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7. Adjective + Noun sequences in attributive or NP-final positions: Observations on lexicalization

  • Pierre Arnaud , Emmanuel Ferragne , Diana M. Lewis and François Maniez
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Phraseology
This chapter is in the book Phraseology

Abstract

Frequent Adjective + Noun sequences in the British National Corpus based on the most frequent ‘central’ adjectives were examined in their use as noun premodifiers and in other uses (predicative, adverbial, or with N being the head of a noun phrase). Hyphenated and non-hyphenated occurrences were taken into account. An investigation of the presence of these sequences in dictionaries shows a relatively strong correlation with frequency of occurrence, as well as with hyphenated spelling. Six Adj + N sequences were more closely examined in the Periodicals and Spoken sections of the BNC, and evidence of reanalysis was found in changes of scope, predicative uses of an adjectival nature, adverbial uses, and occurrences of Adj + N as subjects or objects with restricted sense. A small, but not negligible, proportion of unambiguously lexicalized occurrences was found. Finally, the accentual behaviour of Adj + N sequences was investigated in a laboratory experiment. The prevalence of the /12/ accentual pattern across the frequency of occurrence range and in attributive as well as predicative uses showed that degree of lexicalization had no influence on the stress pattern.

Abstract

Frequent Adjective + Noun sequences in the British National Corpus based on the most frequent ‘central’ adjectives were examined in their use as noun premodifiers and in other uses (predicative, adverbial, or with N being the head of a noun phrase). Hyphenated and non-hyphenated occurrences were taken into account. An investigation of the presence of these sequences in dictionaries shows a relatively strong correlation with frequency of occurrence, as well as with hyphenated spelling. Six Adj + N sequences were more closely examined in the Periodicals and Spoken sections of the BNC, and evidence of reanalysis was found in changes of scope, predicative uses of an adjectival nature, adverbial uses, and occurrences of Adj + N as subjects or objects with restricted sense. A small, but not negligible, proportion of unambiguously lexicalized occurrences was found. Finally, the accentual behaviour of Adj + N sequences was investigated in a laboratory experiment. The prevalence of the /12/ accentual pattern across the frequency of occurrence range and in attributive as well as predicative uses showed that degree of lexicalization had no influence on the stress pattern.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. List of contributors xi
  4. Acknowledgements xiii
  5. Preface xv
  6. Introduction: The many faces of phraseology xix
  7. Part I. Phraseology: theory, typology and terminology
  8. 1. Phraseology and linguistic theory: A brief survey 3
  9. 2. Disentangling the phraseological web 27
  10. 3. A unified approach to semantic frames and collocational patterns 51
  11. 4. Processing of idioms and idiom modifications: A view from cognitive linguistics 67
  12. 5. A very complex criterion of fixedness: Non-compositionality 81
  13. 6. Reassessing the canon: 'Fixed' phrases in general reference corpora 95
  14. Part II. Corpus-based analyses of phraseological units
  15. 7. Adjective + Noun sequences in attributive or NP-final positions: Observations on lexicalization 111
  16. 8. Phrasal similes in the BNC 127
  17. 9. Foot and Mouth: The phrasal patterns of two frequent nouns 143
  18. 10. The Good Lord and his works: A corpus-driven study of collocational resonance 159
  19. 11. Fixed expressions, extenders and metonymy in the speech of people with Alzheimer's disease 175
  20. Part III. Phraseology across languages and cultures
  21. 12. Cross-linguistic phraseological studies: An overview 191
  22. 13. Figurative phraseology and culture 207
  23. 14. Critical observations on the culture-boundness of phraseology 229
  24. 15. Phraseology in a European framework: A cross-linguistic and cross-cultural research project on widespread idioms 243
  25. 16. Free and bound prepositions in a contrastive perspective. The case of with and avec 259
  26. 17. Contrastive idiom analysis: The case of Japanese and English idioms of anger 275
  27. 18. Automatic extraction of translation equivalents of phrasal and light verbs in English and Russian 293
  28. Part IV. Phraseology in lexicography and natural language processing
  29. 19. Dictionaries and collocation 313
  30. 20. Computational phraseology: An overview 337
  31. 21. A computational lexicography approach to phraseologisms 361
  32. 22. Extracting specialized collocations using lexical functions 377
  33. 23. Combined statistical and grammatical criteria for the retrieval of phraseological units in an electronic corpus 391
  34. Envoi
  35. The phrase, the whole phrase and nothing but the phrase 407
  36. Author index 411
  37. Subject index 417
https://doi.org/10.1075/z.139.13arn

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. List of contributors xi
  4. Acknowledgements xiii
  5. Preface xv
  6. Introduction: The many faces of phraseology xix
  7. Part I. Phraseology: theory, typology and terminology
  8. 1. Phraseology and linguistic theory: A brief survey 3
  9. 2. Disentangling the phraseological web 27
  10. 3. A unified approach to semantic frames and collocational patterns 51
  11. 4. Processing of idioms and idiom modifications: A view from cognitive linguistics 67
  12. 5. A very complex criterion of fixedness: Non-compositionality 81
  13. 6. Reassessing the canon: 'Fixed' phrases in general reference corpora 95
  14. Part II. Corpus-based analyses of phraseological units
  15. 7. Adjective + Noun sequences in attributive or NP-final positions: Observations on lexicalization 111
  16. 8. Phrasal similes in the BNC 127
  17. 9. Foot and Mouth: The phrasal patterns of two frequent nouns 143
  18. 10. The Good Lord and his works: A corpus-driven study of collocational resonance 159
  19. 11. Fixed expressions, extenders and metonymy in the speech of people with Alzheimer's disease 175
  20. Part III. Phraseology across languages and cultures
  21. 12. Cross-linguistic phraseological studies: An overview 191
  22. 13. Figurative phraseology and culture 207
  23. 14. Critical observations on the culture-boundness of phraseology 229
  24. 15. Phraseology in a European framework: A cross-linguistic and cross-cultural research project on widespread idioms 243
  25. 16. Free and bound prepositions in a contrastive perspective. The case of with and avec 259
  26. 17. Contrastive idiom analysis: The case of Japanese and English idioms of anger 275
  27. 18. Automatic extraction of translation equivalents of phrasal and light verbs in English and Russian 293
  28. Part IV. Phraseology in lexicography and natural language processing
  29. 19. Dictionaries and collocation 313
  30. 20. Computational phraseology: An overview 337
  31. 21. A computational lexicography approach to phraseologisms 361
  32. 22. Extracting specialized collocations using lexical functions 377
  33. 23. Combined statistical and grammatical criteria for the retrieval of phraseological units in an electronic corpus 391
  34. Envoi
  35. The phrase, the whole phrase and nothing but the phrase 407
  36. Author index 411
  37. Subject index 417
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