Overview

Situated at the interface of corpus linguistics, discourse analysis, sociolinguistics, and surveillance studies, this book focuses on how surveillance is defined, discussed, and negotiated in public discourses. It analyses different meaning components of the cultural keyword of surveillance – inherently linked to power relations – in ongoing debates of public discourses. The author looks at the representation of surveillance in different discourse domains through three different studies – the prime academic journal in surveillance studies (Surveillance & Society), The Times newspaper, and the signage of public spaces. The first two studies illustrate implementations of a novel method of ‘co-occurrence comparisons’ in diachronic analyses of collocation. The final study integrates cutting-edge research on the multimodal representation of surveillance in public spaces. Adopting the sociolinguistic framework of ‘surveillant landscapes’ from mediated discourses analysis, this analysis reveals how surveillant practices are signalled in public environments. To capture the textual and material representation of surveillance in a collection of photographs from public spaces in multiple cities across Europe, North America, and Asia, the study presents a novel methodology combining corpus and qualitative methods for the analysis of multimodal data. With its analysis of innovative corpora, Exploring Meaning in Surveillance Discourses through Corpora contributes new insights into meaning-making patterns of surveillance and makes a strong case for the role of corpus methods in the emerging ‘sociolinguistics of surveillance’.

Full Product Details

9781350501515

Table of Contents

Reviews

In an increasingly inhuman world with big data and artificial intelligence penetrating every aspect of our lives, this book on surveillance discourses across time and space is a timely and original contribution which expertly and innovatively synthesizes methods and frameworks from corpus linguistics, mediated discourse analysis and linguistic landscape research. * Phoenix Lam, Associate Professor of Linguistics and Communication, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China *

In an increasingly inhuman world with big data and artificial intelligence penetrating every aspect of our lives, this book on surveillance discourses across time and space is a timely and original contribution which expertly and innovatively synthesizes methods and frameworks from corpus linguistics, mediated discourse analysis and linguistic landscape research. * Phoenix Lam, Associate Professor of Linguistics and Communication, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China * We live in a surveillance society. Negotiating this from a personal, institutional and ethical perspective relies on a clear understanding of what surveillance actually means. Viola Wiegand’s groundbreaking sociolinguistic study of the topic is both calm and authoritative, offering a peerless insight into this most important of issues. * Dan McIntyre, Uppsala University, Sweden *

Author Information

Viola Wiegand is Lecturer in Education (TESOL) at the University of Stirling, UK.

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