Bibliometric analysis of Asian ‘language and linguistics’ research: A case of 13 countries

Abstract

The foci of voluminous bibliometric studies on ‘language and linguistics’ research are limited to specific sub-topics with little regional context. Given the paucity of relevant literature, we are relatively uninformed about the regional trends of ‘language and linguistics’ research. This paper aims to analyze research developments in the field of ‘language and linguistics’ in 13 Asian countries: China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Japan, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Turkey. This study probed 30,515 articles published between 2000 and 2021, assessing each within four major bibliometric perspectives: (1) productivity, (2) authorship and collaborations, (3) top keywords, and (4) research impact. The results show that, in Asian ‘language and linguistics’ research, the relative contributions made by the 13 countries comprised 85% of the total number of articles produced in Asia. The other 28 Asian countries’ output, for the past two decades, never surpassed that of the individual 13 countries. Among the 13 countries, the most prolific were China, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan; they especially published most articles in international core journals. In contrast, Indonesia, Iran, and Malaysia published more in regional journals. Traditionally, research on each country’s national language(s) and dialects were chiefly conducted throughout a period of 22 years. In addition, coping with internationalization worldwide, from 2010 onward, topics related to ‘English’ were of burgeoning interest among Asian researchers. Asian countries often collaborated with each other, and they also exerted a high degree of research influence on each other. The present study was designed to contribute to the literature on the comprehensive bibliometric analyses of Asian ‘language and linguistics’ research.