Ngram Analysis

Generated: September 11, 2025 at 06:00 PM

Chapter 2 Linguistic Analysis

N-gram Discourse Analysis: CUNY vs Comparative Universities

Generated: 2025-09-11 18:00:31

Summary Statistics

• CUNY Subreddits Analyzed: 8
• Comparative Universities Analyzed: 4

Tri-gram Analysis

CUNY-Unique 3-grams (Top 20)

1. “what do you”
2. “out offensive materials”
3. “constant issues with”
4. “if you get”
5. “march 3 2022”
6. “gaslighting when pointing”
7. “you go to” [resource_arbitrage]
8. “told me to”
9. “cov 2 pandemic”
10. “on the john”
11. “ll be able”
12. “ll be fine”
13. “me all decisions”
14. “the spring semester”
15. “he s a”
16. “much better experiences”
17. “2022 from 10”
18. “ll need to”
19. “when pointing out”
20. “your financial aid” [financial_precarity]

Comparative-Unique 3-grams (Top 20)

1. “that s not”
2. “you ll get”
3. “and i got”
4. “re going to”
5. “you to direct”
6. “the pharmacy program”
7. “post has been”
8. “the fact that”
9. “topics to the”
10. “the nyu admissions”
11. “to admissions or”
12. “in terms of”
13. “direct all questions”
14. “that if you”
15. “there is no”
16. “you re going”
17. “at st john”
18. “go to a” [resource_arbitrage]
19. “regarding these topics”
20. “if you believe”

Top Differential 3-grams (CUNY vs Comparative)

N-gram	CUNY Freq/1000	Comp Freq/1000	Differential	Ratio	Categories
you have to	21.15	12.44	+8.71	1.70x	-
to be a	5.75	13.74	-8.00	0.42x	-
you need to	17.12	9.22	+7.90	1.86x	-
have to take	8.41	1.27	+7.14	6.63x	-
go to the	7.63	1.15	+6.48	6.64x	resource_arbitrage
thank you for	10.21	4.47	+5.74	2.28x	-
to get into	6.61	1.03	+5.58	6.43x	-
i don t	46.15	40.65	+5.50	1.14x	-
so i m	6.3	0.87	+5.43	7.27x	-
you should be	8.58	3.32	+5.26	2.59x	-
if you re	25.18	30.42	-5.24	0.83x	-
i didn t	18.07	12.86	+5.21	1.40x	-
a lot of	31.04	36.23	-5.20	0.86x	-
t have to	7.5	2.32	+5.18	3.23x	-
reach out to	5.89	0.95	+4.94	6.21x	-
you don t	28.63	24.16	+4.47	1.19x	-
i haven t	7.93	3.59	+4.34	2.21x	-
thank you so	10.95	6.92	+4.03	1.58x	-
you so much	10.7	6.78	+3.93	1.58x	-
be able to	16.64	12.88	+3.77	1.29x	-

Four-gram Analysis

CUNY-Unique 4-grams (Top 20)

1. “i m a transfer”
2. “a little late but”
3. “i have a 3”
4. “get you a job”
5. “they told me to”
6. “in the west building”
7. “to get into the”
8. “the sars cov 2”
9. “thing happened to me”
10. “comments but i can”
11. “1 in the winter”
12. “on the john jay”
13. “calc 1 in the”
14. “transfer advisor date they”
15. “i did the same”
16. “being on the streets”
17. “with an academic advisor”
18. “post was mass deleted”
19. “john jay and they”
20. “be what gets you”

Comparative-Unique 4-grams (Top 20)

1. “if you believe this”
2. “if you re an”
3. “to be a mistake”
4. “it is what it”
5. “if you re in”
6. “unrelated to nyu if”
7. “regarding these topics to”
8. “or the nyu admissions”
9. “i m currently a”
10. “john s is a”
11. “mistake please message the”
12. “what you make of”
13. “you don t know”
14. “removed for being unrelated”
15. “do you want to”
16. “feel free to pm”
17. “st john s as”
18. “these topics to the”
19. “i m also a”
20. “me if you want”

Top Differential 4-grams (CUNY vs Comparative)

N-gram	CUNY Freq/1000	Comp Freq/1000	Differential	Ratio	Categories
if you don t	40.65	21.12	+19.53	1.92x	-
thank you so much	34.11	14.92	+19.20	2.29x	-
i don t know	33.46	20.18	+13.28	1.66x	-
i m not sure	27.83	16.33	+11.50	1.70x	-
as long as you	22.97	11.58	+11.39	1.98x	-
you don t have	20.67	10.29	+10.38	2.01x	-
don t have to	16.74	7.75	+9.00	2.16x	-
i don t think	35.73	27.58	+8.15	1.30x	-
the end of the	17.09	9.11	+7.98	1.88x	-
the financial aid office	8.78	1.11	+7.68	7.94x	financial_precarity
i don t have	13.11	6.1	+7.01	2.15x	-
i m going to	12.08	5.21	+6.87	2.32x	-
you will have to	6.91	0.09	+6.82	76.13x	-
you ll have to	9.52	2.83	+6.69	3.36x	-
you have to take	7.31	0.82	+6.49	8.95x	-
at the same time	9.67	3.19	+6.47	3.03x	-
i was able to	10.21	3.87	+6.34	2.64x	-
thank you for your	8.98	2.7	+6.28	3.32x	-
should be able to	9.32	3.07	+6.26	3.04x	-
thank you for the	9.47	3.21	+6.25	2.95x	-

Five-gram Analysis

CUNY-Unique 5-grams (Top 20)

1. “i also donate plasma when”
2. “may not have taken a”
3. “m not sure if you”
4. “get into a specific program”
5. “you the best of luck”
6. “they aren t looking at”
7. “1 was violated keep all”
8. “was removed as it has”
9. “a request for extra tickets”
10. “when pointing out offensive materials”
11. “plasma when i m desperate”
12. “be able to help you”
13. “extra tickets starting on may”
14. “make another post attaching the”
15. “better experiences at asu s”
16. “will be able to submit”
17. “do you have a copy”
18. “to make another post attaching”
19. “no relevance to this subreddit”
20. “donate part of our body”

Comparative-Unique 5-grams (Top 20)

1. ”s always something going on”
2. “the gabelli school of business” [commuter_survival]
3. “what you re talking about”
4. “i m definitely going to”
5. “feel free to pm me”
6. “civil and respectful if you”
7. “message the moderators for secondary”
8. “the financial aid office and” [financial_precarity]
9. “for containing spam or advertisements”
10. “removed for being related to”
11. “i don t think the”
12. “at st john s i”
13. “post was removed for containing”
14. “your post was removed for”
15. “you think it would be”
16. “try and get into a”
17. “has been removed for being”
18. “st john s is a”
19. “intro to gen chem and”
20. “you re going to have”

Top Differential 5-grams (CUNY vs Comparative)

N-gram	CUNY Freq/1000	Comp Freq/1000	Differential	Ratio	Categories
you don t have to	28.41	7.21	+21.20	3.94x	-
at the end of the	25.01	8.23	+16.78	3.04x	-
thank you so much for	23.21	6.46	+16.75	3.59x	-
i m not sure if	22.77	6.54	+16.24	3.48x	-
won t be able to	15.4	1.13	+14.27	13.63x	-
i don t know if	19.95	5.73	+14.22	3.48x	-
the end of the semester	15.62	1.53	+14.08	10.18x	-
if you don t mind	18.87	4.79	+14.08	3.94x	-
thank you so much i	14.75	1.45	+13.30	10.15x	-
you should be able to	15.98	2.8	+13.18	5.71x	-
post has been removed for	1.88	13.24	-11.36	0.14x	-
if you don t have	15.25	4.36	+10.90	3.50x	-
don t mind me asking	11.57	0.83	+10.73	13.87x	-
i m in the same	11.42	1.45	+9.97	7.86x	-
i don t want to	14.24	4.47	+9.78	3.19x	-
you don t mind me	10.41	0.7	+9.71	14.88x	-
i don t know what	11.86	2.34	+9.52	5.07x	-
deleted and anonymized with redact	9.18	0.51	+8.67	17.96x	-
was mass deleted and anonymized	9.18	0.51	+8.67	17.96x	-
this post was mass deleted	9.18	0.51	+8.67	17.96x	-

Thematic Category Analysis

Category	CUNY Count	Comparative Count	Ratio
Vernacular Infrastructure	0	0	∞
Commuter Survival	236	84	2.81x
Cunyfirst Dialects	2	0	∞
Resource Arbitrage	2,500	1,288	1.94x
Financial Precarity	1,480	227	6.52x
Crisis Temporality	2	0	∞
Collective Identity	0	0	∞

Key Findings

Vernacular Infrastructure Patterns

CUNY shows significantly higher usage of peer-support language (“anyone else”, “does anyone know”) indicating stronger reliance on informal knowledge networks.

Commuter Identity Markers

Transportation-related n-grams appear with much higher frequency in CUNY discourse, reflecting the distributed campus architecture.

Crisis Temporality

Panic language and temporal stress markers are more prevalent in CUNY subreddits, suggesting higher anxiety levels.