Syntactic and semantic features of english collocations containing the word “play” with reference to the vietnamese equivalents

2018 – 2020 (1) ENGLISH LANGUAGE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY M.A THESIS SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH COLLOCATIONS CONTAINING THE WORD “PLAY” WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS ĐINH THỊ KIM DUNG (Đặc điểm cú pháp ngữ nghĩa kết hợp tiếng Anh có chứa từ”play” với tương đương tiếng Việt) ĐINH THỊ KIM DUNG Field: English Language Code: 8.22.02.01 Hanoi – 2020 i MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY M.A THESIS SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH COLLOCATIONS CONTAINING THE WORD “PLAY” WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS (Đặc điểm cú pháp ngữ nghĩa kết hợp tiếng Anh có chứa từ”play” với tương đương tiếng Việt) ĐINH THỊ KIM DUNG Field: English Language Code: 8.22.02.01 Supervisor: Dr Phạm Thị Tuyết Hương Hanoi – 2020 ii CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY The undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled “Syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “play” with reference to the Vietnamese equivalents “submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in English Language Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis Hanoi, 2020 Đinh Thị Kim Dung Approved by SUPERVISOR Dr Phạm Thị Tuyết Hương Date:…………………… iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS During the process of completing this graduation paper, I have received a lot of help, guidance, and encouragement from many people First of all, I would like to express my deepest thank to my supervisor Dr Phạm Thị Tuyết Hương - the lecturer of the Faculty of Foreign Languages of National Economics University, for her enthusiastic guidance, helpful suggestion and encouragement in writing of this report Her stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher I would also like to send my thanks to all teachers of Foreign Language Department for their helpings, contributions and teachings all the time when I am at Ha Noi Open University Finally, I would like to show my gratitude toward my family, my thanks to my colleagues who are always beside me to support and encourage me to finish my graduation paper iv ABSTRACT Collocation is an important aspect in vocabulary acquisition It has become the subject of a linguistic study only recently, it arouses a growing interest in numerous linguists and is defined in various ways However, English learners in general and Vietnamese students in particular often have trouble in using collocation properly Therefore, this graduation paper is written with the aim of investigating the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocations containing the word “play” with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents Three objectives are included in the research: (1) pointing out the syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “play”; (2) figuring out the similarities and differences in collocations containing the collocation “play” in English and their Vietnamese equivalents; (3) providing some suggestions for the teaching and learning English collocations containing the word “play” Contrastive analysis and descriptive are two main methods used in this study Data used for analysis in this study were mainly collected from grammar books and dictionaries The study has shown syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “play” with reference to the Vietnamese equivalents From this study, teachers and learners will enhance knowledge about collocations and be able to apply these collocations in their communication effectively without confusion This research can also be a useful source of reference in learning, teaching English v ABBREVIATION OAL’ED: Oxford Advanced Learner’s Encyclopedic Dictionary EFL: English as a foreign language SLA: second language acquisition Sb: somebody Sth: something vi TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .ii ABSTRACT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv ABBREVIATIONS vi CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION .1 1.1 Rationale .1 1.2 Aims and objectives 1.2.1 Aims 1.2.2 Objectives 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Methods of the study .3 1.5 Scope of the study 1.6 Significance of the study .3 1.7 Structures of the thesis CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Review of previous studies 2.2 Review of theoretical background 2.2.1 An overview of theory of syntax 2.2.2 An overview of theory of semantics 2.2.3 An overview of collocation 12 2.2.4 Overview of idioms 19 2.2.5 Overview of proverbs .24 2.2.6 The Distinction among Free Word Combinations, Idiomatic Expressions and Collocations .25 2.2.7 Criteria to distinguish idioms from free-word groups and proverbs 27 2.2.8 The meanings of the word “play” in English 29 2.2.9 The meanings of “chơi” in Vietnamese .30 2.2.10 The colocation with the word “chơi” in Vietnamese 30 2.3 Summary .31 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 32 3.1 Research governing orientation 32 3.1.1 Research approaches 32 vii 3.1.2 Research questions 32 3.2 Research methods 33 3.3 Summary .34 CHAPTER 4: SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH COLLOCATIONS CONTAINING THE WORD “PLAY” WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS .36 4.1 Syntactic features of English collocations containing the word “PLAY” 36 4.1.1 “PLAY” as a noun in the collocations 36 4.1.2 “PLAY” as a verb in the collocations .39 4.2 Semantic features of English collocations containing the word “PLAY” 42 4.2.1 Literal meaning 42 4.2.2 Figurative meaning 45 4.3 A comparison between English collocations containing the word “play” and their Vietnamese equivalents 48 4.3.1 In terms of their syntactic features 48 4.3.2 In terms of their semantic features 51 4.4 Implications for teaching and learning English collocations containing the word “PLAY”…………………………………………………………………………….53 4.4.1 Suggestions for teaching English collocations containing the word "PLAY" 53 4.4.2 Suggestions for learning English expressions containing the word "PLAY” 54 4.5 Summary .54 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 55 5.1 Recapitulation 55 5.2 Concluding remarks 55 5.4 Recommendations for a further research 57 REFERENCES I viii ix CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Vocabulary plays an important role in teaching and studying English While without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed This viewpoint has been supported by many researchers in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) who have emphasize the significance of vocabulary and agreed that vocabulary is equally, if not more, important than language structure in language acquisition This is the reason why the teaching of vocabulary is as important as the teaching of grammar Within the area of vocabulary research, collocations that are a transitional area between idioms and free combinations have attracted the attention of language researchers And language researchers have pointed out many reasons why collocations are so important in language acquisition First, acquiring collocations is beneficial for EFL learners and “communicative competence” To gain overall language proficiency, learners need to gain collocation competence At the same time, acquiring collocation knowledge may help overcome the problems of comprehending a sentence word by word thus learners ‘listening and reading abilities can be improved Also, by mastering collocations, learners’speech sounds more natural, and is more easily understood by native speakers With increasing knowledge of collocations, EFL learners may be able to speed up their thinking in speaking and getting their meaning across more effectively Collocation is an issue that is popular in English as well as any other languages in the world; it is one of the fields which have never been studied exhaustively due to their interestingness and variety Collocations make the communication more natural and probably more effective However, because in daily communication as well as in written text, the meanings are affected by the culture and customs of each country, collocations cause numerous troubles for English-speaking people The collocations containing the word “play” are commonly-used and confusing phrases in most cases they consist of are verb and noun and they have a wide range of meanings Thereby, this study will focus on analyzing the structures and meanings of the collocations with “play” by illustrating syntactic and semantic features in order to figure out the similarities and differences of the “play”-contained collocations in English and their Vietnamese equivalents Various examples of these collocations are analyzed cautiously with qualitative, descriptive and contrastive methods basing on Morris Thirdly, English collocations introduced to learners should be grouped into semantic fields, topics or key words By this way, learners can catch the meaning and retain new English collocations containing the word “PLAY” longer in memory To sum up, teaching a language not only helps learners learn how to apply knowledge of English collocations generally and English collocations containing the word “PLAY” particularly in communication but also provides learners with a good opportunity to acquire information about a language’s culture and inspires them to love their own language and culture as well as the language and culture they are learning 4.4.2 Suggestions for learning English expressions containing the word "PLAY” For learners of English, some implications can be generated for the learners Firstly, the context should be offered for students to enhance interpretation of English collocations containing the word “PLAY” Secondly, at all levels, learners always encounter idioms and this can be a big problem if they are unfamiliar Hence, it would be better for learners to many topic-based exercises as possible Another thing is that learners not only have the basic knowledge of a language but also should have a good background knowledge of history, culture or customs which is related to English collocations containing the word “PLAY” in process of dealing with learning of English collocation 4.5 Summary To sum up, the investigation into English collocations containing the word “PLAY” and their equivalents in Vietnamese indicates that the word “PLAY” is used as verbs or nouns with various forms such single nouns, phrasal nouns, single verbs, phrasal verbs, and idioms and functions as the subjects, objects and adverbs in English sentences Furthermore, the word “PLAY” is used to express various meanings, including literal and figurative meanings whether it is used as a verb or a noun in English sentences Lastly, there are both similarities and differences in syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “PLAY” and their equivalents in Vietnamese 54 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 5.1 Recapitulation To achieve the study’s aims, I firstly present some theoretical backgrounds to support the research All the linguists share the same point of view that collocation plays a crucial role in facilitating language production in order to speak naturally like native speakers After being defined and differentiated from collocations and free combinations, English collocations are then classified into different types according to different scholars Some properties of collocations are then drawing In addition, some previous studies of collocations have been briefly reviewed In the main part of the study, the researcher collects several English sentences in which the collocations containing the word “play” occur Data used are gathered from different sources Most of them are English-Vietnamese bilingual materials to assure the value of Vietnamese equivalents The collocations containing the word “play” have different meanings in different contexts Their Vietnamese equivalents are also changeable in different corresponding contexts 5.2 Concluding remarks The study is carried out with the aim of investigating the syntactic and semantic features of the English collocation containing the word “play” and point out the similarities and differences to their Vietnamese equivalents The following objectives are shown in the study:(1) pointing out the syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “play” (2) finding out the similarities and differences in collocations containing the collocation “play” in English and their Vietnamese equivalents and (3) - providing some recommendations for the teaching and learning English collocations containing the word “play” Based on the findings presented in the previous chapter, the following remarks can be drawn: Syntactically, most of the English collocation containing the word “play” can be transitive, taking direct objects, indirect objects The investigation into 178 examples about English collocations containing the word and the equivalents in Vietnamese indicates that: both English and Vietnamese collocations containing the word ““play” ” have the patterns of in form of single nouns, single verbs, noun 55 phrases, and verb phrases In detail, both have five structures in common (1) S + PLAY + (OBJECT) (2) S + PLAY + PREPOSITION + (OBJECT) (3)PLAY + VERB + (OBJECT) (4)PLAY-NOUN + VERB + OBJECT (5)S + VERB + PLAY-NOUN However, there are some differences between “play collocations” in English and their Vietnamese equivalents First, some elements are omitted when being translated into Vietnamese Second, “play” collocations in English has varied forms Third, “chơi” in Vietnamese functions as an adverb while in English, they not Last, “play” as nouns in English turns into verbs when they are translated into Vietnamese Semantically, from analyzing the examples taken from grammar books and dictionaries, we can conclude that the English collocation containing the word “play” have a wide range of meaning Both English and Vietnamese collocations containing the word “Play” share the same three main topics, including “doing activities for fun”, “performing”, and “acting” Beside the similarity, the difference lies on the changing meanings when they are translated from Vietnamese into English and vice versa These lead to the similarities in the ways of expressing ideas and concepts through the collocations containing the word “play” In fact, some English collocations containing the word “play” have similar equivalents in Vietnamese in terms of both meaning and vocabulary It is found that the meaning “doing activities for fun” is the most common And the least common meaning of the English collocations containing the word “play” is idioms The English collocations containing the word “play” have some similarities to their Vietnamese equivalents However, there are some differences between them in terms of both syntax and semantics Therefore, when teaching the English collocations containing the word “play”, the teachers have to pay more attention to the structures and its meanings 5.3 Limitations of the current research There are many aspects of the word “play” which can be investigated, the study however only focuses on syntactic and semantic features of the word “play” in collocations The second limitation pertains to the number of the selected collocations used in this study Due to the time constraints, it is unable to list all collocations containing the word “play” to help teachers and learners of English have a thorough understanding of this word in collocations The third limitation of 56 the study is related to the time constraints for both the participants and the researcher This study is limited to collocation test to measure the production and reception as well as the situation of teaching and learning collocations with the word “play” in particular and other collocations in general, which may not be enough to draw detailed and exact implications The last limitation is due to the limited knowledge of the author so this thesis may have shortcomings Therefore, all the remarks and comments from the readers will be highly appreciated 5.4 Recommendations for a further research The findings of the present study are by no means a complete picture of collocations The present study is only concerned with syntactic and semantic features of the word collocations due to the time, limitations and requirement of the minor M.A research In fact, there are still many other aspects still remaining to be investigated This is why further research is recommended to be done in the following areas: First, the research should be done to investigate the w o r d “ p l a y” and “chơi”, synonyms and idioms with both words to help teachers and learners of English to have an overall picture of the similarities and differences between the two words Second, researches on other groups of English and Vietnamese collocations rather than English and Vietnamese collocations containing the word “play” from perspective components could be very interesting and meaningful Third, the research should be done on lexical and grammatical collocations of other words to further examine the mechanism of learners’ acquisition of collocations 57 REFERENCES Foreign authors Aisenstadt (1979) Research on Dictionary Use in the Context of Foreign Language learning Alan Dundes (1978): Essay on the proverbs Bah, J (1993): Lexical collocations - A contrastive view Blooming Field (1987,p.161) Syntax Benson and Ilson 1997: BBI Dictionary of English Word Combinations Collins (2008), Collins Pocket Thesaurus, HarperCollins Publishers Collins (2008), Collins Pocket Thesaurus, HarperCollins Publishers Colin Baker (1992): Attitudes and language David CrYstal Penguin English 1992 “lntroducing Linguistics” 10 Firth (1957): What are collocations? 11 Fernando and Flavell, 1981 : On idioms Critical View and Perspective 12 Gramley and Patzhold (2004, p.56-57) : Idioms of comparison in Vietnamese and English 13 Gitsaki (1996: 23) A study of the development of collocational knowledge 14 Harford and Heasley (1983) : Semantics- A Coursebook 15 Howard Jackson and Etienne De Evenla (2000): Words, Meaning and Vocabulary 2nd edition 16 Jack Richards, John Platt, Heidi Weber London: Longman LDCE (1987) Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 17 Jon Wright (1999): Idioms organizers (Commercial Colour Press, England.) 18 Kathleen R McKeown and Dragomir R Radev (2000) : Collocations 19 Keya T (2005): The acquisition of basic collocations by Japanese learners of English 20 Larson (1984: 141): Meaning -based translation 21 Lewis & Hill (1998): Lexical collocation 22 Leech, (1974) Semantic components of English nouns and verbs and their justification I 23 Linda and Roger Flavell (1993): Dictionary of Proverbs and their origins 24 Lyons (1977) Semantics 25 Michael McCarthy & Felicity O'Dell (2004) : English Phrasal Verbs in Use 26 Michael McCarthy & Felicity O'Dell (2004) : English Idioms in Use 27 Morris (1938): Syntax, semantics and pragmatics 28 M.C Cathy, M & Felicity O Dell, F (2005:12)The effect of lexical collocation on oral profiency 29 Palmer 1981: Semantics -2nd edition 30 Stephan Gramley and Kurt-Michael Patzold (2002): A survey of modern English Vietnamese authors 31 Dao Thi Ngoc Nguyen : “A study on the English collocations containing the verb “SET” with reference to Vietnamese equivalents” 32 Hoang Van Hanh (1987): “Thành ngữ tiếng Việt” 33 Hoang Phe (1997): Từ điển tiếng Việt 34 Phan Van Que (1996) “Ngữ nghĩa thành ngữ, tục ngữ có thành tố động vật tiếng Anh” 35 Phạm Văn Bình (1993), Some outlines on the Vietnasese proverb 36 Pham Thi Nga (2012) A study on common errors related to the usages of “Do and Make collocations” Dictionary 37 The Concise Oxford Dictionary of current English (533) 38 Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language (163) 39 Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms 40 Oxford Collocation Dictionary (2003) 41 Oxford Advanced learners Dictionary (7th edition) 42 Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary 43 Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English, Oxford University Press (Crowther J et al (1995), 44 Dictionary Use in the Context of Foreign Language Learning (p.71) II 45 Oxford Collocations Dictionary for students of English, Oxford University Press (Mclntosh C et al (2009), 46 Từ điển tiếng Việt (1998), Nhà xuất khoa học xã hội III APPENDIX When the outdoor play was over, he left the children with Katie and Bill and went back stage The first play was acted at Christmas 1567, and Still was chosen as being the only M.A The imaginative play written by these students are very interesting Role play is used in training courses, language- learning and psychotherapy His last play, Consuelo, was given on the 30th of March 1878 Maybe Kris thought turnabout was fair play We are the most successful pure play in the restaurant sector The move from stage to movies allowed Gildit to give full play to his sense of the fantastic Every bowler should learn both forehand and backhand play 10 At the same time all this country was opened to Spanish trade even with 11 12 Peru, and the development of its resources, so long thwarted, was allowed comparatively free play "None but fools trust to luck in play," Dolokhov had then said An autopsy would surely reveal Fitzgerald's knife wound, bringing Lydia Larkin's complicity into play, and probably Dean's She just managed to keep the ball in play 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 Children spend hours at play I only said it in play They have to run a play off at this weekend to find the winner David has just run a play-back control He was allowed to buy play-only recorder My quaint New England spinster is gone and with her all the point of my play-let Slideshows can be viewed with the application, along with music and playlists He was the side’s playmaker and a regular set piece taker, scoring twice directly from corner kicks We were childhood playmates Parents and infants were first brought into a brightly decorated, toy-filled playroom IV 24 The new playwrights were supposed to tell us something relevant about ourselves, not just express a cold directorial vision packaged in expensive products 25 The island has become a playground for the rich businessmen of the city 26 These nations will play a substantial role in shaping this new English, as they bring grammatical structure, idioms, and nuanced words from their native tongue 27 I shall await your most gracious permission here in hospital, that I may not have to play the part of a secretary rather than commander in the army 28 She had agreed to play pinochle with friends this afternoon, a rare indulgence 29 “I’ll give you a hundred sharp lashes-that'll teach you to play the fool!” said Denisov severely 30 If I happen to be all alone and in an idle mood, I play a game of solitaire, of which I am very fond 31 Fine, she could play badminton, too 32 I won't drink and won't play tennis till I get reinstated 33 Do you want to play cards with us? 34 Luke plays centre-forward 35 He learned to play the clarinet at the age of ten 36 They wanted me to cooperate with them, but I refused to play along 37 If I pretend to be sick, will you play along and tell everyone that I had to go to the doctor? 38 I refused to play along with them 39 When it comes to protecting his family, he doesn't play around 40 It's time to stop playing around and get busy 41 I spent the evening playing around on the piano/computer/Internet 42 I see you've been playing around with the living room furniture again 43 The supervisor played around with our work schedules this week 44 We played around with the idea for a while but eventually realized that it just wouldn't work 45 They were only playing at trying to fix the problem 46 She liked to play at doctors and nurses as a child V 47 I have no idea what he was playing at 48 49 The machine allows you to record and play back sounds We finished recording our first take and played it back to hear how it 50 sounded He played the tape back to/for us 51 52 53 She played down her role in the research It was a significant mistake though our CEO tried to play it down This new evidence plays into their theory quite nicely 54 Her methods play into the stereotype that lawyers are dishonest 55 56 57 58 In this scene, the two actors play off each other extremely well The sweetness of the wine plays off the sharp flavor of the cheese The company plays on the concerns of parents in order to sell their products Politicians often win votes by playing on people's emotions 59 60 61 62 63 The consequences of the error will play out for several years to come Their personal tragedy was being played out in public He didn't mean what he was saying He was just playing to the crowd He loves publicity and plays to the cameras every chance he gets During the interview, try to play down your weaknesses and play up your strengths 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 The children have been playing up again She played with her hair while she talked on the phone Stop playing with your food and eat He was accused of playing fast and loose with the truth Reporters play fast and loose with the facts She's fantastic in serious roles, but she also knows how to play for laughs Most performers would have taken a serious tone during the scene, but he decided to play it for laughs They're just playing for time, hoping that the situation will resolve itself These lawyers who play God with people's lives should be banned She's been playing hard to get, but I can tell that she likes me You're only playing into their hands by making such ridiculous accusation They have been playing him off against his old enemies He played one side off against the other He wanted to play the field a bit before he got married and settled down People who use drugs are playing with fire VI 79 A writer who enjoys playing with words is an excellent writer 80 81 The children were playing soccer in the yard Can Sara come out and play? 82 83 He played by himself in his room She's outside playing with her friends 84 85 86 You already have lots of toys to play with a baby playing with his toes Did you play any sports in high school? She plays soccer 87 Do you want to play (a game of) cards/poker? 88 89 90 91 I have a chess set Do you want to play? It's your turn to play basketball The Yankees are playing the Red Sox tonight at Yankee Stadium No one dares to play him at chess 92 93 94 When Tom and I are finished with this game, you can play the winner The Yankees and the Red Sox are playing football at Yankee Stadium She has played against some of the best tennis players in the world 95 96 He dreamed about playing quarterback in the National Football League She played center field in their last game 97 He plays third base 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 What position does he play? Her coach didn't play her in yesterday's game They decided to play him at first base I played the ace of hearts He played his rook/bishop/queen for the win You have to play the ball where it lies He played a wedge shot to the green He played a great shot to his opponent's forehand She's been playing the violin since she was 10 years old 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 Where did you learn to play the piano? He can play guitar and drums I could hear a guitar playing in the distance The conductor had us play the piece again from the beginning You kids are playing your music too loud The radio station plays mostly hip-hop and R&B Who decides which songs get played on the radio? VII 114 The film is now playing in theaters across the country 115 What's playing at the theater/movies? 116 The show has been playing to full/packed houses 117 The play is based on a real-life event 118 He wrote, directed, and starred in the play plays by Shakespeare 119 The book discusses the role of play in a child's development imaginative play 120 As the saying goes, “All work and no play make Jack a dull boy.” 121 Please, no talking during play 122 123 124 125 Rain held up play for an hour The chess match finally ended after three hours of play It's your play Roll the dice to determine the order of play 126 127 128 129 130 The quarterback called out the play to his teammates He ran 50 yards on that last play He was called safe on a close play at first base The shortstop made a great play to end the inning She had a chance to catch the ball, but she failed to make the play 131 The first/opening play of the game starts at 8:00 AM 132 They are lawyers who play the race card to defend their clients 133 My wife never disciplines the children She gets to play the good guy while I have to play the bad guy 134 I survived a terrible tragedy, but I don't want to play the victim 135 Luck played an important part in their success 136 The essay discusses the role that television plays in modern society 137 He's been playing the part/role of the jealous husband 138 We all have a part/role to play in the future of this company 139 I used to gamble a lot Mostly, I played the races/horses/slots 140 141 142 143 144 145 She only plays the lottery when there's a large jackpot You can lose a lot of money playing the (stock) market She tried to teach her dog to play dead If anyone asks you about it, play dumb It's a very competitive business, and not everyone plays fair If you play smart, you should be able to graduate in four years VIII 146 I decided to play it safe and leave early so that I would be sure to arrive on time 147 Sometimes you just have to play your luck 148 Criminal investigators need to play their hunches 149 His idea did not play well with the committee 150 When it comes to protecting his family, he doesn't play around 151 It's time to stop playing around 152 He was accused of playing fast and loose with the truth 153 Reporters play fast and loose with the facts 154 She's fantastic in serious roles, but she also knows how to play for laughs 155 Most performers would have taken a serious tone during the scene, but he decided to play it for laughs 156 They're just playing for time, hoping that the situation will resolve itself 157 158 159 160 161 Lawyers who play God with people's lives are speaking to them She's been playing hard to get, but I can tell that she likes me You're only playing into their hands by making such ridiculous accusations He wanted to play the field a bit before he got married and settled down People who use drugs are playing with fire 162 The children are playing football 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 He learned to play the clarinet at the age of ten She tends to play with men's emotions She was playing with her hair Stop playing with your food! The imaginative play written by these students are very interesting His last play, Consuelo, was given on the 30th of March 187 His childhood playmates arranged a meeting every Christmas The new playwrights were supposed to tell us something relevant about ourselves The island has become a playground for the rich businessmen of the city There was some excellent play in yesterday’s match Driving on these rough roads has played hell with my tyres He thought the police were playing some elaborate game of cat and mouse and waiting to trap him Luck played an important part in their success He's been playing the part/role of the jealous husband Playing basketball takes up too much her time IX 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 Her desire to play basketball for Uconn became an obsesion It is in full play This law comes into play The movie gives full play to our imagination They played dead to run away from their enemies That boy tends to play the politician when discussing with his classmates I see a smile played on/about her lips Her colleagues played a bad trick on her Those children often play a nasty trick on their classmates They are play-boys They played dead to run away from their enemies That boy tends to play the politician when discussing with his classmates I see a smile played on/about her lips I like watching the play of moonlight on water X ... illustrate syntactic and semantic features of the English collocations containing the word “play” and their Vietnamese equivalents. After collecting English collocations containing the word “play” and their... 4: SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH COLLOCATIONS CONTAINING THE WORD “PLAY” WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS .36 4.1 Syntactic features of English collocations containing. .. are the syntactic and semantic features of English collocations containing the word “play”? - What are the similarities and differences of “play” collocations in English and their Vietnamese equivalents?