Culturomics Study Shows Patterns of Cultural Memory and Censorship

from regular verbs (regularity>50%). Six verbs became regular (upper left quadrant, blue), while two became wregular (lower right quadrant, red). Inset: the regularity of “chide” over time. (G) Median regularity of verbs whose past tense is often signified with a -t suffix instead of —-ed (burn, smell, spell, spill, dwell, learn, and spoil) in US (black) and UK (grey) books. Fig. 3. Cultural turnover is accelerating. (A) We forget: frequency of 1883 (blue), 1910 (green) and 1950 (red). Inset: We forget faster. The half-life of the curves (grey dots) is getting shorter (grey line: moving average). (B) Cultural adoption occurs faster. Median trajectory for three cohorts of inventions from three different time periods (1800-1840: blue, 1840-1880: green, 1880-1920: red). Inset: The telephone (green, date of invention: green arrow) and radio (blue, date of invention: blue arrow). (C) Fame of various personalities born between 1920 and 1930. (D) Frequency of the 50 most famous people born in 1871 (grey lines; median: dark gray). Five examples are highlighted. (E) The median trajectory of the 1865 cohort is characterized by four parameters: (1) initial “age of celebrity” (34 years old, tick mark); (ii) doubling time of the subsequent rise to fame (4 years, blue line); (ii1) “age of peak celebrity” (70 years after birth, tick mark), and (iv) half-life of the post-peak “forgetting” phase (73 years, red line). Inset: The doubling time and half-life over time. (F) The median trajectory of the 25 most famous personalities born between 1800 and 1920 in various careers. Fig. 4. Culturomics can be used to detect censorship. (A) Usage frequency of “Marc Chagall” in German (red) as compared to English (blue). (B) Suppression of Leon Trotsky (blue), Grigory Zinoviev (green), and Lev Kamenev (red) in Russian texts, with noteworthy events indicated: Trotsky’s assassination (blue arrow), Zinoviev and Kamenev executed (red arrow), the “Great Purge” (red highlight), perestroika (grey arrow). (C) The 1976 and 1989 Tiananmen Square incidents both lead to elevated discussion in English texts. Response to the 1989 incident is largely absent in Chinese texts (blue), suggesting government censorship. (D) After the “Hollywood Ten” were blacklisted (red highlight) from American movie studios, their fame declined (median: wide grey). None of them were credited in a film until 1960’s (aptly named) “Exodus.” (E) Writers in various disciplines were suppressed by the Nazi regime (red highlight). In contrast, the Nazis themselves (thick red) exhibited a strong fame peak during the war years. (F) Distribution of suppression indices for both English (blue) and German (red) for the period from 1933-1945. Three victims of Nazi suppression are highlighted at left (red arrows). Inset: Calculation of the suppression index for “Henri Matisse.” Fig. 5. Culturomics provides quantitative evidence for scholars in many fields. (A) Historical Epidemiology: “imfluenza” is shown in blue; the Russian, Spanish, and Asian flu epidemics are highlighted. (B) History of the Civil War. (C) Comparative History. (D) Gender studies. (E and F) History of Science. (G) Historical Gastronomy. (H) History of Religion: “God.” Sciencexpress / www.sciencexpress.org / 16 December 2010 / Page 7 / 10.1126/science.1199644 Downloaded from www.sciencemag.org on December 16, 2010 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_017002