The right tool for the job? Methodological considerations in selecting and designing corpus tools

Abstract: Despite the move towards increased methodological rigour in applied linguistics and corpus linguistics, researchers’ selection of software for building, managing and analysing corpora (also known as corpus tools) is often described uncritically. This has implications for corpus studies involving general linguistic analysis, as well as more applied, pedagogical corpus applications, e.g., Data-driven learning (DDL). In this paper, several important methodological decisions that researchers need to make when adopting a corpus tool for their study are explored, as well as the decision-making processes involved in the design of such tools, focusing on two freely available corpus tools, i.e., AntConc (Anthony, 2024) and CorpusMate (Crosthwaite & Baisa, 2023). By exploring the choice of tools through the lens of their features and functions, the goal is to motivate the corpus linguistics research community to enhance transparency around tool selection in their methodological reporting. Adopting a more critical stance in this area could contribute to strengthening the methodological precision of corpus linguistics studies, as well as guide the development of future corpus analysis tools.

Dr Peter Crosthwaite is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Languages and Cultures at the University of Queensland. He holds an MA in TESOL from the University of London and a Masters and Ph.D in applied linguistics from the University of Cambridge. His areas of research include corpus linguistics, second language acquisition and the use of English for general and specific academic purposes.

Local: CEL UNICAMP
            Rua Cora Coralina, 300 – CEP: 13.083-896
            Cidade Universitária, Campinas (SP) | Fone: (19) 3521-1987

Data e horário: 22 de abril, 14h às 16h

Link para inscrição: https://forms.gle/3zmKT5XqHBSmqyTn7

PARCERIA