M: Have you heard of the Bank of English?
W: No, I haven't. Can you tell me something about it?
M: Well, I'd love to. The largest body of English words gathered togeth-er for linguistic research in one computer reference source is the Bank of English corpus or word bank at the University of Birmingham. The computer database has 120 million words in it. The vocabulary which an ordinary English speaker would draw on in normal conversation is around 7,000 words. The Bank of English has been put together from the everyday use of English found in England in current newspapers such as The Times of London, publications like magazines, radio pro-grammes like those of the BBC and today's books.
W: What's the use of the Bank of English?
M : It is used for research into the way ordinary people use English today,for linguists studying the way language is developing and for psychol-ogists looking at the way people communicate with each other.
W: Could you give me an example so that I can know it better?
M: Well, let's take the word "lover" as an example. One finding was that the words most often associated with "lover" were "ex" and "former", meaning someone who was a past lover. The Bank of English also reveals that in the publications studies the phrase "her lover" occurred more often than "his lover". Professor John Sinclair who is in charge of the Bank of English says one of the findings that comes out of the studies is the wit and liveliness with which ordinary people use the English language.
W: Thank you very much. I know a lot about it now.