Open Access

Susanne Kabatnik, Anne Klee

• The study examines pandemic-related language change using historical lexicons on cholera. It is based on a cholera corpus generated from the historical archives of the DWDS and DeReKo, which was analysed using Sketch Engine and examined for frequencies, compound words and semantic patterns. Historical dictionaries and secondary literature were also consulted to explore concepts such as the feminisation of the disease. The analysis shows that pandemic language change is particularly visible in thematically focused fields such as infrastructure and medical measures. Frequency data show wave-like patterns, with pandemic compound words following productive patterns. Semantic fields are cyclically reactivated across pandemics. Methodologically, the study combines corpus linguistic methods with cultural studies contextualisation and links the results in Linked Open Data structures, enabling comparative analyses between pandemics. The study demonstrates how historical language data can be integrated into modern digital infrastructures, thus opening new perspectives for diachronic analyses of pandemic vocabulary.