Language

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Dual Readership

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Dual Readership refers to the process of constructing a work or text, also called crossover literature, which can play to two different levels of understanding for various audiences. This practice is most commonly employed in children’s literature.

Multimodality

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Multimodality is frequently characterized as either the interaction among semiotic modes or the integration of semiotic modes or resources (Poulsen, 2014). It approaches comprehending communication and representation to be more than about language.

Metaphor

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A metaphor is a trope, or a figure of speech, that directly refers to one thing by mentioning features of another one; an object, or an idea, is viewed as a metaphor which offers people new ways of examining ideas and viewing the world.

Comics

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Comics (generally referring to comic books and comic strips) are a popular form of visual storytelling that combines still images and text.

Overlexicalization

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Overlexicalization refers to the repetitions of words in order to emphasise a certain concept or definition. It is a process where words are used to persuade and accentuate something within discourse. Often, these words are quasi-synonymous - referring to the same thing in a slightly different tone - and give a sense of overcompleteness. Overlexicalization can be recognised when words are placed within a discourse which aims to persuade and cause to believe in something.

Junk News

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Junk news is news that is consumed and goes viral not because it is relevant or appreciated, but because it is addictive (Venturini, 2019).

Intertextuality

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Intertextuality occurs whenever we observe material from one text occur in other texts, explicitly as well as implicitly.

Indexicality

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Meaning that emerges out of text-context relations. Apart from (often) having a denotational meaning, linguistic and other signs are indexical in that they suggest metapragmatic, metalinguistic, metadiscursive features of meaning. Thus, an utterance may indexically invoke social norms, roles, identities.

Frame

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A frame is a set of meaningful signs connected to specific types of social action. Together they create a 'logic' of action and make the action understandable for those involved in it.

Formats

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Formats are recognizably patterned forms of behavior, subject to norms and judged accordingly by others.

Ethnography

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Ethnography can be defined as the small-scale study of human behavior through "clinical" observation and intersubjective participation.

Linguicism

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Linguicism is language discrimination or language racism, the discrimination of speakers of a certain language.

Discourse

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Discourse can be seen as language-in-action, something that is effectively used in communication.

"We only speak Dutch at school"

Paper
Tessa Peters
01/05/2020
11 minutes to read

The use of home languages is not allowed in many schools in the Netherlands although a multilingual approach seems promising. This paper presents strategies that can be used as guidelines for dealing with multilingualism in the classroom.

Qanon, Qarmy, Trump

QArmy vs. QAnon Debunkers: The role of confirmation bias

Paper
Federica Morgandi
23/03/2020
12 minutes to read

QAnon is an American conspiracy theory associated with Trump supporters and right-wing politics. How can one article - which seeks to explain what QAnon is - influence debunkers and believers of the theory?

Betsy Rymes

Diggit profile: Betsy Rymes on citizen sociolinguistics

Interview
Jan Blommaert
11/03/2020

Betsy Rymes (UPenn GSE) talks about how she engaged with 'citizen sociolinguistics' and turned it into a new field of online-offline sociolinguistic research.

Debates on populism and diversity

The monolingual bias in studies on populism

Column
Juan Eduardo Bonnin
30/01/2020
4 minutes to read

Scholarly articles written in English about populism often forget linguistic and discursive diversity.  Drawing from a monolingual tradition, they tend to overlook linguistic and discursive diversity in the political processes they study.

Maastricht

The linguistic landscape of Maastricht

Article
Joël Eduard Nicholas Grassère
26/11/2019
11 minutes to read

Old factory signs, preserved French hotel names and signs in the local dialect paint Maastricht's rich linguistic landscape. An analysis of three examples showcases how the city's history and current developments are embedded in public signs.

2020: A Greek script Odyssey

Article
Francesca Iaboni
21/11/2019
14 minutes to read

A kind of lookalike English came about as a necessity for Greeks to adapt to the changes brought on by a digitalized world. To this day, "Greeklish" stirs public debate about the necessity to preserve and conserve cultural heritage.

"Window of culture" at the Junho Medical Center

Asian Culture and Commodity in the City Centre of Tilburg

Article
Marit van Dijck
20/11/2019
13 minutes to read

This paper is focussed on Asian culture and commodity in the city centre of Tilburg in the form of linguistic and semiotic signs. Therefore we found three shops that represent important aspects of life: health, beauty and nutrition. 

Picture of rapper Lizzo

Lizzo, body positivity and being '100% THAT bitch'

Article
Simone Sprangers
07/11/2019
18 minutes to read

The infamous line '100% that bitch' from hit song 'Truth Hurts', made rapper Lizzo one of the biggest names in music today. Her success story is closely connected to the current phase of globalization.