Language and interaction: applying sociolinguistics to social network analysis

Abstract

In recent years social network analysis, influenced by relational sociology, has taken a cultural turn. One result has been a growing interest in the cultural, and not just structural, aspects of social networks. And yet, while relational literature conceptualizes network ties as being interactionally constructed through cultural processes, relationalist inspired quantitative network analysts have rarely made face-to-face interaction a focus of study. More often, these scholars have adopted an interpretive approach and examined the network structure of cultural forms and belief systems. This article argues that network analysis is missing an opportunity to study procedural aspects of culture by taking advantage of our growing ability to collect and analyze streaming data of face-to-face interaction. To productively do so, however, network studies of interaction can apply ideas from sociolinguistics related to the context and style of communication in order to capture cultural aspects of interaction.