Culturomics

Culturomics is a form of computational lexicology that studies human behavior and cultural trends through the quantitative analysis of digitized texts. Researchers data mine large digital archives to investigate cultural phenomena reflected in language and word usage. The term is an American neologism first described in a 2010 Science article called Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books, co-authored by Harvard researchers Jean-Baptiste Michel and Erez Lieberman Aiden. Michel and Aiden helped create the Google Labs project Google Ngram Viewer which uses n-gram's to analyze the Google Book digital library for cultural patterns in language use over time. In another study called Culturnomics 2.0, Kalev H. Leetaru examined news archives including print and broadcast media (television and radio transcripts) for words that imparted tone or "mood" as well as geographic data. The research was able to retroactively predict the 2011 Arab Spring and successfully estimate the final location of Osama Bin Laden to within 124 miles. In a 2012 paper by Alexander M. Petersen and co-authors, they found a "dramatic shift in the birth rate and death rates of words": Deaths have increased and births have slowed. The authors also identified a universal "tipping point" in the life cycle of new words at about 30 to 50 years after their origin, they either enter the long-term lexicon or fall into disuse. However, it should be noted that linguists and lexicographers have expressed skepticism regarding the methods and results of some of these studies, including one by Petersen et al.

Further reading

• Michel, Jean-Baptiste; Liberman Aiden, Erez; Aiden, A. P.; Veres, A.; Gray, M. K.; Pickett, J. P.; Hoiberg, D.; Clancy, D.; Norvig, P.; Orwan, John; Nowak, Martin; Pinker, Stephen (16 December 2010). "Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books". Science. 331 (6014): 176–82. doi:10.1126/science.1199644. PMC 3279742. PMID 21163965. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
• Leetaru, Kalev H. (5 September 2011). "Culturnomics 2.0: Forecasting Large-Scale Human Behavior Using Global News Media Tone In Time And Space". First Monday. 16 (9).
• Bohannon, John (14 January 2011). "Google Books, Wikipedia, and the Future of Culturomics". Science. 331 (6014): 135. doi:10.1126/science.331.6014.135. PMID 21233356.
• Schwartz, Tim (1 April 2011). "Culturomics: Periodicals Gauge Culture's Pulse". Science. 332 (6025): 35–36. doi:10.1126/science.332.6025.35-c.
• Morse-Gagné, Elise E. (1 April 2011). "Culturomics: Statistical Traps Muddy the Data". Science. 332 (6025): 35. doi:10.1126/science.332.6025.35-b. PMID 21454771.
• Petersen, Alexander M.; Tenenbaum, Joel; Havlin, Shlomo; Stanley, H. Eugene (15 March 2012). "Statistical Laws Governing Fluctuations in Word Use from Word Birth to Word Death". Scientific Reports. 2. doi:10.1038/srep00313.
• Petersen, Alexander M.; Tenenbaum, Joel; Havlin, Shlomo; Stanley, H. Eugene; Perc, Matjaz (10 December 2012). "Languages cool as they expand: Allometric scaling and the decreasing need for new words". Scientific Reports. 2. {{cite journal}}: Text "doi:10.1038/srep00943" ignored (help)
• Shea, Christopher. "The New Science of the Birth and Death of Words". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
• Acerbi, Alberto; Lampos, Vasileios; Garnett, Philip; Bentley, Alexander (20 March 2013). "The Expression of Emotions in 20th Century Books". PLoS ONE. 8 (3). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0059030. PMID e59030. {{cite journal}}: Check |pmid= value (help)CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link)

External links

• Culturomics.org, website by The Cultural Observatory at Harvard directed by Erez Lieberman Aiden and Jean-Baptiste Michel