The ADV speaking-construction in American English: A quantitative corpus-based investigation

Abstract

In this article, the author applies the theory of frame semantics, a usage-based model of construction grammar, and quantitative corpus-based methodology to investigate the nature of the ADV speaking-construction in American English, an adverbial participle construction that has not been previously explored using quantitative corpus-based methods. To investigate this construction, the author extracted its occurrences from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), analysed its structural, semantic, distributional and discourse-functional properties, and identified adverbs that frequently appear in the construction. The investigation reveals that the construction tends to combine with speech-functional adverbs, which evoke different semantic frames. It commonly occurs in spoken and written registers and serves various functions in discourse. In particular, it is used frequently in spoken discourse and academic prose to comment on the manner of conveying a message and to express speakers’ stances and attitudes toward various topics.