Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint
Using Hebrews as a test case, we investigate how an author’s participation in his literary network influences his writing habits. Our theoretical framework is that no author writes in a vacuum: all authors recycle stylistic habits from their literary contemporaries. We develop and implement a statis...
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
MDPI AG
2025-01-01
|
| Series: | Religions |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/16/1/55 |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1832587678245191680 |
|---|---|
| author | Erich Benjamin Pracht Thomas McCauley |
| author_facet | Erich Benjamin Pracht Thomas McCauley |
| author_sort | Erich Benjamin Pracht |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Using Hebrews as a test case, we investigate how an author’s participation in his literary network influences his writing habits. Our theoretical framework is that no author writes in a vacuum: all authors recycle stylistic habits from their literary contemporaries. We develop and implement a statistical procedure to trace stylistic influences, both in terms of which texts in an author’s literary network are influential and also in terms of which text-features are suggestive of influence. Stylistic units of analysis in this study are two-word sequences (N-Grams), 40 of which recur in Hebrews as a function of influence from the author’s literary network. We find that the author of Hebrews shares stylistic micro-patterns particularly with his co-religionists, which indicates that, already in New Testament times, the literature of emerging Christianity was developing a distinctive stylistic fingerprint, the features of which were transferred from one author to another. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-d95b3a15dfb8441890d8513f90871d49 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2077-1444 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Religions |
| spelling | doaj-art-d95b3a15dfb8441890d8513f90871d492025-01-24T13:47:27ZengMDPI AGReligions2077-14442025-01-011615510.3390/rel16010055Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic FingerprintErich Benjamin Pracht0Thomas McCauley1School of Culture and Society, Aarhus University, 8000 Aarhus, DenmarkMath Department, Arlington High School, Arlington, MA 02476, USAUsing Hebrews as a test case, we investigate how an author’s participation in his literary network influences his writing habits. Our theoretical framework is that no author writes in a vacuum: all authors recycle stylistic habits from their literary contemporaries. We develop and implement a statistical procedure to trace stylistic influences, both in terms of which texts in an author’s literary network are influential and also in terms of which text-features are suggestive of influence. Stylistic units of analysis in this study are two-word sequences (N-Grams), 40 of which recur in Hebrews as a function of influence from the author’s literary network. We find that the author of Hebrews shares stylistic micro-patterns particularly with his co-religionists, which indicates that, already in New Testament times, the literature of emerging Christianity was developing a distinctive stylistic fingerprint, the features of which were transferred from one author to another.https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/16/1/55Hebrewsinfluencestylestylometryintertextualitycorpus linguistics |
| spellingShingle | Erich Benjamin Pracht Thomas McCauley Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint Religions Hebrews influence style stylometry intertextuality corpus linguistics |
| title | Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint |
| title_full | Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint |
| title_fullStr | Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint |
| title_full_unstemmed | Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint |
| title_short | Style and Influence: Computing Hebrews and the Early Christian Stylistic Fingerprint |
| title_sort | style and influence computing hebrews and the early christian stylistic fingerprint |
| topic | Hebrews influence style stylometry intertextuality corpus linguistics |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/16/1/55 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT erichbenjaminpracht styleandinfluencecomputinghebrewsandtheearlychristianstylisticfingerprint AT thomasmccauley styleandinfluencecomputinghebrewsandtheearlychristianstylisticfingerprint |