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Towards a Typology of Diagrams in Linguistics

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Diagrammatic Representation and Inference (Diagrams 2018)

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Abstract

The aim of this paper is to lay out the foundations of a typology of diagrams in linguistics. We draw a distinction between linguistic parameters — concerning what information is being represented — and diagrammatic parameters — concerning how it is represented. The six binary linguistic parameters of the typology are: (i) mono- versus multilingual, (ii) static versus dynamic, (iii) mono- versus multimodular, (iv) object-level versus meta-level, (v) qualitative versus quantitative, and (vi) mono- versus interdisciplinary. The two diagrammatic parameters are (i) iconic/concrete versus symbolic/abstract representation and (ii) static versus dynamic representation. We briefly illustrate how different types of linguistic diagrams can be analysed in terms of the interaction between the linguistic and the diagrammatic parameters.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In the field of Information Graphics or Data Visualisation, the different ways in which information can be structured have been captured under the acronym latch (= Location Alphabet Time Category Hierarchy), according to whether the elements are organised spatially, organised alphabetically, organised against a time line, divided into classes or ranked in order of priority [21]. The Location dimension typically yields concrete diagrams, whereas the others standardly yield abstract diagrams.

  2. 2.

    Notice that such a series of diagrams can develop as an animation through time, or by juxtaposition in space.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Linguistics, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Hans Smessaert

  2. Center for Logic and Analytic Philosophy, KU Leuven; FWO, Leuven, Belgium

    Lorenz Demey

Authors
  1. Hans Smessaert
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  2. Lorenz Demey
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Correspondence to Hans Smessaert .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, UK

    Peter Chapman

  2. University of Brighton, Brighton, UK

    Gem Stapleton

  3. Tallinn University of Technology, Tallinn, Estonia

    Amirouche Moktefi

  4. Mitre Corporation, McLean, VA, USA

    Sarah Perez-Kriz

  5. University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy

    Francesco Bellucci

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Smessaert, H., Demey, L. (2018). Towards a Typology of Diagrams in Linguistics. In: Chapman, P., Stapleton, G., Moktefi, A., Perez-Kriz, S., Bellucci, F. (eds) Diagrammatic Representation and Inference. Diagrams 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 10871. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91376-6_24

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91376-6_24

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-91375-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-91376-6

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