Statistical Stylistics and Childrens Literature a Study in Light of Quantitative Linguistics (Childrens Stories as a Model)

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (S1) ◽  
pp. 731-742
Keyword(s):  
Quantitative Linguistics

Using corpora in depth psychology: a trigram-based analysis of a corpus of fetish fantasies

Corpora ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Depth Psychology ◽  
Constant Pressure ◽  
Psychological Theory ◽  
Evidence Base ◽  
Future Research ◽  
German Language ◽  
Alternative Theory ◽  
Depth Psychological ◽  
Psychological Constructs ◽  
Quantitative Linguistics

Contemporary depth psychology is under constant pressure to demonstrate and strengthen its evidence base. In this paper, I show how the analysis of large corpora can contribute to this goal of developing and testing depth-psychological theory. To provide a basis for evaluating statements about foot and shoe fetishism, I analyse the thirty-six most frequent three-word phrases (or trigrams) in a corpus of about 1.6 million words of amateur fetish stories written in the German language. Zipfian methods from quantitative linguistics are used to specify the number of phrases for analysis and I argue that these reflect the core themes of the corpus. The analysis reveals three main dimensions. First, it corroborates the observations of the early sexologists that foot and shoe fetishism is very closely intertwined with sadomasochism. Secondly, it shows that genitalia-related phrases are also common, but an examination of their contexts questions Freud's theory that fetishism results from an assumption of female castration. Thirdly, it reveals that the mouth also plays a key role; however, the frequent co-presence of genitalia references in the same texts does not seem to support straightforwardly the most common alternative theory of fetishism based on object relations. Future research could valuably extend this approach to other fetishes and, in due course, to other depth-psychological constructs.

The semic matrices of meaning

1968 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Guiraud
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Method ◽  
Word Frequency ◽  
Generative Grammar ◽  
Quantitative Approach ◽  
The Other ◽  
Quantitative Models ◽  
Quantitative Linguistics ◽  
Semiotic Systems ◽  
Qualitative Models ◽  
The One

The possibility of a quantitative approach to the problem of sense outlined in the following article, is one which has been suggested innu merable times in those sciences which are based on a model of the sign (e.g., linguistics and logic) . The controversy between partisans of the quanti tative or statistical method and those who accept the qualitative or semantic one remains unresolved. If the 1930's, influenced by logic, favored the first method, recent years have evinced a preference for the second. Nevertheless, the problem remains. Generative grammar eliminates the question when it proposes calculations of syntactical transformations and mathematically organizes the generation of " signified " structures as if they were "signifying " structures without ever formulating the problem of sense. Semiotics is an heir to this situation, again seriously raising the dilemma, to organize as signifiers, the signified in systems which it studies. The complementarity of the two approaches (quantitative, qualitative) is essential. One cannot overemphasize the fundamental importance of the first method, more concretely and more specifically in the realm of semiotics, that is, the importance of mathematical and logical proce dures for articulating the signifying of the corresponding signified material. M. Guiraud's text, while strictly in the realm of linguistics, is of considerable interest to semiotics because of the methodological and theo retical problems which it raises : 1) The homology of the signifier/signified. 2) The acceptance of the notion of " sense " a) as a function of a statistical factor (word frequency), b) as semic content on the one hand, and sense, in its fullest meaning, on the other, and c) as an " orientation of the word toward words, as a relationship with the semic properties which it does not possess ". Semiotics, still in its formative stages, can render more flexible the qualitative models which it has hitherto used, by these and other propo sitions of quantitative linguistics. With this article, we initiate the regular publication of studies involving the application of quantitative models, thereby working towards the rigorous axiomatization of semiotic systems. ( Editor's note.)

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