Tracing the grammar–discourse interface in Spanish (2000–2025): A bibliometric analysis of epistemological shifts

Abstract

This study provides a bibliometric analysis of the grammar–discourse interface in Spanish-language academic production between 2000 and 2025. It aims to identify how theoretical frameworks, methodological practices, and research trends have evolved in the field over time. The analysis is based on a corpus drawn from Google Scholar and CORE, combining automated topic modelling with qualitative analysis of research domains. The findings reveal a clear shift from predominantly theoretical approaches toward empirically grounded, interdisciplinary, and computationally oriented paradigms. Functionalist frameworks—especially Systemic Functional Linguistics and Functional Discourse Grammar—emerge as central in articulating the relationship between grammatical structure and communicative context. At the same time, the field has expanded toward new domains, including academic literacy, political discourse, and social media, where grammar is increasingly examined as embedded in multimodal and ideological practices. Taken together, the results position the grammar–discourse interface as a productive domain for understanding how linguistic structure and social meaning interact in contemporary discourse.