16 January: DCLRS -- Victoria Guillen & Dieter Stien, Friday, January 19, 16:00
Dublin Computational Linguistics Research Seminar: Index of January 2018 | Dublin Computational Linguistics Research Seminar - Index of year: 2018 | Full index
Friday of this week (January 19), at 16:00, in room 3074 of the Arts
Building (TCD), Prof. Victoria Guillen (University of Alicante) and
Prof. Dieter Stein (Heinrich-Heine University Duesseldorf) speak.
Title:
Forensic Linguistics & Language Crimes: The Linguistics of Mobbing in
the Workplace
Abstract:
Within the framework of forensic linguistics, e.g. an applied branch
of linguistics that is concerned with the scientific study of
evidential language, this talk focuses on a particular type of
language crime, "mobbing in the workplace", also referred to as
"workplace bullying". "Mobbing in the workplace" refers to the
systematic succession of acts of hostile and unethical communication,
which one or a few individuals maliciously direct over a significant
period towards a targeted person, designed to secure the removal from
the organisation of the victim, who experiences a profound sense of
shame and powerlessness (Leyman, 1990). The foundational research on
this phenomenon expanded in the 1990s with the work of German-Swedish
psychologist Leyman (1990; Leymann & Gustafsson, 1996). Since then,
because of the worldwide interest in the topic, a considerable body of
research has been developed in multiple fields, such as social
psychology, sociology, conflict resolution, law, nursing, medicine,
traumatology, and occupational health, to name the major disciplines
involved up to now (Duffy & Sperry, 2012: 23). On reviewing the
literature, however, one major weakness stands out. Specifically, no
dedicated specifically linguistic research exists in the analysis of
mobbing.
The aim of this talk is to present our research in progress concerning
the characterisation of "mobbing in the workplace" activity from the
theoretical point of view of modern theory of genre (Levinson 1979:
365-399; Biber 1995; Giltrow & Stein 2009). Our research takes a
closer look at the surface side and tries to identify less abstract,
surface based elements of cohesion, with a view to identifying
linguistic structures that may be indicators or diagnostic symptoms
for describing and recognizing a macro-act of mobbing. The linguistic
analysis is data based. For purposes of analysis, a short selection of
relevant cases of mobbing will serve as a basis to draw some
generalising statements about the linguistic cohesive principles
operating in mobbing as a specific type of genre involving the
malicious use of language.
We hope our research may contribute to shed new light on the study of
workplace bullying from the linguistic theory of genre, as well as to
provide the administration, and especially courts, with strong
linguistic evidence when it is already too late to prevent the
offence.
REFERENCES
Biber, D. (1995). Dimensions of register variation. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Duffy, M., & Sperry, L. (2012). Mobbing. New York: Oxford University
Press.
Giltrow, J., & Stein, D. (2009). Genres in the Internet. Issues in the
theory of genre. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Levinson, S. C. (1979). Activity types and language. Linguistics, 17, 365-399.
Leymann, H. (1990). Mobbing and psychological terror at work. Violence
and Victims 5(2), 119-126.
Leymann, H., & Gustafsson, A. (1996). Mobbing at work and the
development of post-traumatic stress disorders. European Journal of
Work and Organizational Psychology 5(2), 251-275.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Victoria Guillen holds a PhD in Applied Linguistics from the
University of Alicante (1993) and a Master's degree in Forensic
Linguistics from Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona (2008). At
present, she is a tenured Associate Professor at the University of
Alicante where she directs the Master's program in English and Spanish
for Specific Purposes and teaches Applied Linguistics and Forensic
Linguistics. She has worked as expert witness in Spain, Germany and
the US. She is currently doing research on language crimes, e.g. the
linguistics of mobbing in the workplace, defamation, and hate speech.
Dieter Alfred Stein is Emeritus chair of English Linguistics at
Heinrich-Heine-University Duesseldorf. One main focus of his work is
language development, others deal with pragmatics, open access
publishing, the linguistics of the Internet and, as a most recent
addition, language in the legal domain. In addition to teaching at his
home university, he teaches at several foreign universities including
China and the law school of UCLA Los Angeles.
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The Dublin Computational Linguistics Research Seminar series, hosted
this year by the Trinity Centre for Computing and Language Studies, is
a cooperation among Trinity College Dublin, Dublin City University,
University College Dublin and the Dublin Institute of Technology, a
long standing collaboration which overlaps with the SFI CNGL/ADAPT
centres.
www.scss.tcd.ie/disciplines/intelligent_systems/clg/clg_web/DCLRS
Trinity Centre for Computing and Language Studies
www.scss.tcd.ie/CCLS
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