What are collocations?

Ming Wei tried to used a range of vocabulary but some collocations were used incorrectly. But what are collocations?

Collocations

A collocation is a group of two or more words that are almost always put together to create a specific meaning. Using a different combination of words sounds unnatural or awkward. Some common collocations are:

• to make a mistake, but not to do a mistake
• a big decision, but not a large decision
• to commit a crime, but not perform a crime

Ming Wei used the following collocations incorrectly:

• the most enormous city (the correct collocation is the largest city)
• business region (a more common collocation would be business centre or financial hub)
• tall rise (the correct collocation is high rise)
• shopping in the window (window shopping would be the right collocation).

Collocations in the English language can follow several structures:

• adjective + noun (e.g. He gave me some excellent advice.)

• noun + verb (e.g. The disease spread before anything could be done to prevent it.)

• verb + noun (e.g. I have always tried to follow my father’s advice.)

• verb + adverb (e.g. Consider the proposal carefully before you make a decision.)

• adverb + adjective (e.g. An ability to speak Japanese is highly desirable for this job.)

• noun + noun (e.g. The coach pushes the players to perform beyond their comfort zone)

For a single word, there can be more than one collocation. Let’s take the word rain as an example:

• There was heavy rain last night. (adjective + noun)
• At sunset, rain began to pour down. (noun + verb)
• It rained non-stop all night. (verb + adverb)
• A few drops of rain had fallen. (noun + noun)

Discussion

Think of a collocation that you often use and write a sentence using this collocation in the comment box below. Feel free to comment on other participants’ sentences.