English and German pop song lyrics : Towards a contrastive textology





Faculty/Professorship: English and Historical Linguistics  
Author(s): Werner, Valentin  
Title of the Journal: Journal for language technology and computational linguistics : JLCL
ISSN: 2190-6858
Publisher Information: Regensburg : Gesellschaft für Sprachtechnologie und Computerlinguistik
Year of publication: 2023
Volume: 36
Issue: 1
Pages: 1-20
Language(s): English
DOI: 10.3201/eid2904.221552
URL: https://jlcl.org/article/view/235/238
Abstract: 
The present contribution offers a contrastive corpus-based analysis of English and German pop lyrics. It conceptualizes lyrics as a specific text type/register and tries to identify cross-linguistic commonalities and differences. As empirical base, it uses corpora that represent the lyrics of commercially highly successful pop songs in Anglophone and German contexts. Given the similar sociocultural functions and production circumstances of English and Ger-man lyrics, the study starts from the assumption that a large-scale linguistic overlap can be traced. While indeed cross-linguistic convergence is found especially for lexical patterns in terms of topic choice, the analysis also reveals a common property of conveying a conversa-tional feel through lexicogrammatical means. However, given the differing typological make-up of the languages contrasted, fine-grained differences emerge as regards the ways conver-sationality/informality is established in pop lyrics as a performed text type.
GND Keywords: Englisch; Deutsch; Korpus <Linguistik>; Popmusik; Vergleichende Sprachwissenschaft
Keywords: pop culture, pop cultural linguistics, performed language, media language, music, media linguistics, textlinguistics, register study, typology, LYPOP, Songkorpus
DDC Classification: 420 English  
RVK Classification: HF 450   
Peer Reviewed: Ja
International Distribution: Ja
Open Access Journal: Ja
Type: Article
URI: https://fis.uni-bamberg.de/handle/uniba/59413
Release Date: 17. May 2023