[Corpora-List] Diachronic frequency change

[Brett Reynolds]

The string "all of the", for example, demonstrates a dramatic increase in frequency as a percentage of the entire corpus leading up to about 1920 as can be seen in this Google Ngram graph:

http://tinyurl.com/c2mnoor

Since this is a percentage, it shows an increase relative to other words. if you wanted to test for significance, would it make sense to simply use this comparison (string vs entire corpus) or would it make more sense to compare it to another similar string such as "many of the"? What statistical test would you use? Would it be best to compare the nadir and the peak, or to repeatedly compare consecutive years?

I expect that the answers will be something like "that depends on your purpose." Currently, however, I don't really have a purpose. I'm just poking around, observing, and learning.

Best,
Brett

-----------------------
Brett Reynolds
English Language Centre
Humber College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
brett.reynolds at humber.ca





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