially with advanced learners who want to expand their lexical knowledge beyond the most basic vocabulary. 4.2 Earlier Approaches to the Teaching of PVs Traditionally, two approaches to the teaching of vocabulary can be distinguished, the monolingual (or direct) method and the bilingual method. The bilingual method, which does not exclude making use of the mother tongue in explaining unk: nown target language words, has gained ground in the past years (cf. Butzkamm/ Eschbach 1985: 134, Butzkamm 1989: 176-185). lt has partly replaced and supplemented the monolingual method highly in fashion in the 1960s and 70s where the use of the mother tongue in the second language classroom was regarded as counterproductive (cf. Scherfer 1985: 422-27). The monolingual method can be seriously challenged on theoretical grounds, since it assumes that the learner does not make use of previously acquired linguistic knowledge, i.e. their mother tongue. 11 Thus, one of the most important drawbacks of the monolingual approach is the fact, that the avoidance of mentioning the Ll equivalents in the classroom will not prevent the learners from associating Ll and L2 items in their mental lexicon. Moreover, if learners only know the L2 word form but fail to understand the L2 concept, they will tend to either forget the word form or resort to an L1 concept to remember it (Scherfer 1994: 214). The strong links between L1 and L2 lexical knowledge have also been pointed out in our above discussion of PVs in interlanguage. The interlanguage facts constitute a strong argument for an approach in the teaching of PVs that takes into account the inherent systematicity of English PVs on the one hand, and the systematic comparison of English and German structures on the other. Before dealing with these two aspects in more detail, let us take a look at earlier approaches to the teaching of PVs (cf. Side (1990: 144) for a summary). The traditional approach of giving students a list of PVs together with a definition and/ or translation and asking them to learn the words by heart has long been criticized. Firstly, this method only seems to convince students that PVs are "words that are hard to learn and easy to forget" (Saftien 1975: 223, our translation). Secondly, in these lists, if presented systematically, PVs are mainly grouped together according to the verb, e.g. giving ten PVs with the verb get. More often 11 The concept of 'coordinate bilingualism' has often been mentioned in favor of the monolingual method. However, this notion has been severely criticized, andin particular Mans (1986) has refuted the compound-coordinate theory of bilingualism both on theoretical and empirical grounds. FLuL 24 (1995) Phrasal Verbs in lnterlanguage: Implications for Teaching 99 than not, however, it is the particle and not the verb, that is more important for the meaning of their combination. In such cases, the learner cannot infer the meaning of an unknown PV from an already known verb (see also Saftien 1975: 220, Side 1990: 146). In many textbooks PVs are not treated at all. lf there is a separate section on PVs, older textbooks (cf. inter alia Graver (1971), Köhring/ Morris (1972), Algeo (1974)) do not consider semantic but only syntactic problems of PVs (differences between phrasal and prepositional verbs, transitive/ intransitive PVs, pronominalization, etc.). Concerning the exercises, the textbooks do often not go beyond pattem drills (cf. Köhring! Morris (1972: 107-109)). Only more recent textbooks (e.g. Morris 1993: 37-40, Shovel 1985) treat PVs in their contexts and encourage students in the active use of PVs. They include, however, no systematic treatment of the semantics of the particles and the kind of verbs they accompany. Tue only exception to our knowledge is the recent Phrasal Verbs Workbook (Goodale 1993) published as a supplement to the CDPV. Here, the PVs are arranged according to the meaning of the particle. Tue particle up, for example, is treated on 25 pages, first introducing the different meanings in typical contexts, then encouraging the student to practise their knowledge in a series of exercises that go far beyond pattem drills (Goodale 1993: 95-120). A forerunner to this approach is Side (1990), who describes how the systematicity of PVs can be integrated into teaching English as a foreign language. Neither Side nor Goodale, however, make reference to potential mother tongues of the learners. Earlier, Saftien (1975) had developed an alternative model of PV teaching that tried to circumvent the problems outlined above for the majority of textbooks. Instead of giving decontextualized lists of a single verb plus different particles or, a single particle plus different verbs, Saftien proposes the introduction of PVs in their typical contexts, explaining their semantic, stilistic and grammatical problems with illustrations from these contexts (Saftien 1975: 223). For the explanation of PVs in dass, Saftien puts special emphasis on comparing the English PVs with similar German structures (1975: 222, 226). This includes giving German translations of the word in question. Saftien's approach transcends the shortcomings of the monolingual method, but his concentration on the role of the context can be criticized since it neglects the systematic semantic relationships among PVs. 12 Saftien's approach is heavily attacked in an article by Pentzlin (1983) who pleads for a monolingual approach in the teaching of PVs in order to avoid transfer. Pentzlin's approach, however, based on an English textbook for students at the intermediate level, does not take into account the semantic regularities of the English particles nor the cross-linguistic relationships between the English and German structures. 12 In addition, relying exclusively on the explanatory force of the context seems not to be a very effective teaching strategy (cf. Scherfer 1985: 429). FLuL 24 (1995) 100 Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag 4.3 Phrasal Verbs - A Contrastive Approach An important part of teaching the semantics of PVs is to make clear that the particle is integral to the meaning of the PV and always carries some meaning itself. In many cases, it even carries most of the meaning (Side 1990: 146). Moreover, the meaning of figurative PV s cannot be regarded as the sum of the single parts, and the meaning of the adverbial particle in many cases differs considerably from the meaning of the corresponding preposition (Side 1990: 146). A ·systematic explanation of possible meanings of particles is therefore a necessary device for teaching PV s. In a bilingual approach, the semantics of basic types of PVs and their German equivalents are made transparent in order to avoid incorrect cross-linguistic identification and foster correct inferences on the basis of already acquired knowledge. In general, good contrastive lexical studies are not available, so that the teacher is left to themself concerning the development of suitable teaching material. In the following we will try to show how such an enterprise can be undertaken, giving two examples of a contrastive treatrnent of the semantics of PV s. Of the dictionaries mentioned in the introduction, the Collins COBUILD Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs is an especially useful source for our purposes. CDPV has two major parts. In the main part, the PV s are listed according to the verb they contain; in the so-called 'particles index', the particles are arranged alphabetically, giving the core categories of meaning and the actual number of occurrences of each particle. Our description of the English particles is based on the latter part of the dictionary. One of the most frequent particles in PVs is up (482 items in CDPV). The core meanings of up are (CDPV pp. 487-490): 1. Movement upwards This meaning mainly occurs in literal combinations, e.g. to run up a hill. The particle (P) indicates the movement, the verb (V) indicates how the movement is achieved. This use is very frequent. 2. Increase and intensification Comparable to 1. V gives the cause or quality of increase while P indicates the increase itself, e.g. to speed up. This use is also very frequent. 3. lmprovement and preparation Here, the meaning of P follows from 1. and 2., indicating the increase in quality or readiness of something, e.g. athletes train up for the Olympic Games. Again, this use is of high frequency. 4. Fastening and restriction P indicates fastening or restriction in some way, while V indicates the quality or kind of fastening/ restriction, e.g. bandage up a wound. (less frequent) 5. Approach P indicates that two people are moving/ staying close together, e.g. catch up with sb. (less frequent) FLuL 24 (1995) Phrasal Verbs in lnterlanguage: lmplications for Teaching 101 6. Disruption and damage P indicates that something is not in its normal way but damaged in some way, e.g. he messed up the room. (less frequent than 1.,2.,3.) 7. Completion and finishing a) P indicates that something has been finished/ has ended, e.g. hang up the phone b) P indicates that something has been done thoroughly/ has been completed, e.g. tear up a piece of paper (fairly frequent) · 8. Rejection and surrender P indicates that something is given away or rejected, e.g. pass up an ojfer (= reject) (not very frequent) 9. Happ~ning and creation P i~dicates. the creation or happening, e.g. a storm brews up (fairly frequent) 10. Collection and togethemess P indicates the collection, V often indicates .the container for the collection, e.g. bag up, crate up (not very frequent) 11. Disclosure P indicates information being revealed/ disclosed, V indicates the way the information is being disclosed, e.g. dig up a secret (not very frequent) 12. Separation P indicates that person/ thing is moved away/ separated from person/ thing, e.g. divide up a quantity (frequent) To summarize, we can say that we have twelve different meanings of up, the most frequent ones being 'movement upwards', 'increase and intensification', 'improvement and preparation', 'completion and finishing', and 'separation' . 13 Let us turn to the German corresponding constructions. Given the extreme polysemy of up, the question arises, which German particle should be considered "corresponding". Here, the notion of primary counterpart is pertinent. lt is defined as "the equivalent which in the process of foreign language learning is acquired to render the common meaning of a given Ll lexical item" (Arabski 1979: 34). In the case of up, the primary counterpart in German is clearly auf. The core meanings of German auf are (cf. Paul 1992: 58ff, Plank 1981: 46-51): 1. Movement upwards as in aufschauen, aufgehen 2. lmprovement e.g. aufmotzen, aufpeppen, aufarbeiten 13 Semanticists might argue for a more sophisticated analysis of the polysemy of the particle up. Thus, the meanings mentioned under 2,3,9 are metaphorically related to the basic meaning given in 1 (MORE is UP, see Lakoff/ Johnson 1980). For the present purposes the CDPV treatment suffices. FLuL 24 (1995) 102 Gabriele Neumann, Ingo Plag 3. Completion e.g. aufessen, aufrauchen 4. Attaching onto the surface of something e.g. aufnähen, aufkleben, auftischen 5. Opening antonym of zu (closed), e.g. aufbrechen German auf only has five different core meanings. A comparison of English and German shows that only three of the meanings correspond in the two languages, namely 'movement upwards' 'improvement' and 'completion and finishing'. For the leamer this means that certain interpretations are ruled out a priori. Since there is no equivalent for the German 'opening', close up cannot mean what the German counterpart aufschließen suggests, the same is true for button up and aujknöpfen. 14 The primary counterpart may sometimes not be helpful in the understanding of the English PV. This is shown in our second example, about. The central meanings listed for 88 items involving about in CDPV (pp. 450-51) are: 1. Movement in various directions over a period of time This meaning mainly occurs in literal combinations, e.g. drift about. 2. Inactivity and aimlessness e.g. Lounge about. 3. Encirclement Tue particle here has the literal meaning of putting one thing around another, e.g. He throws his arms about her. 4. Turning used in literal combinations, mainly in formal use, e.g. turn about. 5. Action e.g. bring about. This meaning only occurs in very few combinations. 6. lntroduction of subject In many combinations with the literal meaning 'conceming a particular subject', e.g. know about, hear about. Only the first four meanings of English about, as listed above, correspond to German herum- (cf. Paul 1992: 404t). The primary counterpart of about, however, 14 In the apparent counterexample open up the meaning 'opening' is expressed by the verb itself and up is best analyzed as intensifier (see meaning 2 above). One of the main difficulties of the explanation of different meanings of the particles is to make clear what inferences are correct, and at the same time avoid confusion. lt is, however, unclear how to avoid the effect of "unteaching" (cf. Nation 1990: 49) completely, if one deals with polysemous iterns. FLuL 24 (1995) Phrasal Verbs in lnterlanguage: Implications for Teaching 103 seems to be the German über-, which only covers meaning 6. lt is through the contrastive approach that we can make these facts transparent for the advanced learner. 5. Conclusion In this article we have argued for a contrastive approach to the teaching of PV s. Interlanguage data show that the monolingual method is bound to fail, since it does not take into account cross-linguistic influence like avoidance, semantic and phonic transfer. Tue contrastive approach sketched above aims at making the learner more autonomous, lt makes transparent the basic meanings of PV s and their German equivalents, aiming at the avoidance of incorrect cross-linguistic identification and fostering intra-lingual transfer. Tue comparison of English and German: structures should crucially focus on the polysemy of the particle, and not on the verbs involved. With our approach, teachers will face the difficulty of having no adequate textbooks or contrastive studies at band, which forces them to develop their own teaching·material. In this respect, the new dictionaries of PVs can be of great help for the instructor. Tue contrastive approach can, of course, not solve all problems. Its limits are reached where systematicity ends. Thus, idioms like put someone up, that do not fall under any of the central semantic categories given above, cannot be captured in a systematic fashion. We hope, however, to have shown that the semantic coherence of PVs in English and their German counterparts is large enough to merit the approach put forward in this article. References ALGEO, John (1974): Exercises in Contemporary English. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. ARABSKI, Janusz (1979): Errors as Indications of the Development of Interlanguage. Katovice: Uniwersytet Slaski. Atkinson, David (1987): "The Mother Tongue in the Classroom: A Neglected Resource? " In: English Language Teaching Journal 41.4, 241-247. BUTZKAMM, Wolfgang (1989): "Wie funktioniert die muttersprachliche Bedeutungsvermittlung? " In: BUTZKAMM, Wolfgang: Psycholinguistik des Fremdsprachenunterrichts. Tübingen: Francke, 176-197. 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