Analysing digital communication: discursive features, rhetorical structure and the use of English as a lingua franca in travel blog posts

Abstract

The digital world is currently offering new modes of communication that allow multiple opportunities for a more immediate and dialogical interaction. Within it, the blog shows up as a very resourceful and sophisticated genre where different sub-genres converge and where speakers from distinct linguacultural backgrounds can communicate through English, which is used as a lingua franca (ELF). Thus, to start comprehending the rationale of the blog, an analysis of the sub-genre of posts and, more specifically, those hosted in travel blogs, is provided in this paper. The linguistic and discursive prominent features encapsulated in travel blog posts will be explored through a data-driven approach, and their rhetorical structure will be identified via a functional analysis. This will allow to understand better how the ELF blogosphere makes use of such a digital sub-genre and what the readership may expect when communicating digitally through it.