Chapter published in:
The Corpus Linguistics Discourse: In honour of Wolfgang Teubert
Edited by Anna Čermáková and Michaela Mahlberg
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 87] 2018
► pp. 77–94

Keywords

Signposts to objectivity?

| Lancaster University
This chapter focuses on describing, illustrating and critiquing the keywords technique, which is used to automatically identify lexical salience when comparing multiple corpora. Arguably, keywords present researchers with words that they may not have chosen to analyse in advance, thus helping to reduce researcher subjectivity. I illustrate how the identification of keywords enables researchers to embark on interesting research journeys, through examples taken from an analysis of the representation of Islam and Muslims in a corpus of British newspaper articles. However, when using large corpora, even with high cut-off points for statistical salience, hundreds of keywords may be produced, meaning that researchers need to make decisions regarding which words are worthy of detailed focus. The chapter ends with an illustrative analysis where I revisit six of my own keyword studies, arguing that researchers should consider the benefits of giving a more reflexive account of their own decision making procedures around keywords.
Published online: 06 December 2018
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.87.04bak
References

References

Baker, P.
2005 Public Discourses of Gay Men. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
2006 Using Corpora to Analyse Discourse. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
2010 Representations of Islam in British broadsheet and tabloid newspapers 1999–2005. Language and Politics 9(2): 310–338.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2012 Acceptable bias? Using corpus linguistics methods with critical discourse analysis. Critical Discourse Studies 9(3): 247–256.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2015 Does Britain need any more foreign doctors? Inter-analyst consistency and corpus-assisted (critical) discourse analysis. In Grammar, Text and Discourse: In Honour of Susan Hunston, M. Charles, N. Groom & S. John (eds), 283–300.Amsterdam:John Benjamins.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Baker, P., Gabrielatos, G. & McEnery, T.
2013 Discourse Analysis and Media Bias: The Representation of Islam in the British Press. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Baker, P. & Love, R.
2015 The hate that dare not speak its name? Journal of Language, Aggression and Conflict 2(2): 57–86.Google Scholar
Baxter, J.
2003 Positioning Gender in Discourse: A Feminist Methodology. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Code, L.
1991 What Can She Know?: Feminist Theory and the Construction of Knowledge. Ithica NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Eichler, M.
1991 Non-sexist Research Methods: A Practical Guide. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Gabrielatos, C. & Baker, P.
2008 Fleeing, sneaking, flooding: A corpus analysis of discursive constructions of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK Press 1996–2005. Journal of English Linguistics 36(1): 5–38.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Gabrielatos, C. & Marchi, A.
2012 Keyness: Appropriate metrics and practical issues. Paper presented at CADS International Conference 2012, 13–14 September, University of Bologna Italy.
Hardie, A.
2014 Statistical identification of keywords, lockwords and collocations as a two step procedure. Paper presented at ICAME 35 Conference 30 April – 4 May, University of Nottingham.
Marchi, A. & Taylor, C.
2009 If on a winter’s night two researchers… A challenge to assumptions of soundness of interpretation. Critical Approaches to Discourse Analysis Across Disciplines 3(1): 1–20.Google Scholar
2013 Experimenting with objectivity in corpus and discourse studies: Expectations about LGBT discourse and a game of mutual falsification and reflexivity. Paper presented at Corpus Linguistics Conference July 23, 2013, Lancaster University.
McEnery, T.
2006 Swearing in English: Bad Language, Purity and Power from 1586 to the Present. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Partington, A., Duguid, A. & Taylor, C.
2013 Patterns and Meanings in Discourse. Theory and Practice in Corpus-assisted Discourse Studies (CADS) [Studies in Corpus Linguistics 55]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Scott, M.
2008 WordSmith Tools, version 5. Liverpool: Lexical Analysis Software.Google Scholar
2009 In search of a bad reference corpus. In What’s in a Word List?, D. Archer (ed.), 79–92. London: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Teubert, W.
2005 My version of corpus linguistics. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 10(1): 1–13.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Toginini-Bonelli, E.
2001 Corpus Linguistics at Work [Studies in Corpus Linguistics 6]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, A. & Thomas, J.
1997 Semantic annotation. In Corpus Annotation: Linguistic Information from Computer Texts, R. Garside, G. Leech & A. McEnery (eds), 55–65. London: Longman.Google Scholar