ABSTRACT
GIS for language study is a relatively new phenomenon within digitally oriented linguistics that took shape during the so-called “spatial turn” within the humanities, beginning in the 1990s. Geographic information systems (GIS) is a framework used for spatial analysis across a large number of disciplines comprising a set of digital tools to manage, analyse, and visualise spatial data. Areas of application within linguistics range from dialectology and onomastics, fields where spatial perspectives have played a crucial role since their establishment, to general linguistics and philology, where interest in spatial aspects of language data analysis is growing. We will begin with the basic issues of geographical modeling of linguistic data (i.e. the possible relationships between linguistic data and spatial locations). The chapter will then offer an overview of the methodology for using GIS for language study, exploring GIS software, interactive GIS used in large-scale infrastructure projects, geocoding, data visualisation, georeferencing, and GIS-based computational analyses. We will pay special attention to geocoding and to the statistics of GIS-based spatial analysis. Discussion of methods is linked to the choice of research questions and materials, two other crucial components for conducting sound research.
