Discourse markers signal
the relationship between the neighboring sentences. The present comparative
study investigates the use of Contrastive Discourse Markers between Chinese English
learners and native speakers based on corpus data. Special attention is
allocated to but and however, since these two small words are
the most popular discourse markers in Chinese English Learners and Native
Speakers. Quantitative and qualitative analyses indicate that both groups prefer
to employ discourse markers like but, although, (even) though, however, etc. when signaling a contrastive
relationship between S1 and S2, though they have different priorities in
different contextual situation; besides, but is overused significantly by Chinese English Learners to signal a contrastive
relationship rather than add further information in context; lastly, Chinese
English Learner usually employs however at the beginning of the sentence, while native speakers put it both at the
beginning or middle of the sentences, which both signal the relationship
between topics and messages. The findings also suggest that more detailed
instructions should be delivered on the procedural meanings and syntactical
positions of Contrastive Discourse Markers used in context.
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