The aim of this course is to introduce the field of corpus linguistics and corpus-based methodology for the linguistic study of English. General issues about the design, collection and analysis of corpus material will be discussed. In practical sessions students will learn how to search and analyse text corpora using software tools. Students will develop the ability to describe and discuss the extent to which language usage varies and can be tracked with reference to genuine examples attested in corpora.
With this course students will acquire skills in:
• the principles and methodology of English corpus linguistics;
• the practical use of linguistic corpora and related software;
• the discussion of specialized literature on corpus linguistics;
• the presentation of research results.
