(linguistics) A component of a phrase that is non-recursive and not found as a sister of the head of the phrase, but rather as a daughter of the maximal projection of the phrase.
“A clear specification of the issue has been provided to management.”
“It would have been easy to include this requirement as a specification in the statute.”
“The generic wrapper engine transforms user requests into a plan for extracting the relevant data according to the specification.”
specificker
(pejorative) A homoeopathic practitioner who sought to ascertain the aetiologies of diseases, focusing on the symptoms most regularly associated with their diagnosis (to the exclusion of peripheral and occasional symptoms), and who, for their treatment, selected remedies (administered in more-or-less undiluted form) on the basis of their general physiological effects, ignoring incidental and side-effects. [mid- to late-19th c., first attested in 1847 and common in the 1860s.]