“There was much new to grok”: an analysis of word coinage in science fiction literature

IF 1.1 2区文学 0 LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS Linguistics Vanguard Pub Date : 2023-11-10 DOI:10.1515/lingvan-2023-0011

Matt Gee

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Abstract

Abstract As can be witnessed in projects such as The Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction (Prucher, Jeff. 2007. Brave new words: The Oxford dictionary of science fiction . Oxford: Oxford University Press), science fiction has been fertile ground for the creation of new words and concepts. Whereas the aforementioned dictionary was constructed by eliciting examples and citations from volunteers, this paper presents an initial foray into data-driven methods for uncovering lexis unique to science fiction. Words unique to science fiction texts are extracted by comparing a science fiction corpus against the British National Corpus (BNC Consortium. 2007. The British National Corpus, XML edition . Oxford Text Archive. http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12024/2554 (accessed 29 June 2022)) to produce a list of 306 neologisms from 74 texts. In addition, this study seeks to examine the ways in which authors impart the meaning of such words to the reader, drawing on frameworks of semantic word relations and work in cognitive linguistics. This reveals the use of definitions and glosses by the authors, both in narration and direct speech, co-occurrence with synonyms, and the drip-feeding of attributes pertaining to the concept being referenced. In addition, characters can be shown to struggle with the concepts to which neologisms refer, allowing authors to explore themes of alienation and other-worldliness.

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“有很多新东西要学”:科幻文学词汇造词分析

这一点可以从《牛津科幻词典》(Jeff Prucher, 2007)等项目中得到印证。勇敢的新词汇:牛津科幻词典。牛津:牛津大学出版社)，科幻小说一直是创造新词和概念的沃土。前面提到的词典是通过从志愿者那里提取例子和引用来构建的，而本文则首次尝试了数据驱动的方法来发现科幻小说特有的词汇。通过比较科幻语料库和英国国家语料库(BNC Consortium. 2007)，我们提取了科幻文本中所特有的词汇。英国国家语料库，XML版。牛津文本档案馆。http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12024/2554(访问日期为2022年6月29日))从74个文本中产生了306个新词。此外，本研究试图检查的方式，作者传授这些词的意义给读者，借鉴语义词的关系框架和认知语言学的工作。这揭示了作者在叙述和直接引语中对定义和注释的使用，与同义词的共现，以及与所引用的概念相关的属性的滴入。此外，人物可以表现出与新词所指的概念作斗争，使作者能够探索异化和超凡脱俗的主题。

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来源期刊

Linguistics Vanguard Multiple-

CiteScore

2.00

自引率

18.20%

发文量

105

期刊介绍： Linguistics Vanguard is a new channel for high quality articles and innovative approaches in all major fields of linguistics. This multimodal journal is published solely online and provides an accessible platform supporting both traditional and new kinds of publications. Linguistics Vanguard seeks to publish concise and up-to-date reports on the state of the art in linguistics as well as cutting-edge research papers. With its topical breadth of coverage and anticipated quick rate of production, it is one of the leading platforms for scientific exchange in linguistics. Its broad theoretical range, international scope, and diversity of article formats engage students and scholars alike. All topics within linguistics are welcome. The journal especially encourages submissions taking advantage of its new multimodal platform designed to integrate interactive content, including audio and video, images, maps, software code, raw data, and any other media that enhances the traditional written word. The novel platform and concise article format allows for rapid turnaround of submissions. Full peer review assures quality and enables authors to receive appropriate credit for their work. The journal publishes general submissions as well as special collections. Ideas for special collections may be submitted to the editors for consideration.