Language and digital communication

Language and communication in digital media are the subject of both ongoing public debate and thirty years of interdisciplinary research. This handbook summarises the results of this research with a focus on linguistics. The articles, written by recognised experts, offer insights into the interdependencies of technical platforms (including smartphones and social media) and semiotic resources (written and spoken language, icons, memes and other digital text artefacts) in the constitution of interaction and sociality as well as society and discourse. The articles examine these interactions at different levels of description. The topics include basic linguistic-semiotic structures and their change (including punctuation, vocabulary, pictorial symbols), conditions and processes of digitally mediated interaction, the emergence of new communication practices and the dynamics of digital discourses in politics and society. The handbook is aimed at students and academics from all disciplines.