Your browser does not support the PubReader view.
Go to this page to see a list of supporting browsers.
The Korean Association for the Study of English Language and Linguistics
[ Article ]
Korea Journal of English Language and Linguistics - Vol. 25, No. 0, pp.170-184
ISSN: 1598-1398 (Print) 2586-7474 (Online)
Print publication date 31 Jan 2025
Received 29 Jul 2024 Revised 10 Dec 2024 Accepted 21 Jan 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15738/kjell.25..202502.170

The Interrelationship between Semantic Peculiarities and Impracticability of Independent Use of fully: A Corpus-Based Analysis

Jungyull Lee
Assistant Professor, Division of Liberal ArtsWonkwang University460 Iksan-daero, Iksan-si, Jeonbuk-do 54538, Republic of Korea brianlee3838@hanmail.net


© 2025 KASELL All rights reserved
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

From the standpoint of semantics relevant to descriptive grammar, this research has enlarged upon analyzing semantic approaches to collocational styles and semantic peculiarities of fully in its collocations. In addition to this, it has attempted to explain the correlation of the distinct semantic characteristics and the impracticability of independent use of fully. Although based upon the Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English (MICASE), fully is found to bond with divergent kinds of lexical items, its collocational styles occur in the two areas having negative and positive senses depending on context modifications. Throughout the analysis, the findings show that the percentages of the types of selected words between the two categories, however, are completely disparate. fully, for instance, tends to collocate preferentially with words connoting more favorable senses than unfavorable ones. Nonetheless, it is meaningful to suggest that fully almost never connects with superlative and hyperbolic words having intensive positive meanings. This case may be intimately related to the impracticability of its independent use. This research surmises that although fully indicates an affirmative sense in its associations, it may not move to an exceedingly powerful positive semantic force. Namely, if forceful favorable superlative and hyperbolic tokens in discourse are not reiterated, it does not appear possible for fully to stand in for and does not enable the ellipsis of unnecessary after the adverbial element fully because the independent use in adjacency pairs can generally play a role of an absolute agreement as both a TCU-initial factor and response device. Based on a variety of corpora and institutional cases, future researches can be expatiated on concrete semantic approaches as regards fully.

Keywords:

collocational style, context modification, fully, independent use, semantic peculiarity

Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by Wonkwang University in 2025.

References

  • Altenberg, B. 1991. Amplifier Collocations in Spoken English. In S. Johanson and A. Stenstrom, eds., English Computer Corpora: Selected Papers and Research Guide, 127-147. [https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110865967.127]
  • Bäcklund, U. 1973. The Collocation of Adverbs of Degree in English. Almqvist and Wiksell.
  • Benson, M., E. Benson and R. Ilson. 2010. The BBI Combinatory Dictionary of English. John Benjamins. [https://doi.org/10.1075/z.bbi]
  • Biber, D., J. Stig, L. Geoffrey, C. Susan and F. Edward. 1999. Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. Longman.
  • Bolinger, D. L. 1972. Degree words. De Gruyter Mouton. [https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110877786]
  • Bullon, S. 2006. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. Longman.
  • Drescher, N. 2003. The relationships among gender, power, and register in the American academic community. Paper presented at the international conference of perception and realization in language and gender research, 19-20th July. Michigan State University.
  • Fahy, P. 2002. Use of linguistic qualifiers and intensifiers in a computer conference. American Journal of Distance Education 16(1), 5-22. [https://doi.org/10.1207/S15389286AJDE1601_2]
  • Fries, C. C. 1952. The structure of English. Harcourt Brace.
  • Gardner, R. 1997. The listener and minimal Responses in conversational interaction. Prospect 12(2), 12-32.
  • Gardner, R. 1998. Between speaking and listening: The vocalization of understandings. Applied Linguistics 19(2), 204-22. [https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/19.2.204]
  • Greenbaum, S. 1970. Verb-intensifier collocations in English: An experimental approach. Janua Linguarum, Walter de Gruyter. [https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110886429]
  • Greenbaum, S. 1974. Some verb-intensifier collocations in American and British English. American Speech 49(1-2), 79-89. [https://doi.org/10.2307/3087920]
  • Hornby, A. S. 2005. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. Oxford University Press.
  • Kennedy, G. 2003. Amplifier collocations in the British national corpus: Implications for English language teaching. TESOL Quarterly 37(3), 467-487. [https://doi.org/10.2307/3588400]
  • Kirchner, G. 1955. Gradadverbien: Restriktiva und Verwandtes im heutigen English. Max Niemeyer Verlag.
  • Lakoff, R. 1973. Language and women’s place. Cambridge University Press. [https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500000051]
  • Lea, D. 2002. Oxford Collocations Dictionary for Students of English. Oxford University Press.
  • Paradis, C. 1997. Degree modifiers of adjectives in spoken British English. Lund University Press.
  • Quirk, R., G. Sidney, L. Geoffrey and S. Jan. 1985. A comprehensive grammar of the English language. Longman.
  • Recski, L. 2004. …It’s really ultimately very cruel…: contrasting English intensifier collocations across EFL writing and academic spoken discourse. Revista de Documentacao de Estudos em Linguistica Teorica e Aplicada (D.E.L.T.A) 20(2), 211-234. [https://doi.org/10.1590/S0102-44502004000200002]
  • Rundell, M. 2007. Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners. Macmillan.
  • Schegloff, E. A. 1982. Discourse as an interactional achievement: Some uses of uh huh and other things that come between sentences. In Tannen, D, eds., Analyzing Discourse: Text and talk, 71-93. Georgetown University Press.
  • Simpson, R., S. Briggs. J. Ovens and J. M. Swales. 2002. The Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English. The Regents of the University of Michigan.
  • Sinclair, J. M. 2001. Collins COBUILD English Dictionary for Advanced Learners. Harper Collins.
  • Tao, H. 2007. A corpus-based investigation of absolutely and related phenomena in spoken American English. Journal of English Linguistics 35(1), 15-29. [https://doi.org/10.1177/0075424206296615]
  • Vasilieva, I. 2004. Gender-specific use of boosting and hedging adverbs in English computer-related texts – a corpus-based study. Paper presented at the international conference on language, politeness and gender, 2-5th September. University of Helsinki.
  • Yngve, V. 1970. On getting a word in edgewise. Chicago Linguistic Society.