Estudiando puentes culturales a través de análisis de redes de texto : Una aplicación al proceso constitucional chileno

A recurring feature of social interactions is the multivocality of meanings. Oftentimes, the same words have different meanings for different actors. These distinctions generate symbolic boundaries and hinder inter-group communication, which has been hitherto studied mainly through qualitative methods. Based on the idea of the relationality of meanings in cultural sociology, this study illustrates the potential applications of text network analysis as an alternative method to study multivocality. Thus, we examine the multivocality of terms in the corpus of norms (N = 2,496) proposed by ordinary citizens and civic organizations during the Chilean constitutional process. Using the declaration of principles of the Chilean political parties across the political spectrum as a dictionary, norm proposals are ideologically classified. The analyses suggest a high level of multivocality among groups when analyzing high-frequency terms. These results highlight the difficulties of reaching political consensus in the definition of constitutional norms proposed by citizens themselves. In sum, our analysis shows how social scientists can leverage network analyses to understand the multivocality of meanings and open new avenues for research on the relationality of culture.