LOGISTICS, LOGISTICAL, LOGISTIC: DIACHRONIC AND SYNCHRONIC CORPUS ANALYSIS Dr. Violeta Jurkovič Faculty of Maritime Studies and Transport Portorož.

LOGISTICS, LOGISTICAL, LOGISTIC: DIACHRONIC AND SYNCHRONIC CORPUS

ANALYSIS

Dr. Violeta Jurkovič

Faculty of Maritime Studies and Transport

Portorož

Introduction

• The terminal in Verona supports the production of three main operator categories: production activities, forwarding agents and logistic operators.

• In order to alleviate the pressure on the environment, it will be necessary for further logistical plans to include green solutions.

Introduction

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Introduction

A language corpus is …

… a collection of authentic texts (Krek and Arhar, 2010), which is homogeneously encoded and computer readable

(Aston, 1996).

Introduction

Main research question:

•pre-modifying function in nominal phrases in English texts– logistics terminal– logistical terminal– logistic terminal

Methodology

• International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management

• Three volumes • 162 articles

  1994 2004 2013

Articles 56 66 40

Tokens 181,981 226,328 243,041

Types 8,964 10,316 11,042

Methodology

• Keywords …

... appear in the specialized corpus significantly more often (at the level of p=0.000) than in the referential corpus (BNC = British National Corpus)

• Collocates …

... are words that are habitually met with other words with a frequency greater than chance.

Results

QUESTION 1:

Which are the keywords in each of the sub-corpora compared to the BNC?

Results – keywords – 1994

N Key word Freq. %1 LOGISTICS 721 0.402 CUSTOMER 714 0.393 SUPPLIER 508 0.284 SERVICE 776 0.435 DISTRIBUTION 444 0.24

33 LOGISTICAL 79 0.04360 LOGISTICIANS 9

LOGISTIC 0 0

Results – keywords – 2004

N Key word Freq. %

1 SUPPLY 1,586 0.70

2 LOGISTICS 846 0.37

3 CHAIN 1,202 0.53

4 SUPPLIER 562 0.25

5 MANAGEMENT 884 0.39

390 LOGISTIC 22

411 LOGISTICAL 19

LOGISTICIANS 0 0

Results – keywords – 2013

N Key word Freq. %

1 AL 1,231 0.48

2 ET 1,193 0.47

3 SUPPLY 1,176 0.46

4 CHAIN 937 0.37

5 LOGISTICS 619 0.24

301 LOGISTICAL 29 0.01

368 LOGISTIC 28 0.01

LOGISTICIANS 0 0

Results

QUESTION 2:

Does a comparison among the results indicate any variation in the use of ‘logistic’, ‘logistical’, and ‘logistics’ through time?

Results - keywords

Results

QUESTION 3:

•What are the most frequent collocates with ‘logistic’, ‘logistical’, and ‘logistics’ in each volume?

Results – R1 collocates of ‚logistics‘

1994 2004 2013 

IS 36 AND 67 AND 44 

MANAGEMENT 32 MANAGEMENT 52 ALLIANCE 26 

OPERATIONS 31 RESEARCH 51 ACTIVITIES 21 

SERVICE 29 CAPABILITIES 38 SERVICES 21 

SYSTEM 29 DISCIPLINE 35 RESEARCH 18  PERFORMANCE 26 IN 25 SCHOLARS 17

Results – R1 collocates of ‚logistical‘

1994 2004 2013 

SEGMENTATION 14 AND 1 SUPPORT 5 

CHANNELS 5 PACKAGING 1 

COSTS 5 

EXCELLENCE 5 

FUNCTIONS 5 

Results – R1 collocates of ‚logistic‘

1994 2004 2013 

FLOW 4 REGRESSION 12 SUPPORT 8 

FLOW 5 AND 3 

Discussion

Logistics

Logistical

Logistic

Operators

Plans

Activities

System

Discussion

• Logistic/al only adjectives• Logistics – noun or pre-modifier (high frequency)• Versatility of English nouns – language transfer• ‚support‘ links well with all three forms• Share and ranking of ‚logistics‘ decreased• Ranking of ‚supply‘ and ‚chain‘ improved• Research shift?• Corpus analysis to illustrate trends (‚logistics alliance/s‘

in 2013)

Conclusion

• Logistics• Logistical• Logistic