Routes of English, The - Inside English: Do You Know What You Are Saying?

Synopsis: Some forty years ago great hopes were raised in the literary community that the sort of routine mechanical analysis of literary texts (e.g. word counts and frequency of use of particular terms) that the advent of the computer and its ability to crunch large amounts of detail quickly and accurately could deliver were going to revolutionise study. Today, there’s a certain degree of scepticism. Some of the claims - like the computer-aided study that suggested that Sylvia Plath’s verse foreshadowed her suicide - have been greeted with ridicule in some quarters. Yet slowly but surely as the software becomes more sophisticated, major advances are being made.

In this programme Melvyn Bragg examines the differences between spoken and written English to find out the way science is being used to analyse and then potentially change the way we use language.
Language: English
Country: Great Britain
Year of release: 2006
Year of production: 2006
Notes: Broadcast on Radio 4 on 5 May 2006.

Extracts from other programmes in the ROUTES OF ENGLISH series are available on the website http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/routesofenglish/
Subjects: English language and literature
Keywords: computer-assisted assessment; English language; textual analysis; Linguistics

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British Universities Film & Video Council