Using the Ucrel Automated Semantic Analysis System to Investigate Differing Concerns in Refugee Literature

Forced Migration Online (FMO) provides instant access to a wide variety of online resources dealing with forced migrants, and their plight worldwide. The online International Thesaurus of Refugee Terminology (ITRT), in turn, provides users with refugee-related terminology in three languages (English, French and Spanish). The FMO data can already be searched thematically as well as regionally. Typical themes include ‘children and adolescents’, ‘food’, ‘reproductive health’, and ‘humanitarian assistance’. In this paper, we show how the UCREL Semantic Annotation Scheme (USAS), a software program for automatic dictionary-based content analysis, might be used to enable users to extend their thematic searches of the FMO data so that they include the classes or domains identified in ITRT or, indeed, more general semantic categories (such as those utilised by USAS). The two-step process involves: (i) Semantically tagging the FMO data, using USAS. (ii) Mapping the tags assigned by USAS to the ITRT classes. We also show how semantic annotation using more general semantic (i.e. USAS) categories might be used to assess the differing concerns, attitudes and, possibly, worldviews of the various authors and/or organisations who produce refugee data.