Joron [Introduction]

What does Covid-19 pandemic imply for sociolinguistic research? Which elements of sociolinguistics need to be expanded and renewed? What social contributions can sociolinguistics make to societies after the pandemic? These are questions that need to be addressed henceforth and that will shape a large part of sociolinguistics in the next decade. After the pandemic, sociolinguistics must address new questions: "How does a corporate culture or learning culture come home?" "What is a good and appropriate mix of analog and digital?" How are the private and professional worlds separated in the home office? "Also, the rapidly advancing digital transformation demands willingness to change, and such predisposition to change differs according to country and across generations. The digital transformation is social, and it is communicative, and therefore a subject of study in sociolinguistics. Transformations will be reflected on all levels of description (lexicon, discourse, writing, etc.) and on all levels of social order (micro, meso, macro). Changes will be found in all research areas of sociolinguistics (generation, gender, migration, language policy, etc.). In this sense, the pandemic represents a unique opportunity for the renewal of sociolinguistics as such.