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This paper examines the manifestation of individual style through the lens of a specific language category: the interjection. The analysis considers how interjections are used as a resource in the dramatic dialogue of three Restoration playwrights: Aphra Behn, John Dryden and Thomas D’Urfey, and how their preferences and practices of use compare to previously identified trends in the history of English. Using the concept of the repertoire as a frame for situated language use, the paper examines how genre, time, and characterisation shape the selection and frequency of interjections in the plays of each author. Corpus linguistic methods are used to provide a quantitative and qualitative overview of each author’s interjection repertoire. The results suggest that whilst genre, time, and characterisation are influential in shaping the selection and implementation of interjection forms, the choice of expressive language in dramatic contexts is also distinctive and coherent at an authorial level.

In his preface to Behn’s posthumously published play, The Younger Brother (1696), Charles Gildon, who secured the play’s performance and publication, makes claims to editorial interference in the f...

Computational stylistics has developed various methods for investigating and attributing authorship of collaborative literary texts. This article investigates ‘precursory authorship’ (Love, 2002): that is, the authorial traces of a source text that inform—to a greater or lesser degree—a subsequent literary output, in order to establish its relevance for our approach to and understanding of the linguistic properties of literary style. Precursory authorship and derivative adaptations are common features of early modern English drama, and the study focusses on two case studies relating to the plays of Restoration playwright, Aphra Behn (c. 1640–89). Using a combination of quantitative methods (Rolling Delta (RD), principal components analysis (PCA), Delta, and Hierarchical Cluster Analysis), the investigation highlights the presence of precursory authorial style in Behn’s The Rover and an anonymous work associated with Behn, The Counterfeit Bridegroom. The results suggest that precursory authorial style is identifiable in both cases, not only through a similarity with the source text but, to a lesser degree, other texts by the precursory author as well. The anonymous play yields complex and non-confirmatory evidence for Behn’s authorship. Methodologically, RD is most sensitive to precursory collaboration. Collectively, the findings highlight the importance of stylistic factors when describing and interpreting literary linguistic quantitative data: precursory authorial style is another facet that intersects with properties such as time period and genre. The article urges a more critical and theoretically informed view of authorially aligned linguistic style.

The Power of Language: How Discourse Influences Society (Second Edition) By L. Young, M. Fitzgerald and S. Fitzgerald (2018) Sheffield: Equinox Publishing, 381pp.

This chapter examines the forms and functions of speech representation in Early Modern English correspondence using corpus-based methods. It considers how the sociopragmatic properties of speech representation are shaped by the communicative context of letter-writing, and identifies key similarities and differences with speech representation in other early modern genres. Using a sixteenth-century subset of the Parsed Corpus of Early English Correspondence, the analysis focusses on speech representation framed by the two most frequent quotatives: SAY and ANSWER. The results suggest that speech representation in letters anticipates the practices of later written genres, such as news reporting, as well as displaying characteristics associated with speech representation in spoken genres, such as conversation. Speech representation in correspondence has a predominantly interpersonal function, linked to values associated with report faithfulness, dramaticality, and the source authority. Reporting practices are informed both by the conventions of the genre and the immediate situation of the letter-writer.

Lyme disease (LD) is an increasing public health problem. Current laboratory testing is insensitive in early infection, the stage at which appropriate treatment is most effective in preventing disease sequelae. The Lyme Disease Biobank (LDB) collects samples from individuals with symptoms consistent with early LD presenting with or without erythema migrans (EM) or an annular, expanding skin lesion and uninfected individuals from areas of endemicity. Samples were collected from 550 participants (298 cases and 252 controls) according to institutional review board-approved protocols and shipped to a centralized biorepository., Lyme disease (LD) is an increasing public health problem. Current laboratory testing is insensitive in early infection, the stage at which appropriate treatment is most effective in preventing disease sequelae. The Lyme Disease Biobank (LDB) collects samples from individuals with symptoms consistent with early LD presenting with or without erythema migrans (EM) or an annular, expanding skin lesion and uninfected individuals from areas of endemicity. Samples were collected from 550 participants (298 cases and 252 controls) according to institutional review board-approved protocols and shipped to a centralized biorepository. Testing was performed to confirm the presence of tick-borne pathogens by real-time PCR, and a subset of samples was tested for Borrelia burgdorferi by culture. Serology was performed on all samples using the CDC’s standard two-tiered testing algorithm (STTTA) for LD. LD diagnosis was supported by laboratory testing in 82 cases, including positive results by use of the STTTA, PCR, or culture or positive results by two enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays for cases presenting with EM lesion sizes of >5 cm. The remaining 216 cases had negative laboratory testing results. For the controls, 43 were positive by at least one of the tiers and 6 were positive by use of the STTTA. The results obtained with this collection highlight and reinforce the known limitations of serologic testing in early LD, with only 29% of individuals presenting with EM lesion sizes of >5 cm yielding a positive result using the STTTA. Aliquots of whole blood, serum, and urine from clinically characterized patients with and without LD are available to investigators in academia and industry for evaluation or development of novel diagnostic assays for LD, to continue to improve upon currently available methods.

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Oil magnate David Koch stepped down from the board of the American Museum of Natural History on December 9, 2015. His departure came only months after dozens of scientists signed a letter calling on the science museum sector to sever ties with the fossil fuel industry. Koch, who governs the sprawling Koch Industries alongside his brother Charles, had sat on the board for twenty-three years, and continues to maintain similar arrangements at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Over the years Koch has donated millions of dollars to these museums. Many argue that this has allowed Koch to influence their public programming while boosting the reputation of Koch Industries.

The letters of Elizabeth I provide valuable insights into the queen’s life and reign. Yet scholarship has largely focussed on her holograph letters, despite the archive primarily comprising scribal letters ‘by the queen’. This essay considers how Elizabeth’s power and queenship is constructed in her correspondence, using corpus linguistic techniques. The investigation identifies similar and contrasting features in scribal and holograph letters relating to the representation of the royal self and the positioning of the author in relation to the recipient. The discussion considers the impact of the associated features e.g. pronouns, on Elizabeth’s authority. It concludes with a case-study of a “hybrid” letter, in which scribal and holographic elements are combined, and finds that the text exploits the contrastive potential of both letter-types.

Since the Grabiner Report in 2000 there has been growing concern on the part of government over the scale of the informal economy. Most of the proposals to address this growth have focused on ways to deter such activity. But there have also been efforts to assist those who wish to legitimise their activities. This paper argues that a social enterprise approach to formalisation would be of benefit to tackling joblessness and social exclusion as well as generating further social economic activity in deprived neighbourhoods. The paper draws upon review research and original research work currently being conducted into formalisation strategies.

The drive toward the externalization of public services and the organizational implications therein have been well-documented in the first part of this book. In large measure, the driver for this trend has been to reduce bureaucracy, improve quality and to increase efficiency and value for money. The inability of the public sector to effectively tackle these issues internally is cited as a consequence of a lack of capacity to innovate associated with an aversion to risk, and both these aspects are seen as inherent to the public sector workforce. Thus the emergence of the managerial state, creation of quasi-market disciplines, agencification and the creation of rafts of quangos (alongside straightforward privatization) have all been identified, in practice, as aspects of the new public management, essentially imposed from above.

This article highlights traditionally and predominantly black colleges and universities, profiles their physical education programs, and offers some suggestions for change.