Research on second language (L2) pronunciation self-assessment reports a general misalignment between self- and other-assessment. This has been attributed to the object of self-assessment, the self-assessment task, the measures to which self-assessment is compared, and speakers' characteristics. Here, we examined self-assessment of a discrete…

This study applies the Apriori algorithm to analyse patterns, syntactic structures, and thematic clusters in Chinese studies data from various genres. This study aims to identify recurring linguistic elements in order to shed light on the dynamic nature of the Chinese language across different contexts and time periods. The Apriori algorithm is…

This plenary speech provides an overview of applications of corpus research in several core areas of applied linguistics, including second language acquisition and language assessment. It does this by showcasing a number of recent studies carried out by or with involvement of the author. These studies all focus on phraseological aspects of…

Completing a postgraduate dissertation requires various types of support, whether it be academic, moral, or financial. One way to express gratitude towards those who contribute is through the acknowledgement section. However, the guidelines provided by universities appear to be inadequate to support students, which poses challenges for those who…

While metadiscourse use has been well-attended in second language (L2) writing research, relatively less effort has been made in documenting changing patterns of metadiscourse use among L2 writers. The present study addressed this gap by probing a diachronic change of interactive metadiscourse in research articles published in "English…

We examine the syntactic structures exhibited by persons with dementia in conversation. Traditionally, research on the linguistic abilities of persons with dementia is either observational (reports kept by caregivers) or experimental (e.g. based on comprehension tasks), and the focus is not on the syntactic competence of the speaker. We combine…

Given the importance of disciplinary specificity in terms of the potential differences in the functionality of nominalizations in scientific textbooks and the dearth of studies of this type, the current study explores the extent to which nominalization is realized across two disciplines. To this aim, eight academic textbooks from Physics and…

While there has been insightful research on the commonly used expression "I think" (IT), this study introduces a non-conventional and innovative conception of elasticity (Zhang 2011), bringing together several properties of IT. Drawn on large-scale naturally occurring classroom data with a rare combination of linguistically and…

Appraisal/Evaluation within Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) is a rather new framework for the analysis of evaluative language, focusing on how human beings reveal their emotions directly or indirectly, how they take stances, and how they align or disalign themselves with social subjects. Through an attitudinal analysis of the system of…

Abstract is of a pivotal genre in scientific communication, assisting not only highly selective readers with judgment of the pertinent articles but also researchers in disseminating new knowledge and intellectual discoveries. Difficult yet challenging, however, is the task of writing effective abstracts particularly among non-English speaking…

This primarily methodological article makes a proposition for linguistic exploration of textual resources available through the "Google Scholar" search engine. These resources ("Google Scholar virtual corpus") are significantly larger than any existing corpus of academic writing. "Google Scholar", however, was not designed for linguistic searches…

This paper offers an analytical procedure for identifying phraseological variation within "concgrams" (Cheng et al. 2006), which are sets of words that co-occur regardless of constituency variation (e.g. AB and A * B), positional variation (e.g. AB and BA), or both. It argues that examining concgrams takes us closer to more fully appreciating and…

Hong Kong popular culture played an important role in the construction and consolidation of Hong Kong identity long before the handover to China. In the past few years leading up to the 10th anniversary of the handover, both Hong Kong and China have undergone numerous changes which seem to be changing their relations. Whilst Hong Kong people had…

Since the late 1980s, collocations have received increasing attention in applied linguistics, especially language teaching, as is evidenced by the many publications on the topic. These works fall roughly into two lines of research (a) those focusing on the identification and use of collocations (Benson, 1989; Hunston, 2002; Hunston & Francis,…

Collocation is an aspect of language generally considered arbitrary by nature and problematic to L2 learners who need collocational competence for effective communication. This study attempts, from the perspective of L2 learners, to have a deeper understanding of collocational use and some of the problems involved, by adopting a task based…