TRADE

a) Keyness

The lemma ‘trade’ was the eighty-fourth most significant key word in the BEC corpus.

N	Word	bec freq.	bec.lst %	bnc freq.	bnc.lst %	Keyness	P
84	TRADE	696	0.07	509	0.03	276.3	0.000000

b) Semantic Prosody

Left: Three groups identified.

semantic prosody	frequency/ 424 & %	example
macro-level demarcation	67 - 15.8%	international trade divisional trade overseas trade world trade
places	34 - 8.01%	China trade Indonesian trade
type/line of business	35 - 8.25%	fire trade motor trade retail trade

Right: Two groups, plus one small one identified.

semantic prosody	frequency/ 424 & %	example
institutions	78 - 18.39%	Department of Trade and Industry trade unions trade associations
people/groups of people	40 - 9.43%	trade apprentice trade manager trade executive
trouble - (barriers to trade)	19 - 4.48%	trade deficit trade dispute trade sanctions

c) Three-word clusters

N	cluster	Freq.
1	overseas trade services	14
2	international trade department	12
3	department of trade	10
4	personname international trade	10
5	the motor trade	10
6	the world trade	10
7	the department of	9
8	trade and industry	9
9	of trade and	8
10	international trade executive	7
11	the international trade	7
12	world trade organisation	7
13	accredited chamber chief	6
14	in the motor	5
15	international trade and	5
16	the overseas trade	5
17	and the trade	4
18	chamber chief executive	4
19	commerce industry	4
20	executive accredited chamber	4
21	industry international trade	4
22	may be required	4
23	of commerce	4
24	references may be	4
25	the trade missions	4
26	trade executive accredited	4
27	trade missions and	4
28	trade references may	4
29	yours sincerely personname	4

d) Macro-generic distribution

e) Colligation

Trade is overwhelmingly used as a noun rather than as a verb:

Verb: 15 instances - 3.53% of sample, (including phrasal verb trade off: 1 instance 0.23% of sample)

Noun: 409 instances - 96.46% of sample

COBUILD Sense 1 (the activity of buying or selling)

373 instances - 87.97% of sample

Patterns: Uncount noun: usually with support

the common shares available for trade

COBUILD Sense 2 (Trade as a verb):

14 instances - 3.3% of sample

Patterns: Verb

continuing to trade successfully with Chile, the need to be able to trade in London

COBUILD Sense 3 (a particular area of business/industry)

35 instances - 8.25% of sample

Patterns: Count noun: usually with a support noun

the book trade, the Fire Protection Trade

COBUILD Sense 4 (the work someone does, i.e. their trade)

2 instances - 0.47% of sample

Patterns: Count noun

working at home alongside their parents learning a trade

I served my time as trade apprentice

Other patterns:

i) noun + of + trade (+ noun)

25 instances - 5.89% of sample

Department of Trade, Board of Trade, Conditions of Trade

f) Associates

The word ‘trade’ was key in 16 files. The only associate of frequency > =5 was ‘trade’ itself.