Summary

1. ADJECTIVES IN TOURISMENGLISH ON THE WEB A CORPUS-BASED STUDY
Patrizia Pierini
Abstract
The study aimsto explore the “phraseologyof tourism”,lexical choicesandrecurringpatternsin
discourse withthe toolsof corpuslinguistics.The methodologyconsistsof twostepswhichare frequent
the wordlistof the occurredadjectivesthatproduced thensome of the mostfrequentadjectivesare
analyzed inconcordancestohighlightrelevantfeaturesof accommodationdiscourse,andtodiscover
collocations.Thisstudyproposedtointegrateacorpusapproach intoa discourse perspective inthe
analysisof data,consideringsituational andfunctional factorstoexplainlinguisticchoices
Introduction
Adjectivesplayarelevantrole indiscourse,itusedtodescribe anentity,foregroundingsome property
or characteristics,orto expressanopinion,ajudgmentoran emotional attitude onanentity,havingthe
special powerof condensingevaluationinasingle lexeme.
From a corpus of writtenAcademicEnglishincludingtextsfromtwenty-eightsubjectareas,we observe
that mostadjectivesare formal Latinate words,suchasadequate,discrete,evident,previous, relevant,
similar.
The tourismindustryisa global enterprisethathascapturedthe relevance of the webasa new mass
mediumforcontactingpotential receiversall overthe worldandpromotingtouristproducts bothin
domesticandinternationalmarkets. Tourismdiscourse canundergothat’swhythisstudyaimsto
explore the phraseologyof tourism, lexical choicesandrecurringpatternsdiscourse.Itinvestigatesthe
use of adjectivesbyconsidering the lexico-semantic,grammatical andpragmaticaspects.It integrates a
corpus approachintoa discourse perspective inthe analysisof data,consideringsituational and
functional factorstoexplainlinguisticchoices.
Corpus compilation and methodology
The webis a multi-billionrepositoryof documents,offeringanenormousamountof empirical datafor
linguisticresearchthatare fresh,authenticandrepresentative,since anydomain.Discourse type,
contentarea or textual genre is present.
The webhas 3 differentfunctionswhichare:exploitedasacorpus to interrogate,asa source that makes
available on-linecorpora,oras a source of textsforcorpus compilation.Evenitissmall anduntagged,
corpus isreliable aidwhenworkingwithdomain-specificlanguage.
The 3 advantagesof corpus are;easy,quickand allow compilingspecializedcorporaonspecifictopicsof
a variable size.

2. The methodologyconsistsof twostepswhichare frequentthe wordlistof the occurredadjectivesthat
producedthensome of the mostfrequentadjectivesare analyzed inconcordancestohighlightrelevant
featuresof accommodationdiscourse,andtodiscovercollocations.
Tourism Discourse:Describing and Evaluating Through Adjectives
The promotional-commercial discourseof tourismunderexaminationtakesplace inabusiness-to-
consumercontext.Theircommunicative purpose istopersuade receiverstopurchase the tourist
product,carriedout eitherwithattractive imagesorlinguisticmeans.The intendedaudience isamarket
segmentdefinedbythe product.
A central dimensionof discourse isthe presentationof the touristproductinpropositionsthatare
multifunctional:theydescribethe characteristicof the touristproduct,presentitinpositive terms,and
constructsits identity.
2 basicsstrategiesare adopted:the use of vocabularyoftenemphaticandhighlyevaluate, extollingthe
positive featuresof the product/service offered,the appealtothe receivers’emotiontryingtmotivate
themto action.
A central taskis to explore howviewpointisindicatedthroughthe exploitationof the linguistic
resourcesavailabletothe encoder.Amongthe variousview markers,adjectivesseemtobe basicmeans
by whichthe encoderexpresseshis/herperceptionandevaluationof agivenentity.
In expressingavalue judgmentordescribingperceptions,dynamicadjectivesare susceptible to
subjective measure,thusreflectingthe individual pointof view of the encoder.
A relevantpointfocused onstative anddynamiccategories.
Producing a Wordlist of Adjectives
By examiningthe adjectivesidentified,we observethattheyare commonadjectivesthatcanbe found
ingeneral language,exceptforthe termen-suite.
Exploring the Semantics of Adjectives
The firstcategoriesaccountfor descriptive adjectives,the othersforthe experiental andevaluate
adjectives.Bothcreatingthe categoriesthemselvesandplacingindividual adjectivesinthemare to
some extentsubjectiveprocesses;inparticular,some needtobe explained.
A well-establishedtechniqueinpromotional discourse isthe use of keywords,frequentwordsthat
conveyprimaryinformationandtendtobe short,clearand to the point.

3. Investigate the Grammar of Adjectives
the use of superlatives,confirmedbythe corpus evidence,isthe grammatical meansmore frequently
exploitedtointensifysemanticvalues;inparticular,the bestappearstobe anall-arroundsuperlative,
referringtoanytouristproduct/service
Dealing with Pragmatic Meaning
A wordin a particularenvironmentcantake on extrameaningof emotionalorattitudinal nature,
creatingwhatis knownas‘semanticprosody’thisphenomenonreferstothe spreadingof convocational
coloringbeyondsinglewordboundaries.
In the industryof persuasionaclearunderstandingof semanticprosodiesisof greatassistance.
Discovering Colloations:the Adjectives + Noun Pattern
Adjectives+Nounpatternsof some of the mostfrequentadjectives,theyappeartobe subjectto
collocational restrictions,usuallyactivatingonlyone of theirsenses.
Conclusions
Corpus-basedstudyhasshownhowlexical choicesare relatedtodomain,discourse type,contentof the
message andmedium,andrestcruciallyonthe ideological pointof view of the tourismpersuader.