Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Palackého

Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky

Intensifiers in English – Case Study(bakalářská práce)

Autor: Petra Janušová (Anglická filologie – Francouzská filologie)

Vedoucí práce: Mgr. Michaela Martinková, PhD.

Olomouc 2009

„Prohlašuji, že jsem tuto bakalářskou práci vypracovala samostatně a uvedla úplný seznam

citované a použité literatury.“

V Olomouci dne 13.5. 2009 ………………………….

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Ráda bych poděkovala vedoucí této bakalářské práce Mgr. Michaele Martinkové, PhD. za

vstřícný přístup a poskytnutí cenných rad, podnětných připomínek a konzultací

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………...................5 1.1 Intensification in general………………………………………………………................5 1.2 Adverbial intensifiers…………………………………………………………………….8 1.2.1 Definition of intensifiers……………………………………………….....................8 1.2.2 Grammaticalization of intensifiers…………………………………………………..8 1.2.3 External factors and their influence on the distribution of intensifiers……………...9 1.2.4 Division of intensifiers……………………………………………………………..11 1.2.5 Grammatical features of intensifiers…………………………………….................12

2 CHARACTERISTICS OF INTENSIFIERS………………………………………………15 2.1 Amplifiers…….………………………………………………………………………..15 2.2 Downtoners………………………………………………………………….................16 2.3 Emphasizers……………………………………………………………………………18

3 CORPUS BASED RESEARCH ON INTENSIFIERS…………………………………….19 3.1 Intensisfiers in other corpora…………………………………………………………...19 3.1.1 Research by Sidney Greenbaum……………………………………….................19 3.1.2 Research by Ito&Tagliamonte……………………………………………………20 3.2 Intensifiers in the British National Corpus………………………………………...…...21 3.2.1 Intensification of some polar adjectives in basic vocabulary…..............................24 3.2.2 Intensification of some adjectives describing people as to their appearance and character…………………………………………………………26 3.2.3 Intensification of adjectives of size………………………………….....................29 3.3 Comparison of intensifiers in British and American English……………….................31 3.3.1 VERY in BrE and AmE…………………………………………………………...32 3.3.2 QUITE in BrE and AmE………………………………………………..................34 3.3.3 RATHER and FAIRLY in BrE and AmE…………………………………………35 3.3.4 ALMOST and NEARLY in BrE and AmE……………………………..................37 3.3.5 TERRIBLY, AWFULLY and PRETTY in BrE and AmE……………..................39

4 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………….....................42

Resumé…………………………………………………………………………….................45

Annotation……………………………………………………………………………………48

References……………………………………………………………………………………49

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1 INTRODUCTION

This thesis is intended to explore the intensification of adjectives by adverbs of

degree in the British National Corpus (BNC). It will result from the database of the BNC and

the comparison with the intensifiers in the Corpus of Contemporary American English

(COCA). For this purpose I used the program of the BNC SARA and the internet website by

Mark Davies offering a free access to the COCA. Likewise, I intend to consult several

grammar books as well other articles written by different linguists who concentrated on the

use of intensifiers from different points of view.

The intensification via adverbs (ADV) of degree is a really large field to study and it

is impossible to cover all modifications by adverbial intensifiers in my bachelor thesis. That

is why I treat only the adverbs of degree and their behaviour as pre-modifiers of adjectives

(ADJ).

First of all, I will define intensifiers and describe the factors which influence their

distribution. I will divide them into groups according to their functions and treat them with

respect to the grammatical rules. In the other chapter, I will deal with each group of

intensifiers in detail. Then I concentrate on my research in the BNC to state the most often

used collations; I will describe their distribution in tables, comment on them and mention

some particularities. Finally, I will choose concrete intensifiers and treat their co-occurrence

with adjectives in British English (BrE) and American English (AmE). I will point out

similarities and differences in their usage.

I will use my results and try to consider possible collocations of adverb-adjective

relation and their use in modern English.

1.1 INTENSIFICATION IN GENERAL

Put very bluntly, intensification is the process used to highlight something which is

important in the phrase, in the discourse from the point of view of the speaker. The English

language offers several ways of highlighting what the speaker needs.

The basic way of highlighting is to use the stress (e.g. /ðɪs ɪz ə ‘bɪg haʊs/). This

manner prevails in spoken language; while in a written form to make this stress “visible” we

use italics (e.g. This is a big house.), bold letters (e.g. This is a big house.), CAPITAL letters

(e.g. This is a BIG house.) or underlining (e.g. This is a big house.).

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Another possible way to intensify is to use “emphatic reflexives.” As König says

these “intensifiers agree with some nominal constituent (their focus) in person, number and

gender. (…) Intensifiers are used as adjuncts to noun phrases or verb phrases” (König 2000:

40). (e.g. The president HIMSELF will give the opening address.). Quirk also mentions the

usage of “emphatic determinative own” that “intensifies the meaning of a possessive

pronoun. For example my own carries the force of ‘mine and nobody else’” (Quirk 1985:

362).

Other ways of highlighting concern the functional sentence perspective. In a Czech

declarative sentence, it is the focus/ rheme standing at the end of the sentence which is

automatically highlighted, because new information is considered the most important in the

whole sentence. However, in English it is different. Veselovská argues that the word order in

English is especially used for grammatical purposes. That is why English uses other specific

syntactic structures (see Veselovská 2006: 80). The examples below are taken from

Veselovská (see 2006: 80-84):

1. The process of passivisation is typical of English to highlight. A transitive

verb changes the order of the patient and the agent that can be expressed at

the end of the sentence and so the agent is rhematised (e.g. John wrote a

story. >> The story was written BY JOHN.).

2. Very strong rhematic positions are created via the existential structures

there is/there are. The word order is marked by the fact that the semantic

subject, the associate of the formal subject there, is in the inversion with

the verb be (e.g. There is A MAN in the middle of the room.).

3. Then, English exploits cleft structures. The cleft sentence is constructed by

the initial clause “It is…” followed by a NP or a prepositional phrase

which is succeeded by a clause starting with what, who, where, when or

that. The rheme of the sentence is the NP or the PP after “It is…” (e.g. It is

THE YOUNG LINGUIST who will meet his friend in the gallery after

lunch.)

4. Similarly, pseudocleft sentences are used to emphasize the most important

part of the sentence. The whole sentence begins with the WH-clause. The

rheme is located in the second part of the sentence preceded by “be…”

(e.g. What the linguist will do is TO MEET HIS FRIEND IN THE LOCAL

GALLERY AFTER LUNCH.)

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5. “English has a choice of the order of the two objects with many verbs

(Anglo-Saxon stress). Therefore FCP can apply and the order is

significant” (Veselovská 2006: 83). (e.g. I gave the present TO BILL, NOT

TO JOHN. I gave Bill A PRESENT, NOT FLOWERS.)

6. English has the possibility to prepose the object and put it in front of the

subject. In this case the word order changes from S-V-O into O-S-V and it

highlights the object thanks to the marked word order (e.g. Most of all I

hate syntax. >> SYNTAX I hate most of all.).

Dušková also treats the issue of highlighting in exclamatory sentences. These

sentences have a different sentence intention. They are introduced by how or what but they

differ from questions by non-inverted subject as it is in a declarative sentence. (e.g. How kind

she is! What fun we had yesterday!) However, there is a restriction on how which cannot be

used with verbs whose meaning is not gradable. (*How she treated him!) (see Dušková 1988:

333).

Other typical means to express intensification is the use of emphatic positive

auxiliary. “Auxiliaries as operators can carry nuclear stress to mark a finite clause as positive

rather than negative. (…) The function of this EMPHATIC POSITIVE use of the operator is

to deny a negative which has been stated or implied. (…) Sometimes the emphatic operator

has no contrastive meaning, but is used purely for emotive force” (Quirk 1985: 124). (e.g.

You should listen to your mother. But I DO listen to her. I AM glad. I DO wish you would

listen.)

Comparisons and similes could be also considered as a way of expressing a high

degree of a certain feature (e.g. as greedy as a pig, as weak as a kitten, as quick as

a lightening).

A special case of intensification is an adjective phrase which has an adjective as a

head and is modified by a noun or an adjective intensifying a certain quality and means in

this case extremely, absolutely (e.g. CRYSTAL clear, PAPER thin, RAZOR sharp).

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1.2 ADVERBIAL INTENSIFIERS

1.2.1 Definition of Intensifiers

According to the definition given by Algeo and Pyles, the intensifier is a “word like

very that strengthens the meaning of the word it accompanies” (Algeo&Pyles 2005: 321).

Other terms for intensifiers used by Méndez-Naya are “degree modifiers” or “degree words”.

He defines them as “linguistic elements which convey the degree or the exact value of the

quality expressed by the item they modify” (Méndez-Naya 2008: 213). They are utilized as

vehicles for expressing persuading, praising, insulting, impressing and “generally influencing

the listener‘s perception of the message” (Ito 2003: 258). What is more they can serve as

fillers to give to the speaker a planning time and “to assert epistemic meaning associated with

speaker‘s level in the truth of their assertations” (Kennedy 2003: 469). Thus, one of their

typical features is that they can be moved out of the sentence without changing the meaning

of the sentence. Another important characteristic of intensifiers is a rather quick development

and a constant change because of being overused. That is why they tend to lose their strength

and consequently there is a need to replace them by stronger ones.

1.2.2 Grammaticalization of Intensifiers

As Méndez-Naya states “English intensifiers offer a picture of ‘fevered invention’,

and without any doubt they “create one of the major areas of grammatical change and

renewal in English, especially from the Early Modern English period onwards” (Méndez-

Naya 2008: 213).

The ability of a rapid change and recycling of different forms is one of the typical

features of the intensifiers. Linguists such as Stoffel, Robertson, Ito and Tagliamonte state

that this process is perpetual, new expressions are constantly needed because the old ones

become unsuitable. Formerly strong words are used on any occasion and after a certain time

the strength of these words begins to fall down, and when the right situation for it arrives it

will not fit in the context; the listener is not attracted anymore, consequently, the speaker is

forced to invent a new stronger word. Those old favourite intensifiers do not disappear from

the language; however, their usage is more restricted (see Ito 2003: 258-259).

When creating a new intensifier, the word gets through the process called

grammaticalization, Ito and Parlington call it rather delexicalization in this case. It is defined

as “the reduction of the independent lexical content of a word, or a group of words, so that it

comes to fulfill a particular function” (Parlington 1993:183). “In the case of intensifiers, a

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given word starts out as a lexical item with semantic context; often it is a word that comments

on speaker‘s assessments of truth conditions or vouches for the sincerity of their words”(Ito

2003: 261) Most often it is adjectives and adverbs which undergo semantic change and as

Méndez-Naya argues they develop in this way a more grammatical function, consequently

with a restriction of scope and loss of morphosyntactic features of their original lexical class,

such as conversion into other classes, or loss of the ability to be graded. Once they were well

established, they lean to be substituted by more emphatic expressions (see Méndez-Naya

2008: 213-214).

To sum up Greenbaum‘s words on the grammaticalization of intensifiers: the more

established the intensifier is, the lower the semantic content of the intensifier is, and the more

restricted the syntactic environment in which it might occur. And vice versa: the more

restricted the syntactic flexibility of the item, the more decreased the semantic potential is.

Moreover, the more delexicalized the intensifier is, the more widely it creates collocations.

This means that the less meaning the intensifier carries on its own, the more it will require

from its surrounding context (see Greenbaum 1974:.80-82).

1.2.3 External factors and their influence on the distribution of intensifiers

Linguists attribute to intensifiers an important role in the social and emotional

expression of the speaker.

Degree adverbs and their use are influenced by the social factors such gender, age or a

social group. This is quite evident “in the diffusion and distribution of intensifiers in a given

community and their interaction with structural factors” (Méndez-Naya 2008: 216). Various

social groups prefer different intensifiers. Méndez-Naya notes that this phenomenon could be

quite seen on the distribution of the intensifier extremely. This concrete intensifier rises in

use among people from higher social classes, especially popular with women. On the other

hand, the intensifiers created by –ly are not so much favoured by the lower classes and is

more used by the middle-class speakers (see Méndez-Naya 2008: 216-217). The usage of

intensifying adverbs is connected with colloquial usage and nonstandard varieties. The

occurrence of these words is really numerous in vulgar discourse and in dialects.

Several linguists conducted research on the distribution of intensifiers according to the

age of speakers. Méndez in his research found out that the older generations do not use the

intensifiers so much, but if they do, their favourite one is very. That is the same with the

middle generation which is more likely to use intensifiers but not more than the young

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generation (see Méndez-Naya 2008: 216-217). He also comments on the influence of the

context combined with the age of speaker. “Concerning the contextual factors explored, it is

shown that the increase in frequency of a given intensifier is preceded by diffusion in terms

of adjective type, and that diffusion and collocation with emotional/non-emotional adjectives

is good indication of the status of an intensifier along the delexicalization path. Thus, the

completely delexicalized and outgoing very collocates widely, even in those age groups

where it is receding, and is favoured with non-emotional adjectives. By contrast, a rising

form like so is intimately associated with emotional contexts and is found across all adjective

types only in the youngest generation of speakers” (Méndez-Naya 2008: 217).

Another important factor is sex. Scholars like Stoffel and Jesperson report that women

are keener on using intensifiers than men. In his work Ito comments on Stoffel who claimed

that “women use these expressions frequently, that they actually developed the intensive use

of the innovation. His explanation is that ‘ladies are notoriously fond of hyperbole’; yet he

also attributes this preference to children” (Ito 2003: 260). Ito also presents Jespersen who

claims that it is “the women who will lead when intensifiers change” (Ito 2003: 260) and he

refers to this as a sort of fashion (see Ito 2003: 260).

The issue of the women‘s language is treated as well in the study by Mary G.

McEdwards. First she says that the female language is rather submissive in the

communication; women prefer avoiding the linguistic aggression. However, on the other

hand she claims that among specific features, which the researchers found, is using of

question tags, more adjectives, qualifiers and intensifiers. These are typical signs for the

usage of hyperbole as it does not go with the argument concerning the submissiveness of

women‘s speech (see McEdwards 1985: 40-41). The characteristic of their language reveals

that women try to express their feelings “about what they are saying and how they hope their

audience will react to what they say” (McEdwards 1985: 41).

Other factors such occupation and education, are reflected in the usage of intensifiers.

In chapter 3 I will deal with some research on the distribution of intensifiers in different

places across the world. Also scholars created their own corpora to find out the situation

concerning the distribution of adverbial intensifiers.

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1.2.4 Division of intensifiers

According to Quirk, intensifiers behave in a sentence as subjuncts, which have more

or less a subordinate role in comparison with other sentence members. Their subordinate role

is reflected in their characteristics such as inability to be grammatically treated and necessity

to be subordinated to a certain sentence element (e.g. verb). Quirk calls this feature of

intensifiers as a “narrow orientation” (see Quirk 1985: 566-567).

In connection with the head of the AdjP, AdvP or VP and the context they occur in,

intensifiers can carry a positive or negative highlighting, or they can just emphasize the head

of the phrase. Quirk distinguishes two major groups of intensifiers: amplifiers and

downtoners.1 There can be also a third group of intensifiers: emphasizers. 2

1. AMPLIFIERS = the intensifiers which scale upwards from an assumed

standard (e.g. a funny film >> a very funny film)

a) MAXIMIZERS – denoting the upper extreme on the scale

(e.g.. completely)

b) BOOSTERS – denoting a higher degree (e.g. very much)

2. DOWNTONERS = the intensifiers having a lowering effect, usually

scaling downwards from an assumed norm

a) APPROXIMATORS – expressing approximation to the force of

the verb, while indicating that the verb

concerned expresses more than is

relevant

(e.g. almost, nearly)

b) COMPROMISERS – having a slight lowering effect, calling

into the question the appropriateness of

the verb concerned (e.g. rather, quite)

c) DIMINISHERS – scaling downwards and meaning

“to a small extent” (e.g. somewhat, a bit)

d) MINIMIZERS – are negative maximizers carrying the

meaning “(not) to any extent”(e.g. hardly)

1 For more details concerning the division of intensifiers see Quirk 1985: 589-591, 597-598.2 Quirk distinguishes emphasizers as a different category of subjuncts with a narrow orientation. However, he notes that certain emphasizers in a certain context can be treated as intensifiers. That is why I mentioned them as a third group in the division of intensifiers (see Quirk 1985: 583).

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3. EMPHASIZERS = adverbs which only emphasize the meaning but do

not express a certain degree (e.g. really3)

- they can approximate to intensifiers when the

constituent which they modify is gradable (see

Quirk 1985: 583)

1.2.5 Grammatical features of intensifiers

Intensifiers can modify adjectival phrases (AdjP), adverbial phrases (AdvP) or verbal

phrases (VP) and their usage is largely extended thanks to the frequent usage of hyperbole.

However, there are some general restrictions on the use of intensifiers. Because this thesis

concentrates particularly on the intensification of adjectives, the rules mentioned below will

deal especially with the restrictions on adjectives.

First of all, I will mention special cases of the distribution of the intensifiers indeed,

enough and so. The ADV indeed and enough are the only intensifiers that can occur after the

item which is modified. With enough, the construction is more common when the ADJ is pre-

modified by not (e.g. She is NOT BRAVE ENOUGH.); and with indeed, the construction is

more common when the ADJ is pre-modified by very (e.g. She spoke VERY CLEARLY

INDEED.) However, with enough, this post-modification is possible only if the AdjP is part

of the subject complement (see Quirk 1985: 448-449), e.g. * brave enough a student to attend

this course. “With so, the construction is also possible if the adjective phrase is part of the

subject or object” (Quirk 1985: 421), e.g. a man so difficult or so difficult a man.

The restrictions mentioned below deal with the modification of gradation (absolute

degree/ comparative/ superlative).

“In general, amplifiers and comparatives are allowed by the same range of adjectives

and adverbs, ie those that are gradable. The range of emphasizers and those downtoners not

expressing degree (…) is much wider” (Quirk 1985: 469).

e.g. definitely He is virtually nonChristian.4

*more *very

3 For example Kennedy in his research on amplifiers in the BNC treats really as an amplifier (see Kennedy 2003: 469)4 All the examples not numbered are taken from Quirk (1985).

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Similarly, there are some restrictions because of semantics. Despite this fact, some

exceptions to the co-occurrence of intensifiers with respect to semantic class of adjectives can

be found (see Quirk 469-470). Quirk gives the example:

e.g. Although the intensifier utterly is more likely to occur with adjectives having a negative value, there are phrases which are common. utterly wrong [negative evaluation] ?utterly right [positive evaluation] utterly reliable [common use] utterly delightful [common use]

“Amplifiers and comparatives are available for adjectives that refer to a quality that is

thought of having values on a scale” (Quirk 1985: 469). Quirk explains this ability on the

sentence John is English. If English refers to the nationality as a quality of John, it does not

allow any amplifier or comparative. Whereas if the adjective English “refers qualitatively to

the way he behaves or to his racial background, they are admitted” (Quirk 1985: 470).

e.g. John is very English. John is more English than the English.

Concerning the gradation of ADJ and ADV, there are intensifiers like quite, so, very

etc. that pre-modify the absolute degree (see Quirk 1985: 472)

e.g. She was so happy. She was very beautiful.

“Comparatives of both adjectives and adverbs, whether inflected or periphrastic, can

be premodified by amplifiers such as much or very much” (Quirk 1985: 472). However, the

modification of ADJ and ADV in absolute and comparative degrees is limited (see Quirk

1985: 472-473).

e.g. The job was (very) much easier than I thought. difficult That is very good. That is *very better. *much much

As Quirk says other intensifiers (adverbs, NP) are very common with comparatives:

somewhat, rather, a lot, a great deal, a good deal, or informal lots, a good bit and very

familiar intensifiers a hell of a lot, a heck of a lot or a damn sight (see Quirk 1985: 473).

He also mentions that for an additional highlighting the intensifiers can be repeated.

Nevertheless, “the repetition is permissible only if the repeated items come first or follow so.

(…) Repetition of intensifiers is a type of coordination that is always asyndetic” (Quirk 1985:

473).

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e.g. very very good [extremely good] much much more careful so very very much better * very much much better * very and very good

“Only much and far are used as intensifiers of premodifying adjectives” (Quirk 1985: 473). e.g. much That was a far easier job.

*a great deal

much That job was far easier (than I expected). a great deal

The pre-modification of superlatives is restricted as well. “The non periphrastic

superlative may be modified by the intensifier very. (…) When very premodifies the

superlative, a determiner is obligatory” (Quirk 1985: 474). (e.g. They arrived at THE VERY

LAST moment.)

“The periphrastic superlative is not premodified by the intensifier very (*the very

most successful candidate) but by the other expressions” (Quirk 1985: 474) such as by far,

far, far and away. The position of the intensifier is also restricted (see Quirk 1985: 474).

e.g. (by) far the best (comedy) It was the best (comedy) by far/*far/far and away.

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2. CHARACTERISTICS OF INTENSIFIERS

Quirk defines features of intensifiers to a large extent. However, he deals especially

with rules concerning their co-occurrence with verbs. That is why I concentrated only on the

rules treating the intensification of adjectives, alternatively adverbs.

2.1 AMPLIFIERS

Amplifiers create a group of adverbial intensifiers whose major feature is to express

degrees of increasing intensification upwards from the assumed standard. According to the

linguist Ito amplifiers are more frequent because they make the speech more interesting.

Moreover, the scholars claimed that in written British and American English a vast majority

of the collocations of intensifiers (72%) have an adjectival head (see Ito 2003: 263).

The amplifiers could be divided into two subcategories: maximizers and boosters.

As Quirk or Kennedy noted, both subcategories are open-class groups because of overusing

of certain intensifiers, which are not over some time effectual, and thus inventing of new ones

with a stronger meaning is necessary (see Kennedy 2003: 469). “Most amplifiers can be

contrasted in alternative negation with the phrase to some extent, and this propensity is a

semantic test for their inclusion in the class of intensifiers” (Quirk 1985: 590). This can be

seen in comparison with emphasizers, which cannot be so used.

e.g. He does not ignore my request completely, but he does it to some extent. *He does not really ignore my request, but he does it to some extent.

a) MAXIMIZERS: They express the upper extreme on the scale.

- e.g. absolutely, completely, entirely, extremely, fully, perfectly,

quite, totally, thoroughly and “the intensifying

use of most” (Quirk 1985: 590)

e.g They fully appreciated our kindness. They thoroughly disapprove of his attitudes. I quite forgot our meeting. [quite means in this case completely] I most appreciated your sincerity. We must absolutely refuse to listen to your complaining.

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b) BOOSTERS: They express a higher degree of the feature on a scale.5

- e.g. badly, bitterly, deeply, enormously, far, greatly, highly, heartily,

intensely, severely, so, terribly, well, strongly, violently, a great deal,

a good deal, a lot, by far, “exclamatory how; and the intensifying

use of more” (Quirk 1985: 591)

e.g. I so wanted her. [I wanted to see her very much] How she suffered! [How very much she suffered!] I more enjoy dancing than reading books. He must bitterly regret his mistake. He annoys me a great deal.

“The distinction between both groups of maximizers and boosters is not a hard one

and fast one”(Quirk 1985: 591). Quirk notes that maximizers standing in the medial position

often state a very high degree, whereas if they occur in the end position, they tend to express

their absolute meaning of extreme degree. Quirk gives the example of the maximizer utterly

and the booster violently when they stand in the medial position (see Quirk 1985: 591).

e.g. They utterly hated him. They violently hated him.

“Speakers vary in the extent to which the give a seriously hyperbolic reading to the

maximizer. The tendency to use the maximizer for merely a high degree is especially great

for attitudinal verbs such as detest” (Quirk 1985: 591), e.g. They utterly/ violently detested

him.

2.2 DOWNTONERS

Downtoners create a group of adverbial intensifiers whose major feature is to express

degrees of intensification downwards from the assumed standard. Quirk divides downtoners

into four groups: approximators, compromisers, diminishers and minimizers (see Quirk 1985:

597-599).

a) APPROXIMATORS: They serve to express an approximation to the force of the

verb expressing more than is relevant.

- e.g. almost, nearly, virtually, all but, informal intensifiers

practically or as good a

e.g. I almost resigned. He virtually dictated the terms of the settlement. They as good as ruined the school.

5 Old-fashioned English uses the intensifier rather as an exclamatory booster. (e.g. “Did you enjoy the party?” “Rather.”) (see Quirk 1985: 591)

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b) COMPROMISERS: They serve to slightly reduce the force of the verb.

- e.g. quite6, rather, enough, sufficiently, more or less,

informal intensifiers kind of, sort of

e.g. I quite enjoyed the party, but I’ve been to better ones. [especially BrE] He more or less resented their interference. I kind of like him. [especially AmE] As he was walking along, he sort of stumbled and seemed ill. She found it rather sad..

c) DIMINISHERS: They scale downwards meaning “to a small extent. Quirk

distinguishes two subcategories of diminishers: the expression

diminishers and the attitude diminishers (see Quirk 1985: 598).

- EXPRESSION diminishers: They “express only part of the potential

force of the item concerned” (Quirk 1985: 598).

e.g. mildly, partially, quite, slightly, somewhat, in part,

to some extent, in some respects, a bit, a little

e.g. We know them slightly. I partly agree with you. They have always mildly disliked him.

- ATTITUDE diminishers: They “seek to imply that the force of the

item concerned is limited” (Quirk 1985: 598).

e.g. simply, only, merely, informal intensifier just

e.g. I was only joking. She will just be out for a few minutes. It was merely a matter of finance. d) MINIMIZERS: They are treated as negative maximizers scaling to the down

extreme. Quirk divides them into two groups: negatives and

nonassertives (see Quirk 1985: 598).

- NEGATIVE minimizers: e.g. barely, hardly, little, scarcely

e.g. She scarcely knows him.

He little realizes what trouble he has caused.

- NONASSERTIVE minimizers: e.g. in the least, at all, a bit,

e.g. They don’t support her at all. We don’t mind in the slightest. I don’t like his attitude a bit.

6 Quite can serve as an amplifier or a downtoner depending on the head of the phrase and the context.

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2.3 EMPHASIZERS

Emphasizers are “subjuncts concerned with expressing the semantic role of modality

which have a reinforcing effect on the truth value of the clause or part of the clause to which

they apply. In adding to the force (as distinct from the degree) of the constituent, emphasizers

do not require that the constituent should be gradable. When, however, the constituent

emphasized is indeed gradable, the adverbial takes on the force of an intensifier. (…) When

these emphasizers are positioned next to a part of the communication, without being

separated intonationally or by punctuation, their effect is often to emphasize that part alone,

though there may be ambivalence as to whether the emphasis on the part or on the whole”

(Quirk 1985:583-584).

Quirk divides emphasizers into two groups. However, he treats them according their

function of a disjunct in a sentence, thus as they modify verbs and not adjectives, which are

the focus of this thesis (see Quirk 1985: 583-584). I will only mention some representatives

of emphasizers but I will not treat them into detail.

Examples of emphasizers: actually, certainly, clearly, definitely, indeed, obviously, plainly,

really, surely, simply, literally, just and emphasizer typical of BrE

fairly.

Emphasizers tend to occur with verbs, however, “The scaling effect of really and

indeed is more obvious with adjectives” (Quirk 1985: 586), e.g. It was REALLY dangerous.

Some emphasizers are close to the scaling effect of boosters when they occur with

gradable items. This effect is more obvious in connection with adjectives and nouns. Of

course, when they stand with non-gradable item, they reinforce the item concerned (see Quirk

1985: 586).

e.g. He really likes her. [He likes her very much.] He definitely impressed her. [He impressed her greatly.] She is certainly intelligent. [She is very intelligent.] He is obviously a fool. [He is a big fool.] He really was there. [non-gradable verb] We definitely saw it. [non-gradable verb]

Although Quirk defines absolutely and fairly as an amplifier and a downtoner, he

treats them also as emphasizers when they modify verbs. Emphasizers fairly and absolutely

“require some suggestion of exaggeration in the predication” (Quirk 1985: 585).

e.g. In her anger, she fairly/absolutely screamed at him. *In her anger, she fairly/absolutely spoke to him.

18

3. CORPUS-BASED RESEARCH ON INTENSIFIERS

In this part of the thesis I concentrated on intensifiers in various corpora. In fact,

intensifiers have become a frequent target of linguistic research over the last decades. I would

like to introduce some research conducted by linguists who were interested for example in

the Scottish Corpus of Texts and Speech, British national corpus, York English corpus; or

they just created their own corpora for their research (e.g. the research in Chicago, Toronto,

at Oregon University). First of all, I will present two results of research conducted by other

linguists. Then, I would like to comment on my own research on intensifiers in the BNC and

their occurrence with adjectives.

3.1 INTENSIFIERS IN OTHER CORPORA

3.1.1 Research by Sidney Greenbaum

Sidney Greenbaum dealt with verb-intensifier collocations in American and British

English. He conducted two experiments: one in England and the other one in Oregon, US;

eventually he compared the results of the two experiments. The informants were

undergraduates and they were given completion tests to add an intensifier to a certain verb in

a sentence. Greenbaum wanted to point out strong individual collocations, similarities and

differences between BrE and AmE and collocational ranges for intensifiers with verbs.

Finally, he found out that BrE has stronger collocational links between verbs and intensifiers,

but in general, there is a great agreement among the American and British major collocates.

There are, of course, some little differences in usage (e.g. the intensifier greatly modifies

more often the verb appreciate than enjoy in AmE, while in BrE the verb appreciate does not

occur so much often). The strongest collocation was created by entirely connected with agree

(see Greenbaum 1974: 83-86). He presented the following results:

badly UK need (65%) want (28%) US need (48%) want (17%)

very much UK like (29%) want (18%) US like (15%) want (5%)

greatly UK admire (44%) enjoy(20%) US admire (16%) enjoy (18%) appreciate (24%)

entirely UK agree (82%) US agree (27%) forget (13%)

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utterly UK none - only in 10% hate US none - only one instance of hate used with utterly

completely UK forget (50%) US forget (46%)

3.1.2 Research by Ito&Tagliamonte

The other research I will mention was carried out by the linguists Ito and

Tagliamonte. They concentrated on the area of York because they considered English of this

region “somewhat conservative and standard” (Ito 2003: 262). The final results came from

the York English corpus. The linguists examined the language with respect to variable factors

such as sex, age, social status and geographic factors. They found out that the usage of

intensifying adverbs is increasing from the oldest to the youngest and that their usage is

rapidly changing. They revealed that 24% adjectival heads (24% out of 4 019) were

intensified. The result showed that the intensifier very was used in 38% of samples; the

second one was really with 30% as it was much more used with the young than the elderly

people. The third one was the intensifier so which obtained over 10%. Then the linguists

classified the diverse adjectival heads according different properties such as color, dimension,

physical properties, age, speed, etc.; and after that they examined very and really with these

adjectives to find out more information about the expansion of these intensifiers. The results

of this experiment showed that both intensifiers are more often used with predicative

adjectives than with attributive adjectives and that this result is consistent for all age groups.

very 38,3%really 30,2%

so 10,1%absolutely 3,2%

pretty 3,2%too 2,8%that 2,7%right 1,6%

totally 1,4%completely 1,2%

bloody 1,2%all other items 4,1%

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3.2 INTENSIFIERS IN THE BRITISH NATIONAL CORPUS

This part of my thesis concentrates on intensifiers in the BNC. In Kennedy’s words, the

BNC “is a 100-million-word structured collection of spoken and written texts. The corpus

was compiled by a consortium of universities, publishers, and the British government in the

1990s to be representative of the spoken and written English used in Britain at the end of the

20th century. (…) It includes 90 million words of written English from eight genres (80%

informative prose, 20% imaginative prose) and 10 million words of spoken English from four

social class groupings, collected in 38 locations in the United Kingdom” (Kennedy 2003:

471).

I focused on how adjectives are intensified by adverbs of degree.

A similar research was conducted by G. Kennedy who summarized his results in the

article called “Amplifier Collocations in the British National Corpus: Implications for

English Language Teaching.” (2003). He treated only amplifiers in the BNC and a

co/occurrence probability of these intensifiers and adjectives according to algorithm. Then he

stated some basic features of these amplifiers and the usage of the results in teaching English

as a foreign language.

Concerning my own research, I used SARA and XAIRA, two programs

accompanying the BNC. First of all, I tried to find all possible combinations of adverbial

intensifiers with adjectives to find out which adjective and intensifier is used the most

frequently. However, it was impossible because of a big number of solutions (994609).

That is why I had to concentrate on concrete adjectives and concrete intensifiers and I

was searching for different combinations of these words. These combinations were searched

in a simple phrase query. Sometimes, however, the intensifying expression had also other

tags and therefore, a query builder had to be used. The intensifiers pretty and that needed to

be stated as adverbs in the query builder, otherwise the BNC would also show me the results

of pretty as an adjective and that as a central determiner modifying a noun and not an

adjective. Figure 1 presents a sample “query builder” query for the phrase that small with

that as an intensifier.

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Figure 1: Sample query for the phrase that small with that as an intensifier.

I chose the adjectives according to the Oxford Learner’s Dictionary of Current

English (2005, the seventh edition) and its section called “The Oxford 3000tm.” This section

offers a list of 3000 words which were selected by experts and experienced teachers

according to their importance and usefulness for learners of English. From this range of

vocabulary I picked polar adjectives in basic vocabulary good, bad, rich, poor, clever, stupid,

sad, happy, new, old, young, then adjectives describing people as to their appearance and

character nice, beautiful, kind, amazing, pretty, great, and finally adjectives describing size:

small, big, large, huge, enormous, tiny. I also chose the adjective handsome which was not

covered in the dictionary but I wanted to compare it with pretty and see the difference

between them when intensified.

Then I made a list of intensifiers as mentioned by Quirk (1985). The amplifiers

intensifying upwards include: absolutely, entirely, extremely, quite, utterly, awfully, terribly,

pretty, greatly, much, so, that, too, very. The downtoners scaling downwards are represented

by: rather, fairly, nearly, almost, somewhat, mildly, and virtually. The emphasizers include:

really, indeed, definitely, absolutely, obviously, well, certainly, actually, clearly.

When I was counting the exact number of results I had to pay attention to the context

the intensifier and the adjective occurred in. I had to cut out the examples where the adjective

was a part of a name (e.g. New Zealand, New York, Happy Prince), thus the intensifier

(certainly, so) did not modify the adjective but the whole phrase; in some cases the adjective

22

was a part of a collocation (e.g. good-looking) and it could not be modified by the intensifier

on its own either.

In the second part of my research, I focused on the intensifiers quite, very, terribly,

awfully, pretty, rather, fairly, nearly and almost. I described them in more detail

concentrating on their distribution and possible collocations in British English and American

English.

23

3.2.1 Intensification of some polar adjectives in basic vocabulary

good

bad rich

poor

stupid

clever

sad happy

new

old young

absolutely 1 0 0 0 14 1 0 3 5 0 0

entirely 4 3 0 0 0 3 0 43 29 0 0

extremely 139 22 19 32 5 14 9 24 0 9 8

quite 596 32 8 14 7 13 14 561 77 30 74

completely

2 0 0 0 5 0 1 20 263 0 0

utterly 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 3 7 0 0

awfully 26 3 1 0 0 4 1 1 0 2 1

terribly 19 8 0 3 0 3 13 3 0 5 2

pretty 485 54 2 34 18 8 4 12 5 9 46

greatly 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

much 225 11 3 3 0 1 1 0 0 4 0

so 823 650

63 93 168 72 112

266 63 106

204

that 91 193

2 3 14 12 0 4 9 1 8

too 470 707

34 72 38 77 14 561 17 442

468

very 4771

463

201 417 46 271 290

727 74 521

604

rather 96 15 1 37 20 13 41 3 5 18 13

fairly 84 5 4 7 0 0 0 13 59 10 16

nearly 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 29 1 0

almost 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 7 10 3 0

somewhat 0 0 0 1 3 0 5 0 3 4 0

mildly 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

virtually 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0

really 861 208

16 15 96 18 30 70 28 43 21

indeed 46 11 3 4 3 5 7 9 0 6 1

definitely 6 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 1 0

obviously 7 4 0 2 0 1 2 10 5 4 1

actually 9 4 0 1 0 0 0 2 4 1 0

well 30 2 0 3 3 1 0 3 3 6 4

certainly 11 0 3 0 0 1 0 4 1 3 1

clearly 1 6 0 0 1 0 0 3 3 3 1

Table 1: Distribution of polar adjectives.

24

The first chart deals with the common adjectives which a learner in English knows

from the very beginning. Almost all the adjectives from this chart combine the most often

with very. The phrase very good showed the biggest number of solutions: 4771; and it is also

the highest result in my research on intensifiers in BNC. The adjectives that did not combine

the most often with very but with other intensifiers were bad, stupid and new. The adjective

bad occurred the most with too, stupid with so and new with completely. There were some

other results with higher frequency: it was the intensification of good by quite and so, then

bad was frequently modified by so and very, and finally, it was the adjective happy modified

by quite and too at the same level. Concerning the downtoners, the results were very low

except from rather good and the combination of fairly with good and new. The same

situation came across the usage of emphasizers. The only important results were

combinations of really with good, bad and stupid.

To sum up, the adjective that was intensified the most often by very was good and its

opposite bad. Good was always intensified in more cases than bad apart from the

combination with too and that. The intensifier the least often used with this set of adjectives

was the amplifier greatly showing no result available and the downtoner mildly, which

combined only in one case with the adjective stupid [1].

e.g. [1] Sub-Prior Richard, decent, comfortable, placid man, marshalled the other ranks out to their ordinary labours, and to the refectory shortly afterwards for dinner, and by his own mildly stupid calm had calmed his flock into a perfectly normal appetite by the time they went to wash their hands before the

meal. [G0M 2132] [2] Dont they realise they look COMPLETELY bent, and completely sad, and

completely STUPID. [J1G 870] [3] Yeah as I say I didn't like the song but I, that was well clever. [KDA 2766] [4] ‘Because the area round Cullbridge is awfully rich in rare species. [H8Y 1191] [5] It's not all absolutely good news at the present time, because the final boundaries of the area are not yet determined and we are currently in negotiation with the U K government about the precise boundaries of the five B area. [HYX 375]

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3.2.2 Intensification of some adjectives describing people as to their appearance and character

nice kind beautiful amazing pretty handsome great

absolutely 2 0 17 14 0 1 14

entirely 0 0 1 0 0 0 0

extremely 13 8 20 0 8 11 2

quite 328 8 34 50 35 4 1

completely 0 2 0 0 0 0 0

utterly 0 0 3 0 0 0 0

awfully 11 5 0 0 2 0 0

terribly 10 1 1 0 1 0 0

pretty 12 2 0 6 0 0 6

greatly 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

much 0 1 2 0 0 0 1

so 216 175 190 7 79 27 436

that 24 0 6 0 2 1 19

too 46 36 22 1 15 3 386

very 1419 365 275 2 212 73 399

rather 91 0 16 0 16 10 0

fairly 1 0 1 1 1 0 0

nearly 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

almost 0 0 10 0 4 2 0

somewhat 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

mildly 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

virtually 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

really 386 11 31 16 42 3 90

indeed 18 4 1 0 2 0 8

definitely 0 0 0 0 1 0 0

obviously 0 0 2 0 0 0 3

actually 0 3 1 0 9 0 1

well 8 3 0 0 2 0 4

certainly 10 1 2 0 3 0 1

clearly 0 0 0 1 2 0 2

Table 2: Distribution of some adjectives describing people as to their appearance and character .

26

This table concentrates on the evaluative adjectives describing people as to their

appearance and character. In fact, I expected a higher rate of intensification since these

adjectives are often used. In all cases, they are intensified the most often only by very, quite,

so; and a high number of solutions appeared with too, rather and really. None of these

adjective was modified by greatly, nearly or mildly.

The phrase very nice occurred the most often (1419 – the highest number of solutions

in this chart). It was followed by the intensifiers I have already mentioned: quite, so, rather

and really.

Kind, a synonym of nice, combined the most frequently with very and so. The

adjective beautiful behaved in the same way. Moreover it was modified by quite and really,

but the number is not so prominent - only around 30 examples. The adjective amazing did not

show any special way of modification except of the intensifier quite (50 results).

Nevertheless, it is not intensified as frequently as the others.

As regards the adjectives pretty and handsome they are often used for the description

of appearance – pretty for women, handsome for men. In general, pretty occurred more often

than handsome, and it was intensified more often, especially by very (212 solutions), by so,

quite, really. On the other hand, handsome was modified most by very (only 73 solutions)

and by so. This adjective was also the least intensified adjective from this chart.

As perhaps expected, pretty is never intensified by pretty. First of all, I searched for

pretty pretty in a phrase query. The BNC showed me 4 solutions. Then I stated the rules for

the search in a query builder: the 1st pretty was defined as the adverb and the 2nd one should

have been the adjective. Finally, I put zero into the table because the first result was not what

I was searching for. In reality, the combination pretty pretty in the phrase query did not mean

very pretty but it was the repetition of the intensifier in front of another adjective to highlight

the intensification (e.g. very very nice).

e.g. [6] … with the sentries is pretty pretty minimal. [HUK 194] [7] … it was pretty pretty good place. [KPA 3157] [8] … we have a wonderful opportunity there for doing something pretty pretty flashy. [JP0 1035] [9] That’s pretty pretty powerful you got batteries. [KPA 3179]

The downtoners occurred with these adjectives really rarely. Only rather was used in

91 examples with nice; surprisingly fairly, which could be considered as its synonym,

intensified nice only in one case. Moreover, adjectives modified by fairly occurred only in 4

examples in total and its distribution with these adjectives is really weak in comparison with

27

rather. The downtoners nearly, virtually and mildly did not combine with any of these

adjectives.

The usage of the emphasizers was a little bit more frequent. Really dominated again in

the chart among the emphasizers. On the other hand, the adverb that was used the least often

for the intensification was definitely found in the only example with pretty.

e.g. [10] I t had been a lightning love I had felt on that bench, I was sure — too sudden, too amazing — but nevertheless love [J2F 474] [11] For while Glenda Grower was the better-looking, Glenda struck rather than attracted; Penny was definitely pretty, and certainly the more approachable. [H8Y 1152] [12] As long as you consult the professionals, a surprising number of walls can be taken down with ease and the resulting increase in light and space is clearly amazing. [HGW 1297]

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3.2.3 Intensification of adjectives of size

small tiny big large huge enormous

absolutely 0 1 0 4 2 5

entirely 0 0 0 0 0 0

extremely 45 6 3 49 0 0

quite 192 5 93 168 3 4

completely 0 0 0 0 0 0

utterly 0 0 0 0 0 0

awfully 10 0 0 0 0 0

terribly 1 0 1 1 1 0

pretty 41 1 8 4 1 0

greatly 0 0 0 0 0 0

much 5 0 1 1 0 0

so 290 43 175 216 39 28

that 8 1 51 8 0 21

too 708 9 598 355 6 2

very 1557 50 471 1353 2 1

rather 82 1 9 71 0 0

fairly 84 1 20 96 0 1

nearly 0 0 0 0 0 0

almost 1 0 2 2 0 0

somewhat 1 0 0 0 1 0

mildly 0 0 0 0 0 0

virtually 0 0 0 0 0 0

really 35 7 150 17 8 1

indeed 28 1 5 18 0 0

definitely 0 0 0 0 0 0

obviously 1 1 0 3 1 0

actually 0 1 1 1 1 0

well 3 0 1 1 0 0

certainly 2 0 3 4 0 0

clearly 2 0 0 1 0 0

Table 3: Distribution of adjectives of size.

29

The third table concerns the usage of intensifiers with the adjectives of size. These

adjectives lie on the scale opposition so they express various degrees of the same quality (see

Peprník 2006: 18). The adjectives huge and enormous are so called “end-of-scale” adjectives.

Such adjectives describe the highest rate without undergoing modification, they are “implicit

superlatives.” The linguist L. J. Briton distinguishes “between the normal scale adjective and

the end-of-scale adjective; the former fits the slot very _____ (e.g. big, tasty, interesting,

beautiful, old, cold, hot), while the latter fits the slot absolutely _____ (e.g. enormous/huge,

boiling/freezing) (…) Note that the end-of-scale adjective is much more varied and

connotationally rich than the normal adjective” (Briton 2000: 137).

Concerning Table 3, only the adjective small shows some marks of higher

intensification than the others; the most frequent combination is the phrase very small. On the

other hand, the intensifiers that did not intensify any adjective were entirely, completely,

awfully, greatly, nearly, mildly, virtually and definitely. In fact, we can conclude that these

adjectives are intensified the least often from all the adjectives covered in my research. The

end-of-scale adjectives huge and enormous are the least often intensified adjectives of size;

besides their intensification by boosters and maximizers is quite comparable despite the

statement by Briton that end-of-scale adjectives tend to occur more with maximizers. Quite

surprisingly, these end-of-scale adjectives combined most frequently with the booster so.

The amplifiers that modify adjectives of size the most often are very, so, too and

quite. As regards to downtoners, the adverbs rather and fairly are preferred. Finally, a similar

situation came with the use of emphasizers: really and indeed are more frequent intensifiers

with these adjectives of size. The frequency of the remaining intensifiers is quite low – up to

ten tokens for each.

e.g. [13] It's a huge balloon, absolutely huge. [JYD 554] [14] You'll see that the pressure is must be quite enormous and produced a raised section there. [F77 455] [15] There nice designs, but there not very big but some of them are really tiny. [KE3 2843]

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3.3 Comparison of intensifiers in British and American English

This section of my thesis will deal with some concrete intensifiers and their usage in

British and American English. For this purpose I used the internet website by the American

professor of Brigham Young University, Mark Davies

(http://davies-linguistics.byu.edu/personal/). He offers a free access of the BNC, the Corpus

of Contemporary American English (COCA) and other corpora via the BYU interface.7

The COCA “contains more than 385 million words of text, including 20 million

words each year from 1990-2008, and it is equally divided among spoken, fiction, popular

magazines, newspapers, and academic texts. (The most recent texts are from late 2008). The

corpus will also be updated every six to nine months from this point on, and will therefore

serve as a unique record of linguistic changes in American English.”8

One problem with using this corpus and comparing it with the BNC is that there will

be a great difference in the number of results, since the COCA is almost fourth times larger

than the BNC (385 million words in the COCA versus 100 million words in the BNC). A

really great advantage of Mark Davies’ corpora website is a possibility to get directly a list of

words which are combined with concrete words ordered according to frequency and there is

no need to search for each combination of words separately to get a concrete number.

Furthermore, you are immediately given a number of the results for each possible

combination.

In this way, I compared the intensifiers very, quite, rather, fairly, almost, nearly,

awfully, terribly and pretty. When I searched for a concrete intensifier followed by an

adjective, I got a list of adjectives from the most frequently used to the least frequently used

adjectives. From this list I chose the first ten adjectives, put the results into a table and

compared them with the adjectives of the other corpus.

7 Mark Davies received a B.A. from Brigham Young University in 1986 with a double major in Linguistics and Spanish, followed by an M.A. in Spanish Linguistics from BYU in 1989. He then received a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin in 1992, with a specialization in “Ibero-Romance Linguistics”. In the early years of his career he was interested in the publication of works concerning Spanish and Portuguese linguistics; then he started to be keen on the design, creation and usage of corpora with respect to English. In 2008 he placed 385 million-word corpora on his website to be free available for students, teachers and linguists; and in 2009 he was given a grant to create a 300 million-word corpus of historical American English (early 1800s - present time). (see Mark Davies, Home page, 23 April 2009 < http://davies-linguistics.byu.edu/personal/>),8 Mark Davies, Home page, 23 April 2009 < http://www.americancorpus.org/ >.

31

Figure 2: Mark Davies’ access to the BNC and searching for awfully + adjective.

3.3.1 VERY in BrE and AmE

Very is one of the most often used intensifying words in English. According to Fries

very belongs to the intensifiers of “Standard” American English (see Ito 2003: 260-261). As

Algeo and Ito comment on the development of very, this booster was one of the first degree

adverbs to undergo the delexicalization and now it “has only an intensifying function; it has

altogether lost its independent meaning ‘truly,’ though as an adjective it survives with older

meanings in older phrases like ‘very heart of matter’ and ‘the very thought of you.’ Chaucer

does not use very as an intensifying adverb; the usage was doubtless beginning to be current

in this day, though the OED has no contemporary citations. The verray in Chaucer’s

description of his ideal soldier, ‘He was a verray, parfit gentil knight,’ is an adjective: the

meaning of the line is approximately ‘He was a true, perfect, gentle knight.’” (Algeo 2005:

238).

According to Kennedy very is more likely to intensify positive adjectives (see

Kennedy 2003: 480). Dušková says that “very se užívá u participií vyjadřujících duševní

stavy, a to jak v atribuci, tak v predikaci, např. he wore very upset, surprised, offended,

32

annoyed, vexed, confused expressions” (Dušková 1998: 468); while Méndez-Naya suggests

that very is “favoured with non-emotional adjectives” (Méndez-Naya 2008: 217).9

Méndez- Naya also focuses on the distribution of very according to the age of the

speaker. He concludes very is often used by the middle aged people, who often use the

intensifier really as well, and it is widely preferred by those over 50.

VERYBritish English American English

good 4777 good 14965different 2346 important 10134important 2155 difficult 7670difficult 2052 different 7194small 1550 hard 4216nice 1419 close 4019high 1358 strong 3930large 1352 high 3771close 972 small 3631similar 915 interesting 3406Table 4: Distribution of very in BrE and AmE

Concerning the distribution in British and American English very collocates most

often in both varieties of English with the adjective good. Then there are some little

variations in the use of different, important and difficult. The adjectives small, high and close

belong to the group of ten adjectives most often used with very in both language varieties.

However, the adjective small is much more frequently used in BrE than in AmE; and the

adjective close combines with very less often in BrE than in AmE. The adjective high

occupies approximately the same position in both varieties of English. Finally, BrE combines

very with some different words than AmE: the other adjectives intensified by very in BrE are

nice, large, similar; while in AmE it is the adjectives hard, strong and interesting. Both

varieties confirm the findings by Méndez-Naya that very occurs with non-emotional

adjectives.

9 Further research confirmed that very modifies more often non-emotional adjectives. Other adjectives that were frequently modified by very were long, low, hard, strong, happy, useful, interesting, short, simple, young, clear, pleased, easy or popular.

33

3.3.2 QUITE in BrE and AmE

Quite occupies among the intensifiers a special position. It can be an amplifier

expressing the highest rate of a quality (synonymous with completely), or it can be a

downtoner scaling downwards (the meaning of fairly). Nevertheless, its function depends on

the context it occurs in and on others factors such as intonation. Even in a concrete sentence,

though, it is hard to decide whether it is an amplifier or a downtoner (see Dušková 1998: 468,

see Quirk 1985: 446).

QUITEBritish English American English

different 1266 different 2135sure 720 sure 1242good 596 clear 761clear 589 good 525 happy 562 right 514right 409 possible 427nice 325 similar 312possible 237 ready 279 difficult 209 common 261easy 204 simple 253Table 5: Distribution of quite in BrE and AmE.

As regards the occurrence of quite with the adjectives in BrE and AmE, the first two

places are occupied by different and sure in both types of English. Then, clear and good

occupied the third and fourth place in BrE, while in AmE it is vice versa. Other adjectives

that occur in both lists of top 10 adjectives are right and possible. Both adjectives are more

often used in American English. The rest of the adjectives in top 10 differ in BrE and AmE.

In BrE the rest of the adjectives in the list is represented by happy, nice, difficult and easy;

while in AmE it is similar, possible, common and simple.

It is interesting that quite is much more used in BrE than in AmE when considering

the size of both corpora (the COCA is almost four times bigger than the BNC). We can look

for example at the adjectives clear and good: these two adjectives occupy comparatively the

same position in both columns, the number of results is comparatively the same as well,

however when we take into consideration the size of both corpora we must say that quite in

BrE intensifies the adjectives (not only clear and good) more often than in AmE, e.g. good

in AmE combined with quite in 525 examples while in BrE good was intensified in 596

solutions).

34

3.3.3 RATHER and FAIRLY in BrE and AmE

The intensifiers rather and fairly are both downtoners and have approximately the

same meaning.

Méndez-Naya explored the development of these expressions. Rather “originally

indicating rapidity of an action or movement (‘quickly, immediately, at once’) developed

when inflected for the comparative, a contrastive/ preferential reading (‘I would rather do X

than Y’). The temporal use of rather declined in Middle English after the loss of the (positive

form rathe, and the new, preferential sense became more salient. In the frequent expressions

rather (…) than and the rather the contrastive use is likely to be weakened, thus paving the

waz for the emergence of the degree function. Politeness is suggested as the possible trigger

of the development from contrastive to moderator use, which takes place in the Modern

English period, and may also have played a role in the selection of originally positive items

as moderators. (…) It is only in the eighteen century that the moderator use becomes

common, and rather comes to be frequently found in connection with adjectives and adverbs,

thus becoming a modifier. (…) By the nineteenth century the English set of major moderators

is complete, but competition with the other members of the paradigm, notably with fairly,

seems to have pushed rather back to the earlier contrastive use, which nowadays is the

prevalent function of the adverb” (Mendéz-Aya 2008: 214).

RATHERBritish English American English

different 481 large 253difficult 112 different 223good 96 small 180nice 90 difficult 120 small 82 like 109similar 76 unusual 109large 71 limited 93odd 71 simple 93 strange 71 high 82special 67 good 80Table 6: Distribution of rather in BrE and AmE

35

FAIRLYBritish English American English

easy 115 good 324 simply 101 easy 316high 98 common 261large 96 large 260clear 92 high 233obvious 91 simple 225good 83 new 188small 83 small 180common 77 certain 178 straightforward 76 typical 148Table 7: Distribution of fairly in BrE and AmE

Concerning the distribution of rather in BrE and AmE, rather is more used in BrE. In

BrE it combines the most frequently with different (481 solutions) while in AmE it occupies

the second place in the list. Rather in AmE intensifies most often the adjective large (only

253 examples when considering the size of COCA), however large in BrE is only the 7th most

often intensified adjective. Other interesting facts concern the distribution of good which

occupies in BrE the 3rd place but in AmE only 10th place. The adjective difficult occupies

quite the same position in both varieties of English. Another difference is the usage of other

adjective with rather in both varieties: BrE rather intensifies nice, similar, odd, strange,

special; and AmE rather modifies adjectives like10, unusual, limited, simple and high.

Concerning the intensification by fairly in BrE and AmE, when we consider the size

of the corpora we can say that fairly has a similar frequency in both varieties. The distribution

of adjectives is nevertheless different. The most frequent intensified adjective in BrE is easy;

in AmE fairly modifies the most frequently the adjective good that is not represented in BrE

so often. Another interesting fact is that fairly in BrE modifies the adverb simply despite

assigning the part of speech of the modified element as an adjective; therefore, there is a

mistake in the annotation of this word. The adjectives which are represented in top 10 of BrE

but they are not covered in AmE are: clear, obvious, straightforward; AmE adjectives not

represented in BrE are: new, certain and typical.

In BrE the intensifier rather is more often used than fairly, while in AmE it is fairly

that is more widely combined with adjectives. Rather is said to be used more with negative

10 Despite the fact I defined the modified item as an adjective I found the word like as one of the adjectives the most often modified by rather. Therefore, in the COCA there is a mistake in the assigning of the part of speech of some words.

36

adjectives while fairly is more likely to occur with positive adjectives. As Quirk says “ fairly

is typically used to modify an adjective or an adverb which denotes a desirable quality. If we

feel comfortable in a warm room, we can intensify the adjective saying It’s fairly warm.

[‘warm enough’], whereas rather warm implies that the room is warmer than we desire (‘too

warm’). We would usually say fairly clean but rather dirty to denote, respectively, a

desirable and an undesirable quality” (Quirk 1985: 446). This rule is completely confirmed in

the case of fairly in both varieties. However, rather modifies in both varieties negative items

as well as negative ones (e.g. rather good, rather nice).

3.3.4 ALMOST and NEARLY in BrE and AmE

The downtoners almost and nearly are synonyms since the Oxford Advanced Leaner’s

Dictionary defines both of them as “not quite, not complete” (see Oxford 2005: 41 and 1017).

As such they should modify the same set of adjectives. However, this is not the case.

ALMOSTBritish English American English

impossible 490 impossible 1493certain 308 certain 594identical 185 identical 461complete 145 daily 327total 126 empty 241 inevitable 90 ready 232universal 83 complete 219empty 72 invisible 199black 65 total 199invisible 58 inevitable 174 Table 8: Distribution of almost in BrE and AmE

37

NEARLYBritish English American English

complete 34 impossible 806ready 31 identical 406full 30 empty 305 new 29 invisible 178 impossible 27 perfect 165empty 26 full 155dark 23 universal 135equal 17 equal 131identical 16 complete 121dead 15 blind 80Table 9: Distribution of nearly BrE and AmE

Tables 8 and 9 show that while almost, as a pre-modifier of adjectives, has a similar

distribution in BrE and AmE, nearly is in this syntactic function much less frequent in BrE.11

Another interesting fact is that almost is combined with nearly the same adjectives

and also their frequency is the same in BrE and AmE (especially the adjectives impossible,

certain and identical), while nearly modifies different adjectives in BrE and different ones in

AmE.

11 Concerning the modification of verbs by almost and nearly, the results were not precise because despite the fact I defined the modified item as a verb it gave me examples where the word stands not only as a verb, but also as a preposition or an adjective. The results must be examined in detail to exclude the examples that we do not need.

The adverb almost modifies verbs more often in AmE (especially verbs like [425], double [149], feel [126], become [74], seem [50]), in BrE almost modifies verbs double [18], become [13], feel [12], complete [11], cost [8].

The adverb nearly occurs with verbs more often in AmE than in BrE as well. We have to face the same problem: excluding same examples where the modified item is not only the verb. Nearly in AmE modifies verbs double [178], cost [57], triple [53], complete [50], beat [12]. In BrE the verbs the most often intensified by nearly are double [10], cost [9], put [6], quit [5] and let [5].

38

3.3.5 TERRIBLY, AWFULLY and PRETTY in BrE and AmE

Tables 10, 11 and 12 present the distribution of the boosters terribly, awfully and

pretty, that is expressions which started as lexical words, as adjectives terrible, awful and

pretty. The adverbs created from these adjectives later on replaced the intensifier very. “In

view of the very understandable tendency of such intensifying words to become dulled, it is

not surprising that we should cast about for other words to replace them when we really want

to be emphatic. ‘It’s been a very pleasant evening’ seems quite inadequate under certain

circumstances, and we may instead say, ‘It’s been awfully pleasant evening’; ‘very nice’ may

likewise become ‘terribly nice.’” (Algeo 2005: 238).

TERRIBLYBritish English American English

sorry 29 good 356important 54 important 256difficult 27 sorry 152wrong 21 difficult 79good 19 sad 52hard 19 concerned 51afraid 13 disappointed 49sad 13 good 43nice 10 hard 43excited 9 unfair 36Table 10: Distribution of terribly in BrE and AmE.

AWFULLYBritish English American English

sorry 29 good 156good 26 hard 113long 15 nice 94nice 11 long 77big 8 big 56difficult 7 tough 45jolly 7 quiet 33hard 6 sorry 32tired 6 glad 27glad 5 young 25Table 11: Distribution of awfully in BrE and AmE.

Terribly has a similar distribution as awfully in BrE; whereas in AmE terribly is more

than twice as frequent as awfully. Terribly is more likely to intensify negative adjectives,

39

however, Table 10 shows that it can also pre-modify some positive items (e.g. good, nice,

interesting, interested, easy). The intensifier awfully tends to modify positive adjectives but

there are also some negative items (e.g. difficult, hard, tired, upset).

It is interesting that BrE expresses more politeness; the adjective intensified more

often by terribly and awfully is the adjective sorry (awfully sorry in the COCA [385 million

words] is only in 32 examples while in the BNC [100 million words] there are 29 examples),

while in AmE it is the adjective good.

The last intensifier I will be commenting on is pretty. When I was searching pretty in

the British Component of the International Corpus of English,12 it turned out that pretty was

used as an adjective only in 19 examples, whereas it occurred as an intensifier in 112

examples. In other words, its adverbial usage is almost six times more frequent than its

adjectival use.

Quirk says about pretty as an intensifier that it is stronger than rather and fairly and

that it can be used with both favourable and infavourable import: pretty clean/ pretty dirty

(see Quirk 1985: 446). Table 12 summarizes the usage of pretty in BrE and AmE.

PRETTYBritish English American English

good 485 good 6930sure 161 sure 1057little 118 bad 694bad 54 clear 651obvious 54 big 524well 51 tough 440young 46 close 430 certain 44 cool 412big 41 hard 406clear 40 strong 356Table 12: Distribution of pretty in BrE and AmE.

The first two adjectives good and sure create quite strong collations in both varieties

of English. The adjectives bad, clear and big which are often modified by pretty in AmE are

less often intensified in BrE. The rest of the adjectives is different. Thus, BrE intensifies

12 ICE-GB was compiled in 1990-1993. It is a corpus of a million words, 60% spoken language, 40% written English.

40

more frequently the adjectives little, obvious, young, certain and the adverb well13, whereas

AmE prefers intensifying the adjectives tough, close, cool, hard and strong.

13 Despite assigning of the part of speech of the modified item as an adjective, the BYU engine included in the results also the adverb well.

41

4 CONCLUSIONS

This thesis is concerned with distribution of adverbial intensifiers and their co-

occurrence with adjectives. Its aim is to find out which adjectives are modified by words of

degree most frequently and what collocations they create in the BNC and the COCA.

In order to study the distribution of intensifiers, I first consulted what linguistic

literature has to say about intensifiers and their characteristics. Then I used SARA, a program

enabling retrieving data from the BNC, to conduct research on individual intensifiers. I had to

pay attention to counting a number of solutions since the BNC did not avoid mistakes in

annotation of some words.

Chapter 1 summarizes general properties of intensifiers. The intensifier is a “word like

very that strengthens the meaning of the word it accompanies” (Algeo&Pyles 2005: 321).

They are utilized as vehicles for expressing persuading, praising, insulting, impressing and

“generally influencing the listener‘s perception of the message” (Ito 2003: 258). Quite often,

they are originally lexical words that underwent the process of grammaticalization, that is

they lost their independent lexical meaning. Then I described intensifiers and their

distribution as influenced by factors such as sex, social class, education or geographical

location.

The end of chapter 1 and the whole chapter 2 describe Quirk’s division of intensifiers,

their meaning, their distribution and basic grammatical rules. He divides intensifiers into:

1. AMPLIFIERS - scaling upwards from an assumed norm (maximizers, boosters)

2. DOWNTONERS – scaling downwards from an assumed norm (approximators,

compromisers, diminishers, minimizers)

3. EMPHASIZERS – when modifying a gradable item they approximate to

intensifiers

The third part of my thesis describes the distribution of intensifiers in the BNC with

three groups of adjectives - polar adjectives in basic vocabulary, adjectives describing people

as to their appearance and character, and adjectives of size. Then it analyzes how certain

selected intensifiers are used in British and American English.

My research revealed that the most frequent amplifiers in the BNC are very and quite,

followed by so and too. Among the downtoners, it is rather which intensifies adjectives most

often, followed by its synonym fairly. The most often used emphasizer was really. My

42

research confirmed that amplifiers are used much more often than downtoners (see Ito 2003).

In comparison with the amplifiers, the downtoners did not often combine with the adjectival

groups that I focused on. A similar situation came with the emphasizers. The reason might be

that downtoners and emphasizers tend to occur more with verbs than with adjectives. Quirk’s

chapter on downtoners and emphasizers in general presents predominantly their usage with

verbs.

Concerning the character of the adjectives, the most often intensified adjectives were

polar adjectives in basic vocabulary, followed by adjectives describing people as to their

appearance and character and, eventually, adjectives of size. Only in four cases the number of

results got over one thousand examples, the collocations obtaining such a big number of

solutions were very good (4771 solutions), very small (1557), very nice (1419) and very large

(1353).

Other significant results when the number of solutions got over 500 examples were

collocations with amplifiers: so good, quite good, so bad, quite happy, too happy, very

happy, very young, too small and too big.

The only result above 500 examples in the case of emphasizers was the combination

really good.

There were no results of intensification by downtoners which would reach over 100

solutions. The results were only close to 100 but never over, e.g. fairly large, rather good,

rather nice.

As to the comparison between British and American English it turned out that the

strongest collocations occurred with the intensifier very (very good, very different, very

important, very difficult, very small, very nice). The research proved that very is more likely

to intensify items with positive associations (see Kennedy 2003: 480), and, contrary to

Dušková’s expectations, non-emotional adjectives.

The intensifier quite can have a function of an amplifier or a downtoner, depending on

the context it occurs in. However, even in a concrete sentence it is quite harsh to tell whether

quite is an amplifier, or a downtoner; perhaps intonation could help. In both varieties of

English it often collocates with the adjectives different and sure.

As to the synonyms fairly and rather, they do not show any significant results. Only the

collocation rather different is worth mentioning because its frequency in BrE is higher

than in AmE. Moreover, the results manifest that rather does not occur only with negative

43

items but is more neutral than Quirk claims.14 On the contrary, fairly does modify especially

positive items.

Another pair of synonyms almost and nearly should perhaps modify quite the same

range of adjective, however, the situation is different and they occur with different sets of

adjectives in each variety of English. The strongest collocations were almost impossible and

nearly impossible. Furthermore, I found out that nearly is not so often used in BrE. More

interesting facts could perhaps be discovered if we looked at the modification of verbs by

nearly and almost.

As to the intensifiers terribly and awfully, I found out that terribly tends to modify items

with negative associations more often than awfully. Another interesting fact is that the most

frequent collocate of terribly and awfully in BrE, not in American English, was the adjective

sorry.

The intensifier pretty is in the small corpus ICE-GB used as an adverb more often than

as an adjective. In both varieties of English it collocates most frequently with the adjectives

good and sure.

The distribution of the last three intensifiers is perhaps worth some more linguistic

research as a similar phenomenon can be found also in Czech (e.g. strašně pěkná, hrozně

hodný, pěkně podlé).

Finally, the research on intensifiers in the BNC turned out quite fruitful as it revealed

some interesting findings about the distribution of intensifiers. In my future research I would

like to concentrate on the intensification of adjectives from concrete semantic fields. As my

research revealed that the ‘end-of-scale’ adjectives huge and enormous are modified by

maximizers as well as boosters; and the booster so even occurs with these adjectives most

frequently from all the intensifiers that I investigated in my research, in the future I would

like to focus on the end-of-scale adjectives and subject to analysis Briton’s thesis that end-of-

scale adjectives are modified by maximizers, not by boosters. This will mean considering the

status of end-of-scale adjectives in general.

14Quirk comments on the distribution of fairly and rather in this following note: “Fairly is typically used to modify an adjective or adverb which denotes a desirable quality. If we feel comfortable in a warm room, we can intensify the adjective by saying It’s fairly warm in here [‘warm enough’], whereas rather warm implies that the room is warmer than we desire (‘too warm’)” (Quirk 1985: 446).

44

RESUMÉ

Tato bakalářská práce se zabývá užíváním adverbiálních intenzifikátorů u přídavných

jmen. Účelem této práce je zjistit, která přídavná jména jsou nejčastěji modifikována těmito

příslovci, zda-li existují nějaká ustálená slovní spojení a jaká je celková distribuce

intenzifikátorů u přídavných jmen. Při studiu této problematiky se využívá zejména Britský

národní korpus (the British National Corpus, the BNC) a následně i Korpus současné

americké angličtiny (the Corpus of Contemporary American English, the COCA). Pro určení

základních znaků jak intenzifikátorů obecně, tak i konkrétních intenzifikátorů se využilo

gramatických příruček a učebnic (např. Quirk 1985, Peprník 2006, Dušková 2006, Algeo

2005), dále jsem pak konzultovala různé vědecké práce, které se zabývaly intenzifikátory u

přídavných jmen a sloves, přičemž jsem využívala zejména poznatků o modifikaci

přídavných jmen (např. Ito 2003, Kennedy 2003, Greenbaum 1974, Méndez-Naya 2008).

První kapitola této práce shrnuje obecné vlastnosti intenzifikátorů, jejich užívání

v rámci společnosti a vliv různých podmínek. Intenzifikátor je slovo, které zvýrazňuje

význam slova, jenž modifikuje. Užívá se tehdy, když mluvčí chce hodnotit situaci, chování,

vzhled člověka nebo chce posluchače zaujmout. Intenzifikátor prochází gramatických

procesem nazvaný „delexikalizace,“ nebo též „gramatikalizace.“ V průběhu tohoto procesu

ztrácí intenzifikátor svou původní lexikální povahu a jeho funkce se zredukuje na

gramatickou. K delexikalizaci dochází díky rychlým změnám ve slovní zásobě. Na počátku

mají intenzifikátory velkou schopnost zintenzivňovat význam slova, po nějaké době ale dojde

k opotřebování intenzifikátoru do té míry, že už nemá takový účinek a nakonec má čistě

gramatickou funkci beze stopy lexikálního významu. Díky tomu je potom jeho užití méně

morfologicky, syntakticky a lexikálně omezeno.

Užívání intenzifikátorů je podle lingvistů ovlivněno několika faktory jako např.

společenské postavení, pohlaví, vzdělání, věk mluvčích nebo zeměpisná oblast. Všeobecně

vzato ženy používají intenzifikátory častěji než muži. Ženy mají údajně větší tendence

přehánět, aby zaujaly posluchače, a taky proto aby se co nejpřesněji vyjádřily.

Konec první kapitoly a celá druhá kapitola se týká rozdělení intenzifikátorů podle

Quirka a jejich gramatických vlastností.

45

1) AMPLIFIERS – intenzifikátory, které stupňují směrem nahoru

(boosters, maximizers)

2) DOWNTONERS – intenzifikátory, které snižují míru vlastnosti

adjektiva, sloves (approximators, compromisers,

diminishers, minimizers)

3) EMPHASIZERS – příslovce, která zdůrazňují význam, a pokud

modifikují stupňovatelné adjektivum nebo sloveso,

jehož význam se může stupňovat, potom se

přibližují významově intenzifikátorům

Třetí kapitola této práce se zabývá praktickým užitím intenzifikátorů v BNC a způsob,

jakým modifikují 3 skupiny adjektiv – adjektivní antonyma ze základní anglické slovní

zásoby, adjektiva popisující vzhled a povahu člověka, adjektiva popisující velikost. Kapitola

se potom soustředí na popis rozdílů intenzifikátorů v britské a americké angličtině. Můj

výzkum ukázal, že nejčastěji užívanými intenzifikátory se stala příslovce ze skupiny

amplifiers very, quite, so a too. Z příslovcí ze skupiny downtoners se výrazněji projevila

synonyma rather a fairly. Mezi emphasizers se nejčastěji používalo příslovce really. Tento

výzkum potvrdil, že se amplifiers používají mnohem více než downtoners a emphasizers,

zejména co se týče modifikace adjektiv, což je námětem této práce (viz Ito 2003: 263).

Co se týče vlastností adjektiv, nejčastěji byla zintenzivňována adjektivní antonyma ze

základní slovní zásoby, potom následovala adjektiva popisující vzhled a povahu člověka a

nejméně byla modifikována adjektiva popisující velikost. Tabulky nám ukázaly, že byly jen 4

výsledky, které dosáhly hodnoty větší než 1000. Byla to syntagmata very good (4471), very

small (1557), very nice (1419) a very large (1353).

Spojení adverbia s adjektivem, jejichž hodnoty se dostaly nad 500, byla hlavně slovní

spojení s amplifiers: so good, quite good, so bad, quite happy, too happy, very happy, very

young, too small a too big. Jediným případem, kdy emphasizer dosáhl výsledku nad 500, bylo

spojení really good. Oproti tomu hodnoty downtoners a adjektiv byly velmi nízké a ani ty

nejvyšší hodnoty nepřekročily hodnotu 100, např. fairly large, rather good, rather nice.

Porovnávání britské a americké angličtiny nám jen potvrdilo, že nejstabilnější kolokace

přídavných jmen se tvoří s intenzifikátorem very (very good, very different, very important,

very difficult, very small, very nice). Výzkum prokázal, very má tendenci zintenzivňovat

pozitivní adjektiva (viz. Kennedy 2003: 480) a také dokázal, že se very pojí nejčastěji s

přídavnými jmény, které nevyjadřují emoce a duševní stavy.

46

Intenzifikátor quite může mít funkci amplifier, nebo downtoner. Velice záleží na

kontextu, v němž se quite vyskytuje. Jak v britské, tak v americké angličtině se quite

nejčastěji pojí s přídavnými jmény different a sure.

Synonyma fairly a rather nevykazují žádné význačné hodnoty. Za povšimnutí stojí jen

slovní spojení rather different, jelikož jeho frekvence v britské angličtině je vyšší, zejména

když vezmeme v potaz velikost obou korpusů. Navíc se ukázalo, že rather je neutrálnější,

zatímco Quirk říká, že rather častěji modifikuje adjektiva s negativními asociacemi. Naproti

tomu se prokázalo, že fairly skutečně modifikuje hlavně pozitivní adjektiva.

U dalších synonym almost a nearly by se dalo očekávat, že budou modifikovat jak v

britské, tak americké angličtině zhruba stejná přídavná jména. Avšak není tomu tak.

Nejstabilnější kolokace almost a nearly jsou s přídavným jménem impossible. Navíc se

ukázalo, že se nearly nepoužívá v britské angličtině tak hojně, jako je tomu v americké

angličtině.

Intenzifikátory terribly a awfully jsou zajímavé tím, že se v britské angličtině nejčastěji

pojí s adjektivem sorry, zatímco v americké angličtině se pojí nejčastěji s good. Další

zajímavou skutečností je to, že terribly mnohem častěji modifikuje záporná adjektiva než

awfully.

Poslední intenzifikátor pretty modifikuje v britské i americké angličtině nejčastěji

přídavná jména good a sure. Zajímavostí je, že když pretty zadáme do malého korpusu ICE-

GB jako příslovce, ukáže se nám více příkladů, než když zadáme pretty jako adjektivum.

Do budoucna by možná bylo vhodné se zabývat porovnáním intenzifikátorů terribly,

awfully a pretty v Britském a Českém národním korpusu (např. awfully pretty v porovnání

s hrozně hezká).

Tato práce ukazuje, které intenzifikátory jsou nejčastěji použity a jaká přídavná jména

modifikují. Tento výzkum by mohl mít význam v praxi pro studenty angličtiny a také pro

budoucí výzkumy týkající se intenzifikátorů. V budoucnu bych se ráda zaměřila na

intenzifikaci přídavných jmen v rámci určitých lexikálních polí. Jelikož jsem zjistila díky

vlastnímu průzkumu, že takzvaná end-of-scale adjectives, která vyjadřují nejvyšší možnou

míru vlastnosti, aniž by byla stupňována, jsou častěji modifikována příslovci boosters než

maximizers, i když by tomu mělo být podle lingvistů, jako je Briton, naopak. To by

znamenalo, že bych se soustředila i na obecnou charakteristiku těchto přídavných jmen.

Tímto způsobem bych ráda hledala další velmi silné kolokace, a ne jen nejčastější

kolokace typu very good, které byly též předmětem této práce.

47

ANNOTATION

Autor: Petra Janušová

Faculty: Faculty of Arts

Department: Department of English and American Studies

Title of the Bachelor Thesis: Intensifiers in English – Case Study

Consultant: Mgr. Michaela Martinková, PhD.

Number of Characters:15 71 939

Key words: adverbial intensifier, adjective, pre-modification, the British National Corpus,

the Corpus of Contemporary American English

Annotation: This thesis is concerned with general characteristics of adverbial intensifiers and

the distribution of adverbs intensifying adjectives. The work is based on linguistics

textbooks, scientific works by different linguists and on the research in the British National

Corpus and on the comparison of the usage of intensifiers in British and American English.

The research will reveal the most frequent usage of intensifiers and their typical distribution

with adjectives, which could be relevant for learners of English and for the future research on

intensifiers.

Klíčová slova: adverbiální intenzifikátor, přídavné jméno, pre-modifikace, Britský národní

korpus, Americký korpus současné angličtiny

Anotace: Tato práce se zabývá obecnou charakteristikou adverbiálních intenzifikátorů a

jejich použitím s přídavnými jmény. Práce je podložena jazykovědnými příručkami a

vědeckými pracemi jiných jazykovědců a je založena zejména na výzkumu v Britském

národním korpusu a též na porovnání intenzifikátorů v britské a americké angličtině. Tento

výzkum ukáže, které intenzifikátory jsou nejčastěji použity a jaká přídavná jména modifikují.

Tento výzkum by mohl mít význam v praxi pro studenty angličtiny a taky pro budoucí

výzkumy týkající se intenzifikátorů.

15 No spaces and tables are included in the number of characters.

48

REFERENCES

Algeo, J., Pyles, T., Wadsworth, T. The Origins and Development of the English Language. Heinle, 2005.

Briton, L. J. The Structure of Modern English: a linguistic introduction. Amsterdam:John Benjamin Publishing Company, 2000.

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Scholarly Journals:

Anderson, W. “‘Absolutely, totally, filled to the brim with the Famous Grouse’: Intensifying Adverbs in the Scottish Corpus of Texts and Speech.” English Today 22.3 (2006): 10-16.

Colm, A. O´Muircheartaigh. George. D. Gaskell, Daniel B. Wright. “Intensifiers in Behavioral frequency Question.” The Public Opinion Quarterly 57.4 (1993): 552-565. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 19 Feb. 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

Evans, Nicholas. “Context, Culture, and Structuration in the Languages of Australia.” Annual Review of Anthropology 32 (2003) 13-40. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 11 Feb. 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

Greenbaum, Sidney. “Some Verb-Intensifier Collocations in American and British English.” American Speech 49 (1974) 79-89. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 19 Feb. 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

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Ito, R. Tagliamonte S. “Well weird, right dodgy, very strange, really cool: Layering and recycling in English intensifiers.” Language in Society 32 (2003): 257-279. [19 Feb. 2009 <http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/4685>.]

Kennedy, Graeme. “Amplifier Collocations in the British National Corpus: Implications for English Language Teaching.” TESOL Quarterly 37.3 (2003): 467-487. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 19 Feb. 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

König, E. Sigmund, P.“The development of complex reflexives and intensifiers in English.” Diachronica 17.1 (2000): 39-84.

Kuha, Mai. “Investigating the Spread of ‘so’ as an Intensifier: Social and Structural Factors.” Texas Lingustic Forum 48 (2004) 217-227.

Malmstrom, Jean. “Current English: KIND OF and Its Congeners.” The English Journal 49.7 (1960) 480-499. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 16 March 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

McEdwards, Mary G. “Women´s Language: A Positive View.” The English Journal 74.3 (1985) 40-43. [JSTOR. Knihovna Univerzity Palackého, Olomouc, CZ. 16 March 2009 <http://www.jstor.org>.]

Méndez-Naya, Belén. “Special issue on English intensifiers.” English Language and Linguistics 12.2 (2008): 213-219.

Parlington, Alan. “Corpus evidence of language change: The case of intensifiers.” Text and technology: In honour of John Sinclair (1993): 177-192.

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