Making "fetch" happen: The influence of social and linguistic context on nonstandard word growth and decline

In an online community, new words come and go: today's "haha" may be replaced by tomorrow's "lol." Changes in online writing are usually studied as a social process, with innovations diffusing through a network of individuals in a speech community. But unlike other types of innovation, language change is shaped and constrained by the system in which it takes part. To investigate the links between social and structural factors in language change, we undertake a large-scale analysis of nonstandard word growth in the online community Reddit. We find that dissemination across many linguistic contexts is a sign of growth: words that appear in more linguistic contexts grow faster and survive longer. We also find that social dissemination likely plays a less important role in explaining word growth and decline than previously hypothesized

Re-imagining French lexicography: The dictionnaire vivant de la langue française

The Dictionnaire vivant de la langue française (DVLF), developed by The ARTFL Project at the University of Chicago, represents an experimental, interactive, and community-based approach to French lexicography. The DVLF enables broad public access to a wide variety of linguistic tools and resources, with the goal of changing user interaction with dictionaries and providing better descriptions of emergent word use. In this article we describe the history of the DVLF and provide a survey of similar community-oriented electronic dictionaries. We then proceed to a presentation of the dictionary’s many features, including the variety of its definitions and mechanisms for user interaction. The article concludes with a discussion of ARTFL’s plans for the future developement of the DVLF

Anak Jakarta; A Sketch Of Indonesian Youth Identity

Anak Jakarta refers to the youth of Jakarta, the trend-setters of the Indonesian youth. This paper gives a sketch of the youth in Jakarta as characterized by their appearance, language and lifestyle. Information is derived from discussions and personal contact with different groups of youth and parents (adults with children) in Jakarta; literature review, observations, as well as from flashbacks given by the adults, providing a portrait of anak Jakarta since late 1980's. The youth in Jakarta is Western (American) oriented, copying from the mass- and social media, often times conflicting with local norms and parental advices. Anak Jakarta profile includes: youth created slang language, school gang fights (tawuran) and brand minded consumerism. Jakarta youth has become the role model for most youth all over Indonesia, especially Jakarta migrant youth. Family upbringing, social contact, peer group and the media play a crucial role in forming, transforming and disseminating the characteristics anak Jakarta identity

Eurolanguages-2011: Innovations and Development

Збірник наукових студентських робіт призначено для широкого кола читачів, які цікавляться проблемами вивчення іноземних мов та перекладу в Україн