The function of phrasal verbs and their lexical counterparts in technical manuals

• Main Author: Brady, Brock
• Format: Others
• Published: PDXScholar 1991
• Subjects: English language > Verb phrase; Technical manuals; Technical writing; Applied Linguistics
• Online Access: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/4181; https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5191&context=open_access_etds

Much recent attention has been devoted to the semantic, syntactic, and pragmatic properties of phrasal verbs--those two-part lexical items like "put on" and "tighten up", along with suggestions regarding effective methods of teaching them to non-native speakers. According to Cornell (1985), phrasal verbs, "have been 'discovered' as an important component in curricula for English as a Foreign Language" (p. 1). However, it is very possible that they have become objects of current research primarily because of their complexity: their polysemy, their idiomaticity, their syntactic restraints, a complexity that means covering phrasal verbs in an ESL/EFL course can be a time-consuming process.