ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates a linguistic approach to content analysis that applies semantic grammars to avoid some of the pitfalls of analyses based on aggregated event data. Semantic grammars organize text around a basic structure such as Subject-Action-Object and respective modifiers. Semantic grammars provide powerful tools for the collection of narrative data. Semantic grammars organize text according to a fixed linguistic structure. A semantic grammar consists of a template patterned after the canonical structure of a language. In terms of the text analysis theme of this collection, the analyses show the advantage of the formal application of semantic grammars in the quantification of narrative data. Whereas syntax grammars map the surface structure of texts into grammatical categories, semantic grammars map the deep structure of a text into a limited set of functionally defined categories. The industry-to-service shift in conflict also entailed a transition to a labor market that is less subject to the vagaries of the business cycle.
