Contextualising and mapping genre-based metalinguistic terms in Early Modern English

Abstract This article argues that through contextualising metalinguistic terms surrounding several dramatic genres in the Early Modern English period, we can begin to uncover more about the contemporary understanding and use of this genre-based terminology. Specifically focusing on the collocations for the genres ‘comedy’, ‘tragedy’ and ‘tragicomedy’ in the Early English Books Online (EEBO-TCP) corpus on CQPweb, this article explores how these genres may have been discussed and recorded in early modern print culture. The article offers an exploration into whether collocation networks offer a productive means of investigating these sorts of metalinguistic terms in early modern discourse. Using this exploratory method, the extracted terms and their corresponding collocations are mapped onto collocation networks which illustrate both unique and shared collocates between the terms considered. These networks provide some linguistic insight into how these terms are used and understood in the period. With inspection of the concordance lines, several observations about the nature of the discursive contexts of these terms can be made. The exploratory collocation networks have revealed more about the discourse surrounding these terms and the different discourse contexts in which these terms occur, including: the classical influence on genres, genre as a marketing and conceptual category in early modern print, and contemporary metaphorical associations of terms. In addition, potential issues related to EEBOv3 are highlighted, including bias towards certain types of texts like catalogues and the issue of spelling irregularities.