Introduction
Young people use idioms and slang expressions but they do not often think about them. They are a part of their lives, and they tend to use them more and pick them up mostly unconsciously in their first language but this is more conscious when learning a foreign language. Besides picking up slang expressions from television, newspapers, music and friends, students develop their vocabulary consciously from coursebooks and dictionaries.
As I learn English as a foreign language I am curious to know how English Majors develop their vocabulary: how they learn slang expressions and how they can guess the meanings of new expressions from context. In this paper I describe how I conducted a survey on eleven English majors’ ways of developing their vocabulary. Although I asked few students, I think their answers were typical of other English majors.
Hypotheses
I based my research questions on the learning strategies of my friends and my own experience. I hypothesised that
English major students know some American slang idioms.
They pick them up not only at school but also from other sources.
They can guess the meanings of unknown expressions from context
The more sources they use for learning the more they know
I expected students to have favourites.
Method
I compiled a questionnaire of eight questions: five closed and three open questions. I based my questionnaire on Street Speak: Essential American Slang and Idioms (Burke, David and David Harrington: 1998). The aim of the first question was to find out how many slang idioms students knew. The second question asked how they picked them up. The third and the fourth aimed to find out whether they used them in general and in their university assignments. As students were asked to collect rewritten essays for their Writing and Research Skills Course and they were asked whether they used such expressions in them. The fifth one asked about their favourites and how often they used it. The sixth and the seventh were concrete questions on American slang expressions: in question six they had to tick the ones they knew and then turn over and guess the meanings of the previous expressions in context. Finally, they were asked to tick the one they liked the most.
Participants
Altogether, 11 first-year participants in the Writing and Research Skills course at JPU filled in a questionnaire, four boys, and seven girls, all of them around the age of twenty. They weren’t asked to write their names on them.
Procedure
I distributed the questionnaires to 11 students the last week of November 1998, before an English class; they all seemed to like the task. Some of them gave them back before and some after the class. All participants answered all the questions. They gave only a few words to the open questions.
Results and Discussion
I will analyse the answers according to the questions using the tables of the questionnaire.
Table 1. How do you estimate your knowledge of American slang idioms? Please tick one.
I know few slang expressions 3
I know some slang expressions 6
I know a lot of slang expressions 2
Most of the students said that they knew some slang expressions; only two of them indicated that they knew a lot, with only three ticking the option ‘few’.
Table 2. How did you pick up the ones you know? Please tick the ones true for you.
Watching movies, videos in English 11
Reading printed English texts 5
Listening to pop music 7
While staying abroad 4
From foreign friends 3
At school 7
Others 0
Those who claimed that they knew only a few slang expressions ticked that they picked them up in school and both who claimed that they knew a lot ticked that they learned them while staying abroad. The most frequent way of picking up slang is watching movies and videos in English; in the second place are listening to pop music and learning at school. I don’t know whether they watched movies or listened to music at school. They most often develop their vocabulary outside school.
Table 3. Do you use them, in general?
Yes 6
No 5
The students who knew a lot of slang expressions said that they often used them, the ones who knew only a few of them said that they didn’t. Four of them who knew some expressions use them in general, and three don’t.
Table 4. Did you use some in your Portfolio?
Yes 1
No 10
The only one who used slang expressions in a university assignment was someone who said that he or she knows only some slang expressions. This is somewhat puzzling as I expected students who knew a lot of expressions to use some in their portfolios. It is possible that students knowing more about slang didn’t think it was appropriate to use in their portfolios.
Question 5. Which is your favourite slang expression? Do you often use it?
Five of the students said that they didn’t have a favourite, and I couldn’t find any relationship between knowing a lot of expressions and having a favourite. The favourite expressions were the following: to paint the town red, getting busted, she is on bobtail, beating around the bush, that’s ain’t pie-nuts, to kick the bucket, put somebody up. These are not all slang expressions and the spelling was also problematic.
Question 6. Please tick American slang expressions you know.
1. to pull the show on the road
2. to give something two thumbs up
3. to put someone on
4. to have a sweet tooth
5. rock-bottom
6. to cut class
7. to be in the pink
8. to tie the knot
9. a blind date
10. to be in the boonies
The ones who knew a few ticked three or four out of ten; the ones who knew a lot ticked eight or nine; and the ones ticking some knew between three and seven. So, there was a relationship between what students claimed and how many expressions they ticked. And now let’s see how many they guessed out of ten.
Question 7. Please guess the meanings of the expressions in context or give a synonym
1. I don’t want to go to school. Let’s cut class today and go to the movies.
2. Tonight I’m going on a blind date. I hope he’s better than the last one. He was horrible.
3. I think Joe was putting you on when he said he was married. He just wanted to see your reaction.
4. I’m going to buy a new car today. The dealer is selling them at rock-bottom prices.
5. I heard you and Nicholas tied the knot last month. Congratulations.
6. Let’s get the show on the road! The movie was supposed to start ten minutes ago.
7. My grandmother lives in the boonies. It takes us hours to get to her house.
8. My grandmother is feeling much better. She is finally in the pink again.
9. Did you see all the candy Irene ate? She must really have a sweet tooth.
10. Let’s go see that movie. It should be really good. The critics gave two thumbs up.
Those three who said they knew a few expressions guessed correctly five, six and nine; those who said they knew a lot guessed eight and nine; the other six guessed eight on average. It seems that the students estimated their knowledge well: the ones who said they were good guessed more from context.
Question 8. Please give a tick on the left that you like the most.
This is the rank order of the most liked expressions. Although I asked only for one favourite, there were three who ticked more than one.
No 6 5 votes
No 10 4 votes
No 3 and No 7 2 votes
No 1, No 2, No 4, No 8 1 vote
Conclusion
I have found that the eleven English major students know quite a few American slang idioms. They pick them up not only at school but most often by watching English movies and videos; and by listening to pop music. About half of them have favourites. In the task I gave them they could guess the meanings of the unknown expressions from context very well. I expected that the more sources they used the more they would know, but this hypothesis wasn’t supported by my research.
On the whole, it seems that they liked the tasks, they filled in the questionnaire carefully. One of them even drew an illustration. I have found out about some English majors’ use of idioms and slang expressions and this topic would be worth more research.
No comments:
Post a Comment