Evaluative Meanings and Disciplinary Values - eTheses Repository ...

9.2.4. Uniqueness
The fourth attribute is uniqueness. The UNIQUENESS group indicates whether or not
something exists or occurs in a particular thing, place or situation. This group is akin to the
INHERENCE group in some respects, because uniqueness in a thing can be construed as a
feature inherent in it. Nevertheless, the frequency of adjectives such as specific, unique,
particular and others in the pattern A DJ to N warrants the creation of an independent
uniqueness group. Table 9.24 below summarizes the adjectives in this group in the pattern
A DJ to N in both corpora.
Order ALC Freq. BC Freq.
1 restricted 84 restricted 39
2 specific 64 specific 39
3 unique 34 confined 29
4 common 30 common 19
5 confined 15 unique 18
6 particular 7 particular 6
7 peculiar 6 exclusive 2
8 native 3 peculiar 2
9 exclusive 1 local 1
10 endemic 1 native 1
11 local 1
12 indigenous 1
Total 247 156
Prop. 61% 39%
Table 9.24. The UNIQUENESS group in A DJ to N
Both tokens and types are higher in ALC than BC: this suggests that applied linguistics is
more likely to identify a particular feature in a thing than is the case in business studies.
For example, L2 co-occurs with only the LSP unique to N in this group in ALC,
presenting the semantic sequences FEATURE + (v-link) unique to the L2.
[Applied Linguistics: unique to + L2]
198