Introducing the keyconcept approach to the analysis of language: the case of regulation in COVID-19 diaries.

Using the Mass Observation corpus of 12 of May Diaries, we investigate concepts that are characteristic of the first coronavirus lockdown in the UK. More specifically, we extract and analyse concepts which are distinctive of the discourses produced in May 2020 in relation to concepts used in the 10 previous years, 2010-2019. In the current paper we focus on the concept of regulation, which we identify through a novel approach to querying semantic content in large datasets.