Forensic linguistics and social media?

As I was doing research for my paper topic: forensic linguistics, I came across a Ted talk called "Forensic Linguistics Profiling & What Your Language Reveals About you", which talks about forensic linguistics (the application of linguistics knowledge, methods and insight to the forensic context of law, language, crime investigation, trial, and judicial procedure) and how it could be applied to social media.

I really thought this was interesting because so many crimes nowadays are committed behind a computer. From bullying to fraud. In fact, Harry Bradford talked about online harassment, and that around 20-25% of people who experience it online do not even know and never met the person who is harassing them.
Forensic linguistics, though, could help fight that. It could analyze these anonymous people's language and deduct information about them such as their age, gender, education and much more.
Image result for online harassment
It is truly fascinating how forensic linguistics can be used in so many different ways and could revolutionize the future of investigations that involve social media.


Comments

  1. AM. DadakMarch 1, 2019 at 9:21 AM

    Someone in our class posted a Language Log about a computer that analyzes a text and reveals attitudes of the writer that is indicated by the words they use. Seems related to this post.

    ReplyDelete

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