Project Details
Description
The Newbuild Naming project is an ongoing international and interdisciplinary collaboration between Andrew Smith (University of Hertfordshire), an urban planner and geographer, and Professor Saskia Kersten (LMU), an applied linguist with a research focus on socio-onomastics. A further member of the project team is the student assistant working for Prof Kersten at LMU.
We are currently working on a data collection and analysis pilot in preparation for our accepted panel contribution at the IPra 2025 conference in Brisbane, Australia (22 to 27 June 2025) and presentation of a paper at the UK and Ireland Planning Conference 2025 in Belfast, Northern Island, UK (10 to 12 September 2025). The aim of these conference presentations are to outline the methodology of our project and to share some preliminary data and findings from our pilot study to get feedback from peers in the disciplines of corpus linguistics, pragmatics, urban planning and housing research. There is of yet very little in terms of this kind of interdisciplinary research, but there is a growing interest in the commodification of names and naming and so-called onomastic capital (Puzey, Vuolteenaho & Wolny 2021), making our project very timely.
We would welcome any interest from researchers and practitioners working in and between these disciplines to further this research.
Reference
Puzey, G., Vuolteenaho, J., & Wolny, M. (2021). Signals of onomastic capital: From transhistorical roots to the contemporary globalized trend of sponsored names. Nordic Journal of Socio-Onomastics, 1, 137–186. https://doi.org/10.59589/noso.12021.14731
We are currently working on a data collection and analysis pilot in preparation for our accepted panel contribution at the IPra 2025 conference in Brisbane, Australia (22 to 27 June 2025) and presentation of a paper at the UK and Ireland Planning Conference 2025 in Belfast, Northern Island, UK (10 to 12 September 2025). The aim of these conference presentations are to outline the methodology of our project and to share some preliminary data and findings from our pilot study to get feedback from peers in the disciplines of corpus linguistics, pragmatics, urban planning and housing research. There is of yet very little in terms of this kind of interdisciplinary research, but there is a growing interest in the commodification of names and naming and so-called onomastic capital (Puzey, Vuolteenaho & Wolny 2021), making our project very timely.
We would welcome any interest from researchers and practitioners working in and between these disciplines to further this research.
Reference
Puzey, G., Vuolteenaho, J., & Wolny, M. (2021). Signals of onomastic capital: From transhistorical roots to the contemporary globalized trend of sponsored names. Nordic Journal of Socio-Onomastics, 1, 137–186. https://doi.org/10.59589/noso.12021.14731
Layman's description
This project is a study how new housing developments get their names, combining insights from linguistics and urban planning. Our goal is to understand trends, meanings, and marketing strategies behind place names.
Key findings
TBC/Ongoing
| Short title | New Build Naming Conventions |
|---|---|
| Status | Active |
| Effective start/end date | 1/02/25 → … |
Fingerprint
Explore the research topics touched on by this project. These labels are generated based on the underlying awards/grants. Together they form a unique fingerprint.