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This paper analyses the linguistic resources used by speakers to profile the participants in taboo actions, focusing on expressions for the concept abortar 'to abort' in Spanish sociolinguistic interviews. The tokens referring to the action are analysed in terms of linguistic features that affect agentivity at the level of verbs, subjects and objects. The combination of different linguistic features is classified in three levels of agentivity (prototypical agents, non-prototypical agents and non-agents) with various sublevels. The presence of modals further contributes to reducing agentivity, causing the maximally agentive profiling to be rather infrequent. Second, though the direct construal abortar is generally preferred, the levels of agentivity interplay with onomasiological variation. Third, social variables are not significantly correlated with the levels of agentivity. The paper concludes that mitigating agentivity is a euphemistic strategy against the taboo of a fully agentive woman who aborts, based on the cultural conceptualization of unwanted abortion.

This report is part of the project 2O2CM Overcoming Obstacles and Disincentives to Climate Change Mitigation: A cross-cutting approach by human and social sciences, funded by Solstice (JPI Climate). The goals of this analysis are to understand “how climate change is depicted and communicated in Twitter; what are the obstacles to the adoption of attitudes and behaviours of climate change mitigation: forms of resistance, deformation, and denial; and what textual sources are mostly read, cited and commented on by laypeople and authorities online.” We will tackle these questions from alinguistic perspective, and particularly with a combination of methods from corpus linguistics anddiscourse analysis (which will be explained in detail in section 2.). This will translate very specificallyin the following objectives:Objective 1: Collect a corpus of Belgian French, Climate change-related tweetsObjective 2: Analyze the distribution of the data across segments, time and particular accounts (most active, most mentioned)Objective 3: Analyze the presence and distribution of several important axes related to Climate change that have a crucial impact on individual life (food, transport, energetic efficiency)Objective 4: Extract and analyze the expressions of difficulty in the corpus at different linguistic levels.

espanolLos inventarios representan la existencia de mercancias necesarias para las operaciones de ventas o fabricacion en una empresa. Estos permiten a las empresas cumplir con sus niveles de ventas, al tiempo que representan una oportunidad para el control de costos y la toma de decisiones. Este documento presenta un enfoque de optimizacion para minimizar los costos de inventario en modelos de inventario probabilisticos de demanda independiente. El enfoque ha sido validado para establecer la politica optima de inventarios con demanda probabilistica dentro de una empresa que comercializa productos desechables. La politica establecida tiene como objetivo minimizar los costos de inventario utilizando la desviacion estandar de los datos historicos, la desviacion media de los errores de pronostico y la desviacion media de los datos historicos. Para la determinacion de la cantidad economico de pedido, se seleccionaron tres tipos de productos tomando datos historicos de ventas. Asimismo, se utilizaron diferentes metodos de pronostico, seleccionando el que minimiza el error cuadratico medio para la demanda pronosticada. La metodologia propuesta es practica y de facil uso en empresas donde los inventarios tienen una demanda probabilistica e independiente. Ademas, el enfoque propuesto permitio optimizar los costos relacionados con los costos de mantenimiento, los costos de pedido y los costos de inventario de seguridad. EnglishInventories represent stocks of goods necessary for operations of sales or manufacturing in a company. These allow to the companies meet their sales levels, while representing an opportunity to the cost control and the decision-making. This paper presents an optimization approach to minimize the inventory costs in probabilistic inventory models of independent demand. The approach has been validated for set the policy optimal of inventories with probabilistic demand within a company that markets disposable products. The established policy aims to minimize the inventory costs by using the standard deviation of the historical data, the mean deviation of forecast errors and the mean deviation of the historical data. For the determination of the economic order quantities, three types of products were selected, taking historical sales data. Likewise, different forecasting methods were used, selecting the one that minimizes the mean squared error for the forecasted demand. The proposed methodology is practical and easy to use in companies where inventories have probabilistic and independent demand. Also, the proposed approach allowed optimize the costs related to holding costs, ordering costs and safety stock costs.

The stem #jesuis followed by a toponym (e.g. #jesuisParis) has proved to be very productive in the gathering of affective publics (Papacharissi 2015) around causes of mourning, after terrorist attacks and other disasters. However, not all attacks have given rise to such massive affective use of #jesuis hashtags. Our goal is to examine how Twitter users claim similar displays of affect for these “other” places. We analyze 297 tweets in which the Twitter user utters a condolence speech act while simultaneously contesting the unbalanced affective reactions expressed concerning some places, e.g. “Any #JesuisIraq planned?”. We observe the geographical granularity of the referred place, the structural complexity of the tweet and, if present, the underlying motives for unbalanced reactions suggested by the Twitter users. By doing so, we show how Twitter is used to claim attention for places that are deemed underrepresented, thus confirming the importance of Twitter for expressing solidarity.

In this study, we will present an analysis of how polarization, and more specifically polarizing representations of immigrant communities, are discursively constructed in the online discourse of Belgian French-speaking politicians. Our study is based on Facebook and Twitter messages from leading politicians from all major parties. They consist of two one-month samples, which were collected one month before and during the 2019 electoral campaign for the regional, national and European elections that took place on May 26th. We will show how a variety of linguistic devices, such as deixis and metaphors (Lakoff and Johnson 1980), contribute to creating an opposition between an in-group and an out-group and to presenting the out-group as a threat, thus producing polarizing representations of immigrant communities.

Human and animal infections with bacteria of the genus Sarcina (family Clostridiaceae) are associated with gastric dilation and emphysematous gastritis. However, the potential roles of sarcinae as commensals or pathogens remain unclear. Here, we investigate a lethal disease of unknown etiology that affects sanctuary chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) in Sierra Leone. The disease, which we have named "epizootic neurologic and gastroenteric syndrome" (ENGS), is characterized by neurologic and gastrointestinal signs and results in death of the animals, even after medical treatment. Using a case-control study design, we show that ENGS is strongly associated with Sarcina infection. The microorganism is distinct from Sarcina ventriculi and other known members of its genus, based on bacterial morphology and growth characteristics. Whole-genome sequencing confirms this distinction and reveals the presence of genetic features that may account for the unusual virulence of the bacterium. Therefore, we propose that this organism be considered the representative of a new species, named "Candidatus Sarcina troglodytae". Our results suggest that a heretofore unrecognized complex of related sarcinae likely exists, some of which may be highly virulent. However, the potential role of "Ca. S. troglodytae" in the etiology of ENGS, alone or in combination with other factors, remains a topic for future research.

This paper introduces MadSex, a spoken corpus of 54 sociolinguistic interviews in Spanish based on the topic of sexuality. It was collected in order to study the cognitive sociolinguistic variation of sexual concepts. The paper presents and justifies methodological decisions taken during design, collection and transcription stages. Informants were selected in Madrid, based on a pre-stratified sample divided by sex, age and level of education. The interview methodology relied on an opinion questionnaire designed for the indirect elicitation of sexual concepts, which overcame successfully the limitations imposed by the low frequencies of semantic variables in discourse and the impact of sexual taboo in interaction. Relevant aspects of fieldwork, empathy and ethical protocols are also detailed in the paper. Transcription and markup are explained. Finally, an overview of the corpus is given, as well as some research papers based on it. Examples of the questionnaire are also provided.

We propose an analysis of mitigation in Spanish from the perspective of variation among spoken discourse genres (conversations, classroom interactions, parliamentary debates and sociolinguistic interviews). We rely on the analysis of mitigation in informal conversations and in interviews by Briz (2007), on Fraser (2010) and Blas Arroyo’s (2005) proposal concerning the impact of the conversational contract on the (un)marked nature of a strategy, and on the methodological proposal by Briz and Albelda (2013), in order to offer an analysis of some mitigation phenomena in peninsular Spanish. We show that, both for propositional and illocutive mitigation, phenomena are distributed unevenly across the discourse genres included in our study. It is thus clear that every genre has a specific profile as to the use of mitigation, which has an impact both on the analysis of mitigation and on the analysis of discourse genres. En este análisis, abordamos la atenuación en español desde la variación entre géneros discursivos orales (conversaciones, interacciones en clase, debates parlamentarios y entrevistas sociolingüísticas). Basándonos en el análisis de Briz (2007) de la atenuación en conversaciones informales y entrevistas, en la propuesta de Fraser (1990) y Blas Arroyo (2005) en cuanto al impacto del contrato conversacional en el carácter marcado o no de una estrategia, y en la propuesta metodológica presentada en Briz y Albelda (2013), proponemos un análisis de algunos fenómenos de atenuación en español peninsular. Mostramos que, tanto en la atenuación del decir como en la atenuación de lo dicho, los fenómenos se distribuyen de forma variada entre los géneros discursivos incluidos. Queda claro, pues, que cada género tiene un perfil distinto en cuanto al uso de la atenuación, lo que tiene un impacto a la vez en el análisis de la atenuación y en el análisis de géneros discursivos.

In this article, we show how the hashtag #jesuisCharlie, created following the attack on Charlie Hebdo, gave rise to the use of many other hashtags starting with #jesuis, across languages. Through a corpus-based analysis, we show how the meaning of #jesuis broadened from expressing condolence and support following terrorist attacks over expressing condolence for other (violent) deaths to a more general marker of solidarity and alignment. This broadening of meaning is parallel to a formal evolution of the stem jesuis. Moreover, these hashtags have become emblematic of a particular kind of Twitter user. Furthermore, disaligning uses developed, including mocking uses, which disalign both with certain causes (disalignment de re) and with the process of using jesuis as a means of expressing solidarity (disalignment de dicto). Thus, this variety of uses shows that Twitter users exploit the interpersonal possibilities of hashtags to express alignment and disalignment, creating ambient affiliation. (Hashtag, #jesuisCharlie, solidarity, alignment, emblem, mocking, pragmatic functions)*

Craniometry is a method of determining the occlusal vertical dimension (OVD); the current prediction models do not consider factors such as facial type and sex or normalizing the OVD by using 1 main variable.The purpose of this clinical study was to determine whether sex, facial type, and age can influence the creation of a predictive model by using the right or left eye-to-ear distance to determine the OVD in dentate and edentate individuals.Healthy individuals (N=385) (238 women, 147 men) aged between 18 and 50 years were classified according to sex, age, and facial type. A single operator recorded all distances in millimeters between the anatomic landmarks proposed by Knebleman (nose-to-chin and right and left eye-to-ear distances) by using a computer numerical control (CNC) machined aluminum anatomic gauge. Measurements were converted into z-scores to determine abnormal values (±3 standard deviations criteria). The Pearson correlation coefficient was calculated for each facial type and for the entire sample between nose-to-chin and the right and left eye-to-ear distances. Multiple regression analysis was performed to establish the dependence of the measured variables on the OVD and the development of a further predictive model (α=.05).According to the z-scores of the measured distances, 4 participants were discarded, leaving a final sample of 381 participants (237 women, 144 men; 115 leptoprosopic, 164 mesoprosopic, 102 euryprosopic). The left eye-to-ear distance showed a better correlation with the nose-to-chin distance (leptoprosopic r=0.54, mesoprosopic r=0.60, euryprosopic r=0.55, total sample=0.56) than the right eye-to-ear distance (leptoprosopic r=0.48, mesoprosopic r=0.56, euryprosopic r=0.54, total sample=0.51). Multiple regression analysis revealed that age was not a predictive variable (P=.57), that OVD depended on sex (P.001) and facial type (P.01), and that women had shorter OVD than men, as well as more euryprosopic faces than leptoprosopic faces. Using these relationships, the following equation to determine OVD was constructed as a model: OVD=42.17+(0.46×left eye-to-ear distance)+sex (women=-3.38, men=0)+facial type (leptoprosopic=0, mesoprosopic=-1.19, euryprosopic=-2.19).OVD depends on facial type and sex, both of which are craniometric variables. This study proposed a baseline method of determining OVD by using the left eye-to-ear distance as an initial reference that involves a straightforward mathematical calculation.

Dos elementos clave revelan un cambio de etapa en sociolingüística hacia una perspectiva más flexible: el estudio de la variación semántica y la inclusión de variables microsociológicas. Este artículo consiste en una propuesta teórica para combinar las dos perspectivas responsables de este cambio, respectivamente, la sociolingüística cognitiva y la Tercera Ola de los estudios de variación. Se localizan las conexiones teóricas entre ambas y se expone el programa para una sociolingüística cognitiva de la Tercera Ola. Combinando objetivos, métodos y herramientas de ambas, se subraya la necesidad de investigar la capacidad de la variación semántica para crear significado social. A diferencia de los trabajos sociolingüístico-cognitivos hasta ahora, se defiende una perspectiva ‘más sociolingüística’ tanto en la obtención de datos, como en la interpretación del significado de la variación para los hablantes en tanto que agentes sociales, como en la Tercera Ola de los estudios de variación. Two key elements reveal a step change in Sociolinguistics towards a more flexible perspective: the study of semantic variation and the inclusion of microsociological variables. This article is a theoretical proposal to combine the two perspectives that are responsible for this change: respectively, Cognitive Sociolinguistics and the Third Wave of Variation Studies. The theoretical connections between the two are located and the program for a Third Wave Cognitive Sociolinguistics is exposed. Combining objectives, methods and tools, this paper emphasizes the need to investigate how semantic variation creates social meaning. Unlike cognitive sociolinguistic works so far, the proposal defendes a “more sociolinguistic” perspective, both in data collection and in the interpretation of the meaning of variation for speakers as social agents, as in the Third Wave.

This chapter explores the applicability of the pragmeme framework (Mey 2001; Capone 2005; Allan 2010) to sociolinguistic interviews. It presents an analysis in terms of frequency of speakers’ answers to the same sequence of questions – specifically, polar questions – in a set of interviews in Spanish. The results show that, rather than a single polar element, most of the interviewees give an expanded polar answer, although the place of this expansion and the very presence or absence of an initial polar element may vary. The paper argues that the “expanded polar answer” is an interactional pragmeme with a dyadic nature. Due to the conventional common scene (Ranciere 1995, in Mey 2001) of the interview itself, the pragmeme is made relevant by the requirements of the situation, where the interviewee is supposed to provide information. It presents four allopracts more or less central in the category according to the presence of certain formal elements.

ResumenEste estudio analiza el impacto de la deuda con bonos y de la concentración de la propiedad, sobre la transparencia de la información, en las empresas chilenas. Las hipótesis sugeridas señalan que la deuda con bono y la concentración de la propiedad, deberían presentar un efecto significativo sobre la transparencia de la información. Para probar estas hipótesis se aplicó un modelo econométrico, utilizando la información publicada por sociedades anónimas chilenas, que mostraban deuda con bonos, en el periodo 2001-2005. Los resultados muestran que sólo las variables relacionadas con la concentración de la propiedad, se comportan conforme a lo esperado.AbstractThis study examines the impact of debt in bonds and the concentration of ownership on the transparency of information in Chilean companies. The suggested hypotheses point out that the debt in bonds and the concentration of ownership should have a significant effect on the transpar of information. To prove these hypotheses, an econometric model was used based on information made available by Chilean corporations showing debt in bonds from 2001 to 2005. The results show that only the variables related to the concentration of ownership behave as expected.

Nous présenterons une analyse de messages à la frontière entre opinion et discours de haine, basée sur un corpus de tweets de personnalités politiques belges francophones. Les tweets ont été collectés au cours de la campagne électorale de mai 2019 et durant les mois qui ont précédé cette campagne. Nous sélectionnons quatre personnalités importantes par parti. Nous montrerons que les messages du corpus analysé contiennent très peu de stratégies incitant ouvertement à la haine mais que certains messages se situent à la frontière entre opinion et discours de haine. Ceux-ci peuvent inclure des représentations polarisantes ou stéréotypées de certaines communautés, basées sur des critères liés à l’ethnicité, la religion ou l’orientation sexuelle. Nous analyserons les stratégies linguistiques utilisées pour construire ces représentations polarisantes, comme la déixis, la généralisation, le langage métaphorique, et la construction de l’agentivité et de l’intentionnalité. En outre, nous montrerons comment la combinaison de ces stratégies peut contribuer à la création d’un discours qui représente certaines communautés comme une menace. En dernier lieu, nous comparerons les résultats de cette analyse avec les productions des mêmes personnalités politiques sur Facebook.

In this study, we will present an analysis of discourses on the boundary between opinion expression and hatespeech, based on a corpus of online discourse of Belgian French-speaking politicians. Our corpus consists of the Facebook and Twitter productions from leading politicians from all major parties, which were collected one month right before and one month during the 2019 electoral campaign for the regional, national and European elections on May 26th 2019. While discourses falling within the legal qualification of hatespeech are extremely rare in this corpus, we will analyze the productions that are on the boundary between opinion expression and hatespeech, engaging in polarizing and stereotyping representations of certain communities based on criteria related to ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation. We look into the linguistic strategies that are used to construe these polarizing representations, such as the use of deictics, generalization, metaphorical language use, and the construction of agentivity and intentionality (i.e. the representation of certain actions as intentional deeds, thus construing e.g. an immigrant group as willingly harming the local population). We both analyze the use of these individual strategies in our corpus and show how they are combined in creating a discourse that represents these communities as a threat. Finally, we will also discuss to which extent there are differences between discourse produced before and during the electoral campaign. In doing so, we show how a detailed discursive analysis based on a corpus of contemporary online data can contribute to a better understanding of the general public debate and of people's conceptualisations concerning these communities.