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Linguistic Variation and Change in 250 Years of English Scientific Writing: A Data-Driven Approach

  • We trace the evolution of Scientific English through the Late Modern period to modern time on the basis of a comprehensive corpus composed of the Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, the first and longest-running English scientific journal established in 1665. Specifically, we explore the linguistic imprints of specialization and diversification in the science domain which accumulate in the formation of “scientific language” and field-specific sublanguages/registers (chemistry, biology etc.). We pursue an exploratory, data-driven approach using state-of-the-art computational language models and combine them with selected information-theoretic measures (entropy, relative entropy) for comparing models along relevant dimensions of variation (time, register). Focusing on selected linguistic variables (lexis, grammar), we show how we deploy computational language models for capturing linguistic variation and change and discuss benefits and limitations.

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Metadaten
Author:Yuri Bizzoni, Stefania Degaetano-Ortlieb, Peter Fankhauser, Elke Teich
URN:urn:nbn:de:bsz:mh39-100889
DOI:https://doi.org/10.3389/frai.2020.00073
ISSN:2624-8212
Parent Title (English):Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence
Publisher:Frontiers Media S.A.
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Year of first Publication:2020
Date of Publication (online):2020/09/16
Publicationstate:Veröffentlichungsversion
Reviewstate:Peer-Review
Tag:computational language models; diachronic variation in language use; evolution of Scientific English; linguistic change; register variation
GND Keyword:Automatische Sprachanalyse; Englisch; Sprachgebrauch; Sprachwandel; Wissenschaftssprache
Volume:3
Issue:73
Page Number:15
DDC classes:400 Sprache / 400 Sprache, Linguistik / 400 Sprache
Open Access?:ja
Leibniz-Classification:Sprache, Linguistik
Linguistics-Classification:Computerlinguistik
Program areas:S2: Forschungskoordination und –infrastrukturen
Licence (German):License LogoCreative Commons - CC BY - Namensnennung 4.0 International