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As Sinclair (2004: 30) points out, ‘so-called "fixed phrases" are not in fact fixed; there are very few invariable phrases in English.’ Consequently, any exploration of formulaic language needs to consider not only their structural forms but also their contextual functions. To this end, we analyse repeated clusters of words (n-grams) from Early English Books Online (EEBO) and subject our results to qualitative analysis using analytical frameworks from both classical rhetoric and stylistics. With regard to the former… With regard to the latter, we pay particular attention to discourse presentation (i.e. the techniques used to present the speech and thought of third parties).

We extracted our clusters from the entire EEBO collection, as curated by the Oxford Text Archive. The corpus consists of 60,328 printed works, with approximately 1.5 billion words. Our study therefore constitutes what is likely to be the largest extraction of n-grams from a historical corpus of English to date. The n-gram frequency lists are all made freely available online via the Oxford Text Archive.

Preliminary analysis of the most frequent 4-, 5-, and 6-word clusters reveals a preponderance of formulaic expressions from religious texts, often bible quotations or popular prayers and other ritual expressions. Our analysis of the rhetorical and stylistic functions of these clusters allows insight not only into the nature of formulaic expression in Early Modern English but also the nature of interpersonal communication in this period. In this respect, our study demonstrates the capacity of large corpora of written material to offer insights into the nature of communication across both writing and speech.

Increasingly, academics are called  upon to demonstrate the value of linguistics and explain their research to the wider public. In support of this agenda, Communicating Linguistics: Language, Community and Public Engagement provides an overview of the wide range of public engagement activities currently being undertaken in linguistics, as well as practically focused advice aimed at helping linguists to do public engagement well. From podcasts to popular writing, from competitions to consultancy, from language creation to community projects, there are many ways in which linguists can share their research with the public. Bringing together insights from leading linguists working in academia as well as non-university professions, this unique collection:

• Provides a forum for the discussion of challenges and opportunities of public engagement in linguistics in order to shape best practice
• Documents best practice through a summary of some of the many excellent public engagement projects currently taking place internationally
• Celebrates the long tradition of public engagement in linguistics, a discipline which is often misunderstood despite its direct and fundamental importance to everyday life

Breaking down long-standing divisions between universities and the wider community, this book will be of significant value to academics in linguistics but also teachers, policy makers and anyone interested in better understanding the nature and use of language in society.

Being a public linguist does not have to mean appearing regularly on TV or radio. There are many other ways in which academics can engage the public with their research. Dan McIntyre and Lesley Jeffries did it by starting a magazine. In this chapter, they explain how they went about the process, how they built a brand and found an audience for their work and what benefits they have seen from the work they have done. They also offer some general points about public engagement to be learned from their experiences.

In this chapter, Hazel Price and Dan McIntyre provide a brief historical overview of public linguistics. They offer a typology of public engagement in linguistics, suggesting that there are essentially four models of public engagement: (i) acquisitional, (ii) contributory, (iii) transactional and (iv) reciprocal. They argue that a reciprocal approach to public engagement is the ideal, with the caveat that the extent of reciprocity may vary according to the project in question.

Mick Short is Professor Emeritus of English Language and Literature at Lancaster University, UK. He studied English at the University of Lancaster from 1965, just one year after the university first opened, to 1968. He returned to teach at Lancaster in 1972, retiring in 2012. As an undergraduate he was taught by the early stylistician and poet Anne Cluysenaar,(1) who was instrumental in setting him on track for an academic career in stylistics. In 1979 he, Katie Wales, Ron Carter and others founded the Poetics and Linguistics Association. Then, in 1992 he became the first editor of Language and Literature. In this interview, he explains how he came to be interested in stylistics, as well as how his academic career began. He discusses what it was like to teach and research stylistics in its early days, the influence of structuralism on stylistics, the beginnings of discourse and pragmatic stylistics and the importance of corpus tools for moving stylistics forwards. He also sets out some concerns about current stylistics and how these concerns might be met in future.