Compiling a custom corpus and word list for ESAP : the case of English for geographers

Drašler, Andreja (avtor), Kavalir, Monika (avtor)

The study presents a step-by-step procedure for building a specialised corpus and compiling a technical word list to support instruction in English for Specific Academic Purposes (ESAP). Recognising the lack of suitable textbooks for a highly specialised ESAP course, a custom corpus of 1.4 million words was constructed to support the development of corpus-informed teaching materials for undergraduate geography students. The corpus was compiled from textbook chapters and journal articles that geography professors recommended as directly relevant to students. To ensure representativeness, the corpus was aligned with the first-year BA geography curriculum. A combined approach of keyword analysis and technicality was used to compile a geographical word list according to the following criteria: (1) simple maths keyness score in Sketch Engine, (2) minimum document frequency, (3) technicality (the inclusion of a term in a technical dictionary or its validation by a discipline-specific expert). Keyword analysis has shown that the vast majority (94.24%) of keywords and multi-word items extracted by Sketch Engine are technical and have thus been included in the final word list, which comprises 507 geographical terms relevant to students’ academic needs. More than half of these terms were incorporated into teaching materials, primarily selected based on topic relevance. This study proposes a corpus-informed methodology for designing teaching materials that is straightforward and user-friendly. It offers a practical and methodologically sound framework for ESP practitioners seeking to develop curriculum-aligned, custom corpora and discipline-specific word lists for teaching.

• Jezik: Angleški jezik
• Ključne besede: ESP, custom corpus, corpus building, geographical word list, technical vocabulary, technicality
• Vrsta gradiva: Članek v reviji
• Tipologija: 1.01 - Izvirni znanstveni članek
• Organizacija: FF - Filozofska fakulteta
• Status publikacije: Objavljeno
• Različica publikacije: Objavljena publikacija
• Leto izida: 2026
• Št. strani: Str. 92–102
• Številčenje: Vol. 81
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-182730
• UDK: 811.111'322:91
• ISSN pri članku: 0889-4906
• DOI: 10.1016/j.esp.2025.09.004
• COBISS.SI-ID: 253983747
• Datum objave v RUL: 21.05.2026

Gradivo je del revije

• Naslov: English for specific purposes
• Skrajšan naslov: Engl. specif. purp.
• Založnik: Elsevier
• ISSN: 0889-4906
• COBISS.SI-ID: 25398784

Licence

• Licenca: CC BY-NC 4.0, Creative Commons Priznanje avtorstva-Nekomercialno 4.0 Mednarodna
• Povezava: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/deed.sl
• Opis: Licenca Creative Commons, ki prepoveduje komercialno uporabo, vendar uporabniki ne rabijo upravljati materialnih avtorskih pravic na izpeljanih delih z enako licenco.

Sekundarni jezik

• Jezik: Slovenski jezik
• Ključne besede: AJS, namenski korpus, gradnja korpusa, seznam geografskega besedišča, strokovno besedišče, strokovnost

Projekti

• Financer: ARIS - Javna agencija za znanstvenoraziskovalno in inovacijsko dejavnost Republike Slovenije
• Številka projekta: P6-0218
• Naslov: Teoretične in aplikativne raziskave jezikov: kontrastivni, sinhroni in diahroni vidiki