Topic: “(person) + take + time + to V…”
1. Motivation:
One of our group members, Jessica, is a part-time English tutor. One day while she was tutoring a junior high school student, her student asked a question: “Can we say, ‘I take how much time to do something.’?” According to junior high school grammar, we can only say, “I spend how much time doing something.” or “Doing something takes me how much time.” Therefore, Jessica said, “No. This is ungrammatical.”
Later Jessica could not help but keep thinking about this question, and she thought of a phrase: “take your time.” Jessica wondered, “If we can say, ‘You may just take your time. Don’t rush.’ then why can’t we say, ‘I take how much time to do something.’?” In order to make sure whether this sentence can be considered grammatical by English native speakers, Jessica e-mailed Jean Curran, an instructor in the Dept. of English of NTNU, to ask this question.
Jean replied and this was her idea:
In regards to your question. Yes, this sentence sounds okay to me from the point of view that people do make statements using this phrase. For example, "I need to take a little time to think this over. I'll get back to you next week."
Jean is an English native speaker from the United States. If Jean thinks that it is okay to say, “I take how much time to do something.” then why junior high school grammar says that this is ungrammatical? Due to this contradiction between the grammar rule that we learn at school and an English native speaker’s idea, Jessica decided to make this question a research question in Assignment 1 of Functional Grammar.
2. Findings
According to the corpus data that we found, the sentence structure “(person) + take + time + to V…” is seldom used. Moreover, the pattern is usually “(person) + take time/some time + to V…” (without a specific idea of how much time), and some of the contexts are imperative sentences.
However, we still found a sentence that fit our expectation. In “I took five hours to write my speech: Rahul Gandhi,” we can see the specific description of time “five hours.” But this is the only result that has a specific idea of how much time the person takes.
3. Conclusion
Although English native speakers think that it is okay to say, “I take time to do something,” this structure is really seldom used in writing. (Our corpus is all from written documents.)
As English teachers-to-be, we all agree that while teaching English grammar, we should still teach the standard grammar “person + spend + time + V-ing…” but also tell students that English native speakers may use the structure “(person) + take time/some time + to V…” in their daily life. In this case, we also want to focus on the fact that this structure is seldom used in writing and we non-native English speakers should use the standard grammar in learning. Therefore, we will tell students not to use the structure “(person) + take time/some time + to V…” although it is considered acceptable by English native speaker.
Appendix
Corpus for the Result “(person) + take + time + to V…”
Some Selected Contexts from BNC
A0J 884 First, take time to talk to your husband or wife, or perhaps your family doctor, other parents or teachers
A7N 773 We cant take time to talk to the stylist before they wield the scissors.
A7N 791 Take time to tell him something about your tastes and lifestyle --; and the sort of style you think might suit you.
CG3 1203 Take some time to bathe in short stories and look particularly at what the author is doing with the characters and the setting.
Some Selected Contexts from Time Magazine
Most corpus follows the standard grammar except for data 19231029
19230309
which the firm will handle as fiscal agent for Great Britain. This work will take years to consummate and unnusual financial ability to direct. Mr. Leffingwell's knowledge of
19230827
jokes repeat every two or three years, others (like Halley's Comet) take longer. A little luck-and you can predict unerringly just what grey-bearded quips will march
19230903
days to remove the enemy wounded. Furthermore, the communiqu states that it will take several days to remove the vast quantities of supplies captured from the Spanish forces.
19230903
moon's shadow from one edge of the sun's disk to the other will take about 2 hours and 55 minutes in the path of totality, but less than
19231029
would be renominated almost without opposition. # The President decided that he could not take the time from official business to attend the Army-Navy, Princeton-Navy football games. He
19231203
) being required for its production. Even with the new support, it will take two years more to prepare the serum for public use. It is not a
19230917
three years. The substitution of automatic for manual exchanges throughout London is expected to take about 15 years. # Said The Times: " Each exchange will carry 9,999
19231008
a play in rehearsal is worth six in the manager's safe. It may take him three years to lift it from his shelf and feed it to the actors
19240114
something of destiny in the incident.... Well, it didn't take me long to get an introduction.... For quite a while- several
A Selected Contexts from sify news
New Delhi: Nehru-Gandhi scion and the Congress Member of Parliament from Amethi, Rahul Gandhi, told this correspondent, that he took five hours to write his speech on Monday that he delivered in the Lower House on Tuesday.
Assignment 1-2
Topic: “Because…; Result from…, now that…;seeing that…; on account of…; owing to…;thanks to…; Due to…; Since,…;as a result of…; As…; Given to…”
1. 研究動機
我們在學習英文的過程當中，學到了很多表示「因為」的從屬連接詞和片語。但是很多時候我們並不清楚他們的差異，且很多坊間參考書都將這些連接詞或片語上等號。然而對於此文法表示存疑，並想試著找出不同之處以及適當的使用時機。
2. 研究方法及資料來源
-教師手冊或參考書
-線上字典(主要使用Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)
-語料庫(COCA, BNC, OED)
教師手冊或參考書
在康軒版的國二下(第四冊)第九課，出現了because這個單字。但教師手冊只有簡單地講解用法，並無另外補充。
在遠東版的高一下(第二冊)第九課出現了because，但也只簡單說明並無另外補充。高二上(第三冊)第十二課，出現了now that的文法，但教師手冊也只簡單講解其為連接詞，且常會省略that。除此之外並無另外補充其他片語或連接詞。高三下(第六冊)第七課出現了for，但是也只講其用法，並無另外補充或比較。
在參考書「翰林贏家翻譯句型60則」中，找到的解釋是說:[和Because of 相似的片語尚有owing to, due to, thanks to, as a result of, on account of等]，也就是整理出的這幾個片語都是類似的。
線上字典
A: Seeing that
idiom.
seeing that ... (also informal seeing as (how) ...)
because of the fact that ...:
Seeing that he’s been off sick all week he’s unlikely to come.
B: on account of
idiom.
because of sb/sth:
She retired early on account of ill health.
The marsh is an area of great scientific interest on account of its wild flowers.
C: owing to
prep.
because of:
The game was cancelled owing to torrential rain.
Owing to his illness, he could not continue with his studies.
D: since
conj.
because; as: We thought that, since we were in the area, we’d stop by and see them.
E: thanks to
idiom.
thanks to sb/sth (sometimes ironic) used to say that sth has happened because of sb/sth: It was all a great success—thanks to a lot of hard work. Everyone knows about it now, thanks to you!
F: due to
adj.
CAUSED BY
[not before noun] ~ to sth/sb caused by sb/sth; because of sb/sth: The team’s success was largely due to her efforts. Most of the problems were due to human error. The project had to be abandoned due to a lack of government funding. Due to staff shortages, we are unable to offer a full buffet service on this train.
Help: Some people think that it is more correct to use owing to to mean ‘because of’ after a verb or at the beginning of a clause, as due is an adjective.
G: because
conj. for the reason that: I did it because he told me to.
Just because I don’t complain, people think I’m satisfied.
because of prep.: They are here because of us. He walked slowly because of his bad leg. Because of his wife('s) being there, I said nothing about it.
-活用圖解英文法 建宏出版 :
because(因為) [語氣最強] :I did not go out because it rained.
As (因為;既然) [語氣較弱] : As you are in poor health, you should not stay up late.
H: result from
result- verb [V] ~ (from sth) to happen because of sth else that happened first: job losses resulting from changes in production
-參考書等不把result from歸類於因為這塊解釋…,通常翻作’起因於’
I: now that
now conj.~ (that) ... because the thing mentioned is happening or has just happened: Now that the kids have left home we’ve got a lot of extra space.
-活用圖解英文法 建宏出版 :
since=now (that)=seeing (that) (因為;既然): Since you asked, I will tell you.
Seeing that it’s raining, you had better stay indoors.
J: as a result of
result~ (of sth) a thing that is caused or produced because of sth else
→She died as a result of her injuries. PPEN
K: as
as (Conj.)--used to state the reason for sth.
→As you were out, I left a message.
→She may need some help as she’s new.
L: given to
given (prep.) when you consider sth.
→Given his age, (= considering how old he is) he’s remarkably active.
→Given her interest in children, teaching seems the right job for her.
語料庫
使用頻率和使用年代
COCA
小結
seeing that:
使用頻率非常低，主要是在1500s-1900s，其他時候，幾乎少人使用。在使用的領域上，seeing that多用在口語方面，on account of則用在fiction。
owing to:
在1920年代，是它使用的高峰，但是到了30s就較少人使用(斷層相當大)，但到了近代1990s,2000s則又漸多人用，但比起1920s還是少的了。1700s 1800s 1900s，都是其使用高峰，以1800s為最高，之後也是漸漸下滑了。在使用領域方面主要是以學術為主。
on account of:
也是在1920s為最多人使用，和owning to一樣到了30s就較少人使用(斷層也相當大)，可是使用頻率較owning to少，且在近代也沒有任何起色。在1700s1800s是他的高峰期，十分活躍，到了1900s2000s就下滑了。
since:
可以看出since被大量使用(不過仍須考慮since有其他的用法)，不管在各領域或年代都廣泛被使用。一樣的，since是個出現頻率很高的用詞。在使用年代方面，since的使用頻率以相對較穩定的情況成長。
thanks to:
而thanks to不知為何在雜誌中使用最多，且在近代使用頻率逐漸上升。在新聞報紙上使用的頻率遠高於其他領域。使用頻率則是在20和21世紀使突然成長。
due to:
due to在學術方面較常使用，其他領域則較少。在新聞報紙上使用的頻率遠高於其他領域。使用頻率則是在20和21世紀使突然成長。
because:
首先,由BNC使用頻率的長條圖可知,because在不同種類的context中被使用的比例有極大差別, because絕大部分出現在spoken context,其次由文書形式fiction等. 很容易的我們會想到because這個字似乎本來就較口語話,也較不正式,所以在newspaper和academic等較正式的文書中出現頻率較低,推論也許是在academic中會聽起來更”專業化”的字會較被接受。
若從OED歷史使用趨勢長條圖來看，because被使用的趨勢差不多,很難再做進一步推論。
result from:
從BNC使用頻率的長條圖中，可明顯看到result from於academic中被大量使用,反而其他較生活化的spoken或可能含有較多對話及劇情的fiction比例就少很多.
若從OED歷史使用趨勢長條圖來看，result from在1980s使用頻率較高,初步推測可能與政治情勢相關,不便再推論。
now that:
BNC使用頻率的長條圖：Now that 此組詞在口語語料中佔絕大多數,而在academic及newspaper等較正式的文書語料中比例少很多,顯示now that和because一樣屬於較colloquial的 ‘因為’說法。
OED歷史使用趨勢長條圖：1990s到現在使用比例上升,在現代似乎被大量使用,但以後會不會從口語擴及到正式文書的使用則有待觀察
as a result of:
自1990年起迄今， “as a result of”的使用尚稱平均，而在使用的領域上，尤以「學術」領域(Academic)為最多，為口說(Spoken)領域的2~3倍之多。
“as a result of”主要使用於較正式的學術文章，其次是報紙用詞，以及口說英語。
此外，“as a result of”這個片語，基本上只有「因為」一解，沒有其他解釋，最常出現在句首。
as:
“as”一字自1300年起開始被大量使用，一直到今天。
“as” 是一個多用途且被大量使用的字，據推測，這是由於 “as”並不只有「因為」一個意思，它也可以表示「當……的時候」、「像……一樣」，等等的解釋。
“as”在書寫的文章─學術論文、雜誌、報紙、小說─的使用上遠較口說語用多。
given to:
自1600年起，given to被使用的頻率開始增加，主要的使用情境是學術文章。然而，given to當「因為」解釋只是部分的情況，許多時候它是和Be動詞一起用，當「熱衷於……」解釋。
語料
seeing that
6 1906 Ibid. 27 Mar. 6/7 Seeing that they are Free Traders, and most of us are Protectionists, their talking fiscalism would not be very helpful.
11 1913 Chambers's Jrnl. Aug. 621/1 Seeing that elm is plentiful and extremely low in price, Powellising should result in its more extended application.
21 1933 Punch 12 July 51/2 It is not an easy part, seeing that it is the only character in the whole cast to be drawn in the round.
8 1832 Life in Wilds iii. 40 Seeing that greater strength of finger was what they wanted, he offered his services.
2 1715 Own Time III. (1724) I.... Seeing that he was losing ground at Court, he intended to recover himself a little with the people.
on account of
1 Mod. On account of the snow, the cars on the tramways in London ceased running at eight o'clock.
6 1902 Blazed Trail xxix. 204 They were locked through after some delay on account of the * grain barges from Duluth.
31 1918 Alternating Current Electr.... On account of the fact that it must run at a speed rather less than that of synchronism, the induction motor is sometimes termed an asynchronous motor.
43 1926 Jrnl. Iron & Steel Inst... On account of the titanium alloy being of only 17 per cent. strength, it is not practicable to kill a heat of steel with titanium only.
96 1967 Sweet Ride x. 170 They'll know at the station, on account of they gas up there sometimes.
owing to
1 2008 FIC Analog the dispute might draw the attention of the Galactic Hegemony's Court, which, owing to the tendency of the court's officers to quell disputes with draconian force,
114 2006 MAG SatEvenPost wry satisfaction in learning that at least one of your predictions has come true. Owing to a slight miscarriage in my plans, Mr. Jorgensen became violently enraged under circumstances
119 2006 ACAD HealthSocialW alternative explanation for differences in attendance rates is differences in the demands of attendance. Owing to their lower educational attainment, elderly African Americans may have more trouble managing the
133 2006 ACAD OrthoNursing , the equation is used to calculate the RWL for the selected task parameters. Owing to the limitations in the data used to derive the equation, the assessment of
140 2006 ACAD SocialWork identity, receive acceptance, and enjoy a sense of belonging in their families. Owing to the recency of adopting African children, we were unable to find research data
Since
2008 SPOK CBS_Sixty our jumping-off point for the final leg up to the rainforest the next day. Since the villagers own the land we wanted to visit, we needed their blessing.
2008 FIC Bk:Succubustop play and watch his meal at the same time. It wasn't easy, since he insisted on wearing sunglasses while playing, which then had to be removed while
2008 ACAD VisualImpair There is a lack of consensus on the precise definition of spirituality, since it is a subjective experience that is intertwined with other aspects of existence; furthermore
K8U 2246 If governments had not run such deficits then the slump would have been far deeper, since the deficits worked partially to offset the collapse in demand which resulted from the big increase in OPEC savings and fall in investment.
HPU 990 American firms were among the first to confront a national mass market since the market for consumer goods was huge, the whole of the country being a free trade area for business firms.
1859 Bertrams II. v. 109 Some time since she was giving advice that it should be broken off, and now she was au d / sespoir because that result had been reached.
thanks to
2008 FIC Bk:SecretsHighlander Mr. Gregor, is that having a bunch of sons is no longer important. Thanks to modern technology, being female is more often a strength than a weakness.
2008 MAG TownCountry The Ailey company turns fifty this year and is still a force for innovation, thanks to the canny stewardship of Judith Jamison -- its artistic director and the signature Ailey…
KAP 375 (Now thanks to Nancy Barclay's resourcefulness and the generosity of her employers we are storing books for Christian Aid in a lawyers' office until Mrs. Paton's cellar is ready again).
K21 327 The Association chairman says their finances are now in order, thanks to the generosity of Conservative supporters.
HX8 692 Many thanks to everyone who helped to make the `;Fitness for Fun'; session at Crystal Palace such a great success.
HAW 68 Many thanks to everyone who contributed especially the children for all their artistic efforts!
due to
A43 297 The rise was principally due to higher prices of imported food processing material, underlining City concern over the inflationary impact of a weakening pound.
AMD 2740 If, due to events beyond our control, we are no longer able to provide the holiday booked, we will return to you all monies paid, or offer you an alternative holiday of comparable standard.
C9W 539 I found it interesting, however, that Maxine --; or Martha --; experienced no anxiety due to the nearness of the sea, even when she described to me a violent storm when giant waves lashed the walls of the seaside dwellings.
EB7 248 This has been due to the lack of understanding of the origins of this pottery.
FU3 1503 How far was the decline of the Liberal party, 1906-;24, due to the impact of the First World War?
Because
Concordancerhttp://www.edict.com.hk/scripts/wconcapp.dll?SearchStr=because&Corpus=Articles1.txt
1. This is a space whose geometry can not be seen from any other domain. It may arise because a space has been reserved for an, as yet, undefined component or because the person initiating the search has no authority to see the information contained within that domain.
2. It is hoped that a full scale project will be set in motion at a later date but, because it is primarily operational in nature and the expert system is only a part, it is
3. The inability to speedily and correctly diagnose aircraft system and component failures because good diagnostic skills are in short supply leads to departure delays and possible compromises in safety.
4. The reasons for these two situations arising could be because the correct word is not in the word list, but this
5. system to date is that of the human information processing system. This is largely because human readers use an understanding of the text that can guide the reading process.
result from
Concordancer
1. Since the fire at the premises of the defendants was caused by their employee's negligence, and since it was reasonably foreseeable that firemen would be required to attend the fire and that an explosion of the kind which occurred might result from the fire, the defendants were liable to the plaintiff.
2. Even without the element of uncertainty, however, potential plaintiffs may be reluctant to inflict on the company the disruption that an action against a director can involve, or expose it to the unfavourable publicity that might result from airing its difficulties in public. The problem of the damage that may result from litigation is undoubtedly a real one, and argues against giving shareholders unrestricted standing to sue, which might otherwise
3. Drainage may also be necessary and a pioneer crop may be required in the first year. A less sudden change can result from burning of vegetation (especially moors) coupled with more intensive grazing in order to preferentially encourage grasses rather than ericaceous plants (heather and heaths).
now that
Concordance
1. So not every teacher was one hundred per cent successful with mixed ability teaching, but I don't think one can ever expect that with a new method and I think now that the system has been running for a number of years in the school that it's possible for each department to support new members of staff and introduce them to the appropriate methods and approaches to mixed ability classes.
2. Lord Alexander says now that the Development Plans were never taken seriously, that it was then thought "a nonsense" to try to project five years ahead.
3. 結論
關於owing to, on account of, seeing that這三個片語，從參考書及字典中查出的解釋來看，基本上的意思差異不大，都說是because of ，重大的差別應該是他們的流行時間不同。例如, seeing that 就是屬於15-19世紀的用語，使用頻率上owing to > on account of > seeing that。
但在近代這三個片語已經較少人使用了(owning to 有上漲趨勢)。這幾個詞的差異還是跟社會的使用習慣比較相關。
根據劉毅所編著的「文法寶典」提出的，since的語氣強度介於because和as中間，且常放在句首，且原因通常是對方已知的。但是否有其他的差別仍不清楚。
而關於thanks to，因為這個用法有 “感謝…”之意，後來延伸用於 “因為…” “由於…”所以猜測會用這個片語的時機是，後面要說明一個非常重要或值得感謝的情形，且內容通常是說者認為比較正面、較好的結果。(但是當做反諷的情形也可能出現)
而due to，根據數比語料的觀察和推測，覺得說會用到due to的情況是，通常後面接的原因是比較負面的，或是對說者來說較為負面的原因，或是整個context內容是屬於比較不理想的情況。
至於because，它後面加的很多都是new information,功能是補充說明主要子句。 而(S+V….) / N result from … 通常會先有一個陳述再用result from,而後面所接多為強調說明語氣的new information, 所以這可能造成result from在口語中的不普及,以及在academic中佔大多數(academic在陳述原因時可能會用looked more objective, more emphatic的詞組,而這兩點result from似乎優於because)。
由語料庫的例句中可看到now that不管是語意或用法都與典型的因為很不同,靠它相連的兩個句
子並沒有很直接,因果關係地關聯, now that後面所接的句子似乎用於說明一個新狀況或轉變後的情況,然
後再帶出speaker對這個狀況的決定或推論
“as”在學術文章、小說、報紙中的被廣泛使用，然而，這樣簡單的字卻在口說語用上不被列為首選，我們推測這是因為在書寫的文章中，讀者透過context可以了解 “as”的意思，然而，在口說上，人們似乎喜歡選用其他可以直接表示「因為」的字詞來表達，例如：because就是一個相當好的証明，Corpus長條圖即說明了because多使用在口說用語中，比報紙、學術文章、小說來的多很多。
“Given to”當「因為」的用法不多見，我們推測「因為」這個意思是自「如果有；考慮到」延伸過來的，然而，這個用法被參考書歸到「因為」的片語欄中，我們覺得並不是那麼恰當，因為這只是延伸的意思。
由以上這些發現、推論，我們認為：既然這些表示「因為」的用語各有其使用的情境和時機，參考書和教師手冊將它們畫上等號、列為相等，實屬不夠周詳。
Sources:
國中英語 康軒出版社
遠東高中英文 遠東出版社
劉毅編著 文法寶典 學習出版社
COCA: http://www.americancorpus.org/
BNC: http://corpus.byu.edu/bnc/
OED: http://corpus.byu.edu/oed/
Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary:
http://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/?cc=global
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