Leiden University Student Repository

Al-Darawsheh, Łukasz (2025)

Based and Meaningpilled: Using computational methods to explore neologisms use in the Polish incel community

Bachelor thesis | Taalwetenschap (BA)

This thesis presents a computational approach to the analysis and understanding of neologism use in Polish incel community, with additional focus on division between Polish neologisms and those borrowed from English. The work consists of two parts: constructing a reliable method for extraction of group-specific neologisms from large textual corpora, and analysis of said neologisms. The native neowords and borrowings seem to harmonically co-define the discourse space, which seems to be determined by themes of sexual frustration and need of belonging. Division between neologism source when referring to ingroup and outgroup members shows stratification in how the other is perceived and constructed linguistically. The Incels are investigated through two lenses – as a controversial and socially harmful group, whose language use should be studied, as well as a model for neology trends in online subcultures.

neology

topic modelling

word embeddings

distributional semantics

incels

Author

Al-Darawsheh, Łukasz

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Specialisation

Language and cognition

Supervisors

Prokic, Jelena

ECTS Credits

10

Language

en