TY  - JOUR
U1  - Zeitschriftenartikel, wissenschaftlich - begutachtet (reviewed)
A1  - Koplenig, Alexander
T1  - Using the parameters of the Zipf–Mandelbrot law to measure diachronic lexical, syntactical and stylistic changes – a large-scale corpus analysis
JF  - Corpus linguistics and linguistic theory
N2  - Using the Google Ngram Corpora for six different languages (including two varieties of English), a large-scale time series analysis is conducted. It is demonstrated that diachronic changes of the parameters of the Zipf–Mandelbrot law (and the parameter of the Zipf law, all estimated by maximum likelihood) can be used to quantify and visualize important aspects of linguistic change (as represented in the Google Ngram Corpora). The analysis also reveals that there are important cross-linguistic differences. It is argued that the Zipf–Mandelbrot parameters can be used as a first indicator of diachronic linguistic change, but more thorough analyses should make use of the full spectrum of different lexical, syntactical and stylometric measures to fully understand the factors that actually drive those changes.
KW  - Zipf’s law
KW  - Zipf–Mandelbrot law
KW  - power law
KW  - lexical richness
KW  - vocabulary size
KW  - type token ratio
KW  - syntactic complexity
KW  - noun–pronoun ratio
KW  - diachronic corpus linguistics
KW  - time series analysis
KW  - Google Ngram Corpora
Y1  - 2018
UN  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:bsz:mh39-73491
SN  - 1613-7035
SS  - 1613-7035
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2014-0049
DO  - https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2014-0049
N1  - Dieser Beitrag ist mit Zustimmung des Rechteinhabers aufgrund einer (DFG geförderten) Allianz- bzw. Nationallizenz frei zugänglich.

This publication is with permission of the rights owner freely accessible due to an Alliance licence and a national licence (funded by the DFG, German Research Foundation) respectively.
VL  - 14
IS  - 1
SP  - 1
EP  - 34
PB  - de Gruyter
CY  - Berlin [u.a.]
ER  -