Conrad, Susan. Will corpus linguistics revolutionize grammar teaching in the 21st century

REGISTER-SPECIFIC DESCRIPTIONS OF ENGLISH GRAMMAR
Corpus-based research has consistently shown that grammatical patterns differ systematically across varieties of English. In the past, such systematic variation was examined across socially defined varieties (e.g., Black Vernacular English vs. Standard Midwestern English). However, corpus research has shown that consistent, important differences also occur across varieties within standard English-most notably across registers, varieties determined by their purposes and situations for use (e.g., fiction writing vs. academic prose vs. newspaper writing). Given the results of most corpus-based studies, it is often misleading, if not impossible, to make global generalizations about the use of a particular
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W i l l Corpus Linguistics Reuolutionixe
Grammar Teaching in the 21st Century?*
SUSAN CONRAD Iowa State University Ams, Iowa, United States
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In the final decades of the 20th century, exciting developments began taking place in grammar teaching and research. First, there was renewed interest in an explicit focus on form in the classroom; publications argued that students benefit from grammar instruction (e.g., CelceMurcia, 1991a, 1991b; Celce-Murcia, Ddrnyei, & Thurrell, 1997; Ellis, 1998; Master, 1994) and suggested new approaches to grammar pedagogy, such as teaching grammar in a discourse context (Celce-Murcia, 1991a, 1991b) and designing grammatical consciousness-raising or input analysis activities (e.g., Ellis, 1993, 1995; Fotos, 1993, 1994; Rutherford, 1987; Sharwood Smith, 1988; Yip, 1994). At the same time, computer technology was making it possible to conduct grammar studies of unprecedented scope and complexity. This research is part of cmpus linguistics, the empirical study of language relying on computer-assisted techniques to analyze large, principled databases of naturally occurring language. Although only one aspect of corpus linguistics-concordancing-tended to be emphasized for classrooms (see, e.g., Cobb, 1997; Johns, 1986, 1994; Stevens, 1995), most ESL grammarians would agree that, by the end of the 20th century, corpus linguistics was also radically changing grammar research. Compare, for example, Longman's two reference grammars. The first, published in 1985 (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, & Svartvik) , contained limited reports of corpus studies to supplement traditional intuitionbased description whereas the second, published in 1999 (Biber,
'Aversion of this commentary was presented at the Second North American Symposium o n Corpus Linguistics and Language Teaching, Flagstaff, Arizona, April 2000.
I Specifically, the results reported here come from studies reported in full as follows: linking adverbials-Biberet al. (1999, chapter 10); b a n d that-complement clauses-Biber et al. (1998, chapter 4); that-subject clauses-Biber et al. (1998, chapter 3 ) and Biber et al. (1999, chapter 9). These publications also provide detailed descriptions of the corpora used: the Longman Spoken and Written English Corpus, the Longman-Lancaster Corpus, and the British National Corpus. British and American English are included. Space limitations prevent further descrip tion here.
Johansson, Leech, Conrad, & Finegan), was based entirely on empirical data from corpus-based analyses. In other publications, corpus-based grammatical research ranged from examinations of certain varieties, such as description of the features of spoken British English (Carter & McCarthy, 1995; McCarthy, 1998) to book-length treatments of particular structures (e.g., Mair, 1990, on infinitival clauses; Meyer, 1992, on apposition; Tottie, 1991, on negation). By the end of the 20th century, however, little connection had been made between the grammatical research of corpus linguistics and the rejuvenated interest in grammar teaching. In the 21st century, I will argue, three changes prompted by corpus-based studies of grammar have the potential to revolutionize the teaching of grammar: 1. Monolithic descriptions of English grammar will be replaced by register-specific descriptions. 2. The teaching of grammar will become more integrated with the teaching of vocabulary. 3. Emphasis will shift from structural accuracy to the appropriate conditions of use for alternative grammatical constructions. I illustrate each of these areas with examples condensed from large-scale corpus-based projects (Biber, Conrad, & Reppen, 1998; Biber et al., 1999).' I conclude with speculation on variables that may affect whether or not these potential changes do, in fact, take place.