Arabic Nominalization as Form of Pragmatic Actions in Digital Discourse: A Corpus-Based Study

This article aims to provide a corpus-based study on Arabic nominalization as form of pragmatic actions in digital discourse, utilizing posts from X (formerly Twitter). This study examines how nominalization functions pragmatically to shape meaning, frame discourse, and reflect sociocultural and political ideologies. These themes were found to be productive in sociocultural, political, and identity-related discourses resulting in 5705 nominals in a period spanning over 5 months. The corpus was compiled using Python 3.11.9 targeting only public pages, and every possible action was taken to maintain adherence to X.com’s terms of use, and to safeguard X.com pages’ privacy, coming up with 9 nominalization patterns such as تفاعُل, تفعُّل, مفعلة, فعالة, and فَعْلة. Findings reveal that nominalization frequently encapsulates various sociocultural and political stances constructing several pragmatic themes: Arab identity and nationalism, uncertainty about the future, State-people divide, nostalgia for the past, and hope for a better tomorrow. The study concludes that Arabic nominalization serves not only as a linguistic resource, but also as a powerful discursive/pragmatic strategy in Arabic social media, enabling users to package ideas persuasively and frame social realities.