| Kommentar |
Communication in digital spaces has been gaining momentum in everyday life ever since the advent of web 2.0. At the same time, the way that people behave in the online world is attracting the attention of science, including linguistics. This course moves beyond more traditional modes of speech and writing to different digital spaces and the multifarious technological and social affordances that allow users to transmit information, share content, construct identities and manage social relationships. We use an interactive, empirical approach. Besides exploring top platforms and messenger apps, we will also consider what our observations mean for how language can be analysed, and how chat bots, AI communication tools, and the high number of lurkers in online communities, match traditional linguistic insights on communication structure, conversation design and community building. Course participants will train their analytical skills and learn about linguistic tools. We will discuss research ethics and research goals for digital spaces, and how they can inform questions about the nature of language that remain at the heart of linguistics. |
