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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Natalia, Friends,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Not an instance of the application of Zipf’s law, but still nice.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">I read that some young people in Colorado refer to the Corona virus as ‘boomer remover’. For those unfamiliar with the American expression ‘boomer’ look it up.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">All best,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Zygmunt<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;color:black">From: </span></b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;color:black">Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces@listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Natalia Levshina <natalevs@gmail.com><br>
<b>Date: </b>Saturday, May 2, 2020 at 4:47 AM<br>
<b>To: </b>"lingtyp@listserv.linguistlist.org" <lingtyp@listserv.linguistlist.org><br>
<b>Subject: </b>[Lingtyp] coronavirus and Zipf<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Dear colleagues,<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">I'm writing an informal blog post about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on language, with a focus on Zipf's correlation between frequency and word/expression length. For example, the clipping
<i>corona (</i>from<i> coronavirus) </i>is becoming increasingly popular in English: <a href="https://public.oed.com/blog/corpus-analysis-of-the-language-of-covid-19/">https://public.oed.com/blog/corpus-analysis-of-the-language-of-covid-19/</a> <o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">I also have some data from Dutch, German, Russian and Polish. I'm wondering how other languages behave in that respect. In particular,<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">1) Is there a shorter form for coronavirus, like <i>corona</i>? Can it only refer to the virus, or also to the pandemic and the disease?<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">2) If there is such a form, is it used widely or occasionally (e.g. humorously/creatively/in quotes)? For example, in Russian
<i>koronavirus</i> is the preferred form because <i>korona</i> means 'a crown'. There's an untranslatable Russian joke, <i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Prince Charles finally got a crown (korona), but it was the wrong one.</span></i><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">3) Is there a popular everyday (i.e. non-astronomic) meaning of the word that corresponds to corona in that language (e.g. a crown, like in Russian)?<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">4) Also, are there any other abbreviations or substitutions (e.g. the use of a shorter formally unrelated word, like
<i>car</i> instead of <i>automobile</i>) related to the pandemic you have observed?
<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">I promise to post a summary if I get enough interesting data.<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Many thanks and stay corona(virus)-free!<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Natalia Levshina<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">-- <o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt">Natalia Levshina</span> <o:p>
</o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">Wundtlaan 1, 6525 XD Nijmegen</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">The Netherlands</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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