This book presents the first large-scale usage-based investigation of the conventionalization process of English neologisms in the online speech community. It strings together findings and assumptions from lexicological, sociolinguistic and cognitive research and supplements the existing theories with novel data-driven insights.

Daphné Kerremans studied English Linguistics and Phonetics at the University of Regensburg and Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (both Germany). She holds a PhD from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, where she works at the Chair of Modern English Linguistics. Her research interests include usage-based word-formation and lexicology, lexicography, corpus linguistics, cognitive sociolinguistics and semantics.

Contents: Neologisms – Lexical Innovation – Diffusion – Conventionalization – Cognition – Mental Lexicon – Online Speech Community – Sociopragmatic Analysis – Collocation – Emergence of Syntagmatic Networks – Accommodation – Webcrawler – Conventionalization Continuum – Nameworthiness.