Adverbs of essence 87
the use of basically to contrast what is true ‘deep down’, ‘in essence’ with what is
true on the surface, what is more visible, more obvious.
(3) The analysis consists, in effect, of tracing out the consequences of those beliefs,
in terms of the overall system. As might be expected, this basically simple idea
has some fairly involved theoretical ramifications, but we can ignore these for
present purposes. (BNC, written, non-academic)
Here the contrast between “basically simple” and “fairly involved” is explicitly
recognised and rejected as irrelevant “for present purposes”.
(4) In its Report on Sexual Offences, the Criminal Law Revision Committee con-
cluded that, whilst certain adjustments to it might be desirable, the law of rape
as presently constructed was basically sound. (BNC, written, academic)
In (4) the heteroglossic nature of the assertion is realised in the explicitly conces-
sive clause which voices the objection that might be raised against the evaluation
of the law of rape as being sound. The addition of the modifier basically recog-
nises this objection. The “minor qualifications that might be made” can thus be
expressed in various ways, including concessive clauses. In (5) below they are
presented in a clause introduced by except.
(5) Now suppose Tit for Tat plays against a strategy called Naive Prober. Naive
Prober wasn’t actually entered in Axelrod’s competition, but it is instructive
nevertheless. It is basically identical to Tit for Tat except that, once in a while,
say on a random one in ten moves, it throws in a gratuitous defection and
claims the high Temptation score. (BNC, written, non-academic)
In (6) the focus shifts from backgrounding the minor qualifications to back-
grounding the ‘basic’ quality.
(6) Without departing from the fundamental laws of the selfish gene, we can see
how cooperation and mutual assistance can flourish even in a basically selfish
world. (BNC, written, non-academic)
The selfish nature of the gene is taken for granted as “fundamental” and “basic” but
what is highlighted is the exception, viz. that “cooperation and mutual assistance”
are possible.
All of the above examples were taken from the written data. Butler (2008a,
2008b) points out that basically is relatively more frequent in spoken language,
both as compared with written language and as compared with essentially and
fundamentally. In addition, spoken basically has an overall frequency which far
exceeds those of the other two adverbs (see Butler 2008b, Table 1). In speech