This short web page is an example of
how you can create projects that link directly to corpus queries.
With these links, users don't have to enter anything into the search
form, and you can be assured that they are seeing exactly the same
thing that you did when you first did the query. To return to this
page after seeing the results of the search, just click on [RETURN] in the upper
right-hand corner.
Suppose that in our English class today we
want to focus on the word mind. What are some simple
searches that we can do with the corpora to get better insight into this
word. Well, let's see...
FREQUENCY
1. What is the frequency of mind in the
five major
genres of the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA)? Why do
you think it's higher in fiction? (Notice that here we use [mind]
to represent all of the forms of the lemma mind: mind, minds,
minding, etc). Click on 'See all section' to see the frequency in
all 70+ text types. After the fiction genres, which genres talk about
the mind the most?
2. What about
British English
(using the BNC)? Is it about the same as American English, in terms of
the relative frequency between genres? What about if we separate the
uses as a verb
and as a noun?
What difference now emerges? Why?
PATTERNS
3. What kinds of verbal complement does
mind take as a verb:
to V or
V-ing (e.g.
do you mind to get up / do you mind getting up) ?
4. Look at
positive (I
mind...) and
negative (I don't mind...) phrases with I. Which is
more common? Why?
5. What are some common strings of
words before mind,
strings of words after
mind, or strings with
mind in the
middle? What are the 3-4 main uses of mind, based on this
data?
MEANING
6. Let's turn to mind as a noun.
What kind of minds
are there? Let's focus on relevance now -- words that occur especially
frequently with mind -- in
American and
British English.
Any difference here?
7. What verbs occur with mind, and
let's again look at American and
British English. Any
new or strange meanings or uses here? Feel free -- as with any query --
to look at the context (just click in the frequency listing) to get some
sense of what these phrases might mean.
8. Let's look at
synonyms of mind,
and their frequency in different genres. Notice that this is a bit
simplistic; these words are only potentially synonymous with mind in
some context, but it's still kind of interesting. What about
fiction vs.
academic? In the general semantic field of mind, where do they refer
to egghead, wits, and brain, and where do they talk about
observance, awareness, and cognizance?
9. Finally, look inside people's heads, and
use synonyms to search for phrases like [his
mind was troubled, her thoughts were unspoken, your brain is fried]
-- all at one time.
HISTORICAL
We could focus on frequency, but instead in
this section we'll look at how the concept of mind has been used
during the last 100-200 years, as measured by what words co-occur with
it.
10.
How was the mind
viewed in the 1800s, as opposed to the 1900s? In what century did
they talk about minds being mighty, immortal, candid, noble,
and carnal? And in which century did
they talk about the unconscious, the subconscious, and the
collective mind? Any insights into cultural shifts here?
11. What about more recent periods?
Comparing the
1920s-1940s and the 1980s-2000s, in which decades did they talk
about the British, German, and Japanese mind (and use the
phrase fresh in mind), and in which decades are references made
to great, beautiful, and sharp minds, but also restless, dangerous, and
troubled minds?
12. Finally, let's look at the last two
decades. Compare
adjectives with mind in the 1990s and the 2000s. Does this
reflect anything about changes in culture -- what we fear, what we're
trying to understand, etc?
Well, this is just a short example of how
you can create a web page to link to queries in the corpus, and get some
interesting data. Feel free to create your own projects -- even if
they're only a paragraph or so long -- and then
list them on the corpus portal.