Analyzing Online Communication from a Social Network Point of View: Questions, Problems, Perspectives
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Abstract
This programmatic paper investigates the possibilities, chances, and risks of analyzing personal and professional online communication from the point of view of interactional sociolinguistics combined with modern social network analysis (SNA). Thus, it has two complementing goals: One is the exploration of adequate, innovative concepts and methods for analyzing online communication, the other is to use online communication and its ontological and functional specificities to enrich the conceptual and methodological background of SNA. The paper is organized in two parts. It begins with an introduction to recent developments in sociolinguistic social network analysis. Here, three interesting new concepts and tools are discussed: latent versus emergent networks (Watts 1991), coalitions (Fitzmaurice 2000a, Fitzmaurice 2000b), and communities of practice (Wenger 1998; Eckert 2000). Part two then describes various types of online communication in personal and professional contexts from a social network point of view. In particular, this part addresses methodological and theoretical pros and cons of SNA with regard to online data.
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