The book is a collection of articles that address the theme of linguistic variation in English in its broadest sense. Current research in English language presented in the book explores a broad range of topics, whose unifying element is the corpus linguistic methodology.
Part I of this volume, Meaning in Time and Space, introduces the two dimensions of variation - time and space - relating them to the negotiation of meaning in discourse and questions of intertextuality. Part II, Variation in Time, approaches the English language from a diachronic point of view; the time periods covered vary considerably, ranging from 16th century up to present-day; so do the genres explored.
Part III, Variation in Space, focuses on global varieties of English and includes a contrastive point of view. The range of topics is again broad - from specific lexico-grammatical structures to the variation in academic English, combining the regional and genre dimensions of variation.