<p><strong>Abstract</strong></p><p>This essay is based on an investigation carried out with the help of the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). Taking the system of transitivity as its theoretical base and using spoken and written discourse as its primary source, this study aspired to find out what kinds of actions Americans perceive <em>Fate</em> to perform, for example physical, mental or verbal,<em> </em>in order to control what happens to people. It also aimed to reveal what actions people are said to perform in their attempts to control <em>Fate</em>. Do Americans deem <em>Fate</em> capable of, for instance, “deciding”, “talking” or “conspiring” and do they say that people, for example, “challenge”, “defy” or “defeat” <em>Fate</em>? Furthermore, a comparison was made in terms of the actions performed by <em>Fate</em> and people between the different domains of discourse represented in the corpus: spoken, fiction, magazine, newspaper and academic.</p><p>Among other things, this investigation shows that in American discourse both <em>Fate</em> and people are perceived to resort to physical strategies rather than mental or verbal ones in their endeavor to control one another.</p><p> </p>
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA/oai:DiVA.org:mdh-6580 |
Date | January 2009 |
Creators | Kanmert, Sofi |
Publisher | Mälardalen University, School of Education, Culture and Communication |
Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
Language | English |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Student thesis, text |
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