Understanding threats: Language and genre

Recent years have seen an increase in threatening messages, not least through social media. Threats are meant to instil fear in their recipients; an effect produced largely by the use of language. While practitioners offer 'threat assessments' to determine the seriousness and intent of threats, basic research on threatening language and the genre of threats remains minimal.

The project 'Understanding threats' proposes an innovative combination of linguistics and genre studies to offer in-depth analyses of a text type that causes severe distress but lacks scientific research.  

Given the pervasive nature of legislation upon any aspect of society, citizens cross paths with the legal system in myriad ways, leaving linguistic traces opportune for academic scrutiny. The combined forces of forensic linguistics and rhetorical genre studies promise new insights into threats and other illicit genres formed in the shadows of society. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project participants

Name Title Phone E-mail
Auken, Sune Associate Professor +4520562022 E-mail
Christensen, Tanya Karoli Professor +4535328493 E-mail