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Article published In:
International Journal of Corpus Linguistics
Vol. 23:2 (2018) ► pp.125–157

Dimensions of variation across Internet registers

| Catholic University of São Paulo

This paper presents a study that sought to identify the dimensions of variation underlying a corpus of Internet texts, using Biber’s (1988) multi-dimensional (MD) analysis framework. The corpus was compiled following the method proposed by Biber (1993), according to which the size of each register subcorpus should be determined based on the linguistic variation across the texts. The corpus was tagged using the Biber Tagger and the features were counted and submitted to a factor analysis, which suggested three factors. The factors were interpreted as three dimensions of variation: involved, interactive discourse versus informational focus; expression of stance: interactional evidentiality; and expression of stance: interactional affect. The amount of register variation captured by the register distinctions on the dimensions ranged from 8.7% to 57.1%. Dimension 1 corroborate the oral/involved versus literate/informational distinction defined in previous MD studies of non-Internet registers, whereas Dimensions 2 and 3 highlight the important role played by stance in social media.

Keywords: multi-dimensional analysis, Internet registers, register variation, online communication, social media
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Previous research on Internet registers in the multi-dimensional framework
  • 3.Corpus design and collection
  • 4.Statistical analysis
  • 5.Dimensions of register variation
    • 5.1Dimension 1: Involved, interactive discourse versus informational focus
    • 5.2Dimension 2: Expression of stance: Interactional evidentiality
    • 5.3Dimension 3: Expression of stance: Interactional affect
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgments
  • References
Published online: 5 October 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ijcl.15026.ber
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