This title acts as a one-volume resource, providing an introduction to every aspect of corpus linguistics as it is being used at the moment. Corpus linguistics uses large electronic databases of language to examine hypotheses about language use. These can be tested scientifically with computerised analytical tools, without the researcher's preconceptions influencing their conclusions. For this reason, corpus linguistics is a popular and expanding area of study. "Contemporary Corpus Linguistics" presents a comprehensive survey of the ways in which corpus linguistics is being used by researchers. Written by internationally renowned linguists, this volume of seventeen introductory chapters aims to provide a snapshot of the field of corpus linguistics. The contributors present accessible, yet detailed, analyses of recent methods and theory in Corpus Linguistics, ways of analysing corpora, and recent applications in translation, stylistics, discourse analysis and language teaching. The book represents the best of current practice in Corpus Linguistics, and as a one volume reference will be invaluable to students and researchers looking for an overview of the field.

This readable introductory textbook presents a concise survey of corpus linguistics. The first section of the book introduces the key concepts in corpus linguistics and provides a brief history of the discipline. The second section expands the study of language and shows how corpus linguistics can advance our study of words and meaning, the benefits of studying the corpora, and how meaning can best be conceptualised. Explaining corpus linguistics in easy to understand terms, and including a glossary and suggestions for further reading, this book will be useful to students trying to get a grasp on this subject.

This is a monograph examining English as it is spoken by the Xhosa people in South Africa. English is a global language which has spread historically through imperialism and more recently through communication networks throughout the world. In each location in which English is spoken it absorbs some of the idiosyncracies of the language native to that region, and one of the most fascinating areas of research for World Englishes is the African context. This research monograph examines English as it is spoken by the Xhosa people in South Africa, and is based primarily on an extensive spoken corpus of Xhosa English. Vivian de Klerk presents a detailed and comprehensive analysis of the historical development of this variety of English, and of English in South Africa more generally. The book outlines how the corpus of spoken Xhosa English was designed and compiled, and discusses the criteria relating to informants, the use of spoken rather than written data, and the codes and transcription conventions. The syntactic and pragmatic features of Xhosa English as demonstrated by the corpus are described in detail, and two chapters focus on the use of the discourse markers 'actually' and 'well'. The second section of this book examines the implications of the corpus findings. Vivian de Klerk looks at the implications of the use of this variety of English in educational, legal, social, cultural and everyday contexts. The final chapter of the book speculates as to the future of this fascinating variety of English in a globalised world. This cutting-edge study will be of interest to researchers in world Englishes, language variation and corpus linguistics. "The Corpus and Discourse" series consists of two strands. The first, Research in Corpus and Discourse, features innovative contributions to various aspects of corpus linguistics and a wide range of applications, from language technology via the teaching of a second language to a history of mentalities. The second strand, Studies in Corpus and Discourse, is comprised of key texts bridging the gap between social studies and linguistics. Although equally academically rigorous, this strand will be aimed at a wider audience of academics and postgraduate students working in both disciplines.

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a host of critical reflections about discourse practises dealing with public health issues. Situating crisis communication at the centre of societal and political debates about responses to the pandemic, this volume analyses the discursive strategies used in a variety of settings. Exploring how crisis discourse has become a part of managing the public health crisis itself, this book focuses on the communicative tasks and challenges for both speakers and their public audiences in seven areas: - establishment of discursive and political authority - official governmental and expert communication to the public - public understanding of government communication - legitimation of public health management as a 'war' - judging and blaming a collective other - cross-national comparison and rivalry - empathy and encouragement Covering global discourses from Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North and South America, and New Zealand, chapters use corpus-based data to cast light on these issues from a variety of languages. With crisis discourse already the object of fierce national and international debates about the appropriateness of specific communicative styles, information management and 'verbal hygiene', Pandemic and Crisis Discourse offers an authoritative intervention from language experts.

A novel view of the syntax-semantics interface that analyzes the behavior of indefinite objects. In Indefinite Objects, Luis Lopez presents a novel approach to the syntax-semantics interface using indefinite noun phrases as a database. Traditional approaches map structural configurations to semantic interpretations directly; Lopez links configuration to a mode of semantic composition, with the latter yielding the interpretation. The polyvalent behavior of indefinites has long been explored by linguists who have been interested in their syntax, semantics, and case morphology, and Lopez's contribution can be seen as a synthesis of findings from several traditions. He argues, first, that scrambled indefinite objects are composed by means of Function Application preceded by Choice Function while objects in situ are composed by means of Restrict. This difference yields the different interpretive possibilities of indefinite objects. Lopez's more nuanced approach to the syntax-semantics interface turns out to be rich in empirical consequences. Second, he proposes that short scrambling also yields Differential Marking, provided that context conditions are fulfilled, while in situ objects remain unmarked. Thus, Lopez contributes to the extensive literature on Differential Object Marking by showing that syntactic configuration is a crucial factor. Lopez substantiates this approach with data from Spanish, Hindi-Urdu, Persian (Farsi), Kiswahili, Romanian, and German.

This book provides an up-to-date snapshot of recent research and developments in the use of corpora for language learning and teaching. It is divided into three parts. Part I focusses on innovative uses of corpora by language teachers and learners. These cover the world's first corpus-based TV program for the teaching of English conversation, as well as corpus-based approaches to the teaching of EAP, cultural studies and translation. Part II focuses on new corpus-based tools for LSP learning. Part III illustrates research findings from corpora consisting of language learner data and discusses their implications for language teaching and learning. It will appeal to scholars in both language teaching and learning and corpus and computational linguistics.

In a world in which advanced communication technologies have made the reporting of disasters and conflicts (also in the form of breaking news) a familiar and 'normalised' activity, the information we present here about television news reporting of the 2003 war in Iraq has implications that go beyond this particular conflict. Evaluation and Stance in War News functions as a tool kit for the critical evaluation of language in the news, both as raw data in need of interpretation and as carefully packaged products of 'information management' in need of 'unpacking'. The chapters offer an array of theoretical and empirical instruments for revealing, identifying, sifting, weighing and connecting patterns of language use that construct messages. These messages carry with them world views and value systems that can either create an ever wider divide or serve to build bridges between peoples and countries.

This volume showcases original, agenda-setting studies in the field of learner corpus research of both spoken and written production. The studies have important applications for classroom pedagogy. The volume brings readers up-to-date with new written and spoken learner corpora, often looking at previously under-examined variables in learner corpus investigations. It also demonstrates innovative applications of learner corpus findings, addressing issues such as the effect of task, the effect of learner variables and the nature of learner language. The volume is of significant interest to researchers working in corpus linguistics, learner corpus research, second language acquisition and English for Academic and Specific Purposes, as well to practitioners interested in the application of the findings in language teaching and assessment.

Language and Computers introduces students to the fundamentals of how computers are used to represent, process, and organize textual and spoken information. Concepts are grounded in real-world examples familiar to students experiences of using language and computers in everyday life. * A real-world introduction to the fundamentals of how computers process language, written specifically for the undergraduate audience, introducing key concepts from computational linguistics. * Offers a comprehensive explanation of the problems computers face in handling natural language * Covers a broad spectrum of language-related applications and issues, including major computer applications involving natural language and the social and ethical implications of these new developments * The book focuses on real-world examples with which students can identify, using these to explore the technology and how it works * Features under-the-hood sections that give greater detail on selected advanced topics, rendering the book appropriate for more advanced courses, or for independent study by the motivated reader.

This title acts as a one-volume resource, providing an introduction to every aspect of corpus linguistics as it is being used at the moment. Corpus linguistics uses large electronic databases of language to examine hypotheses about language use. These can be tested scientifically with computerised analytical tools, without the researcher's preconceptions influencing their conclusions. For this reason, corpus linguistics is a popular and expanding area of study. "Contemporary Corpus Linguistics" presents a comprehensive survey of the ways in which corpus linguistics is being used by researchers. Written by internationally renowned linguists, this volume of seventeen introductory chapters aims to provide a snapshot of the field of corpus linguistics. The contributors present accessible, yet detailed, analyses of recent methods and theory in Corpus Linguistics, ways of analysing corpora, and recent applications in translation, stylistics, discourse analysis and language teaching. The book represents the best of current practice in Corpus Linguistics, and as a one volume reference will be invaluable to students and researchers looking for an overview of the field.

Although there are a large number of grammar books that explain the form and meaning of the English modal auxiliaries, there are few resources that provide examples as to what modals could be used, and in which cases, when referring to successive clauses. Modal auxiliaries are among the most difficult structures to teach to students of English as a second or foreign language. Some combinations of modals are more commonly used than others, and pairs of modals are used to express a specific meaning. It is not well known, however, exactly which combinations of modals are more popular. Therefore, a method to extract modal auxiliaries in two consecutive clauses from the British National Corpus 2007 XML edition was developed and is discussed in this book.Pair modal frequencies were not well known since simple string match methods could not be used with embedded sentences, complex sentences and compound sentences. This problem was solved by defining rules of sentence structures to identify important clauses carrying the main ideas of sentences, extracting only the important clauses and calculating t-scores. A system was implemented by using computational linguistic techniques for extracting, parsing, and simplifying sentences for learners to study the use of modal auxiliaries. Which collocational expressions are more common? What is the appropriateness of the results? Learners and educators can make use of these results to gain a better understanding of modal auxiliaries, and to facilitate the process of teaching and learning English.