Interpretable Models for Detecting Linguistic Variation in Russian Media: Towards Unveiling Propagandistic Strategies during the Russo-Ukrainian War

Anastasiia Vestel, Stefania Degaetano-Ortlieb


Abstract
With the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the spread of pro-Kremlin propaganda increased to justify the war, both in the official state media and social media. This position paper explores the theoretical background of propaganda detection in the given context and proposes a thorough methodology to investigate how language has been strategically manipulated to align with ideological goals and adapt to the changing narrative surrounding the invasion. Using the WarMM-2022 corpus, the study seeks to identify linguistic patterns across media types and their evolution over time. By doing so, we aim to enhance the understanding of the role of linguistic strategies in shaping propaganda narratives. The findings are intended to contribute to the broader discussion of information manipulation in politically sensitive contexts.
Anthology ID:
2025.latechclfl-1.11
Volume:
Proceedings of the 9th Joint SIGHUM Workshop on Computational Linguistics for Cultural Heritage, Social Sciences, Humanities and Literature (LaTeCH-CLfL 2025)
Month:
May
Year:
2025
Address:
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Editors:
Anna Kazantseva, Stan Szpakowicz, Stefania Degaetano-Ortlieb, Yuri Bizzoni, Janis Pagel
Venues:
LaTeCHCLfL | WS
SIG:
Publisher:
Association for Computational Linguistics
Note:
Pages:
109–116
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URL:
https://preview.aclanthology.org/landing_page/2025.latechclfl-1.11/
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Cite (ACL):
Anastasiia Vestel and Stefania Degaetano-Ortlieb. 2025. Interpretable Models for Detecting Linguistic Variation in Russian Media: Towards Unveiling Propagandistic Strategies during the Russo-Ukrainian War. In Proceedings of the 9th Joint SIGHUM Workshop on Computational Linguistics for Cultural Heritage, Social Sciences, Humanities and Literature (LaTeCH-CLfL 2025), pages 109–116, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Association for Computational Linguistics.
Cite (Informal):
Interpretable Models for Detecting Linguistic Variation in Russian Media: Towards Unveiling Propagandistic Strategies during the Russo-Ukrainian War (Vestel & Degaetano-Ortlieb, LaTeCHCLfL 2025)
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https://preview.aclanthology.org/landing_page/2025.latechclfl-1.11.pdf