How We Talk Online

Catalog description

Why are TikTok influencers suddenly saying "unalive" instead of "die"? What was the whole "6-7" thing about? In this seminar, we use digital communication as a window into foundational questions in linguistics: how do people convey meaning beyond the literal words they use, and how do communicative conventions emerge and change under social and technological pressures? Drawing on research in pragmatics, conversation analysis, and sociolinguistics, students examine everyday linguistic phenomena online. Two books anchor the course: Gretchen McCulloch's Because Internet (2019) and Adam Aleksic's Algospeak (2025). Students will apply linguistic frameworks to real data: analyzing their own group chats, documenting algospeak in the wild, and developing a final project on a digital communication phenomenon of their choosing. No background in linguistics required.