Journal article
The Proliferation of 'at risk' in The Times: A Corpus Approach to Historical Social Change, 1785-2009
Jens O Zinn
Historical Social Research | University of Cologne | Published : 2018
Abstract
Examining long term social change is one of the most rewarding but time-consuming challenges for sociological research. Historical analyses are often the only way to understand present-day social conditions such as the perception and management of risk in the UK. This article reports research which breaks new ground by utilising corpus linguistic tools to examine the proliferation of risk words in The Times (London) from the 19th to the 21st century. The article develops a corpus sociological approach to show that socio-structural changes, institutional practices and socially relevant events have supported the proliferation of ‘at risk’. The early dominance of insurance, trading and economic..
View full abstractGrants
Awarded by ESRC research centre Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS) at Lancaster University (Jul 2016-Dec 2018) as part of a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship 'Understanding the discourse semantic shift towards risk in the UK and Germany (UnRI)' (H2
Funding Acknowledgements
This publication bases on research conducted at the ESRC research centre Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS) at Lancaster University (Jul 2016-Dec 2018) as part of a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship 'Understanding the discourse semantic shift towards risk in the UK and Germany (UnRI)' (Grant Number 701836, H2020-MSCA-IF-2015). I would also like to thank Tony McEnery for his helpful comments to an earlier version of the manuscript and Julia Cook for her constructive suggestions to further improve the manuscript in content and style. It is always a pleasure to work with such inspiring colleagues.