Abstract
Political identity is often manifested in language variation, but the relationship between the two is still relatively unexplored from a quantitative perspective. This study examines the use of Catalan, a language local to the semi-autonomous region of Catalonia in Spain, on Twitter in discourse related to the 2017 independence referendum. We corroborate prior findings that pro-independence tweets are more likely to include the local language than anti-independence tweets. We also find that Catalan is used more often in referendum-related discourse than in other contexts, contrary to prior findings on language variation. This suggests a strong role for the Catalan language in the expression of Catalonian political identity.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Proceedings of the 2018 Conference of the North American Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics |
Subtitle of host publication | Human Language Technologies |
Editors | Marilyn Walker, Heng Ji, Amanda Stent |
Place of Publication | New Orleans, Louisiana |
Publisher | Association for Computational Linguistics |
Pages | 136-141 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Volume | 2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jun 2018 |