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<p>Stalking has become an increasingly recognised concern in Malaysia since its criminalisation in 2023, yet its early manifestations often remain difficult to identify because they are embedded in ordinary, informal digital interaction. Defined as repeated and unauthorised intrusion into an individual’s life, stalking frequently unfolds through conversational practices that appear benign, socially acceptable, and relationally oriented. While existing research has examined stalking from behavioural, psychological, and legal perspectives, limited attention has been given to the linguistic mechanisms through which manipulation is enacted in everyday interaction. This study addresses this gap through a forensic-pragmatic analysis of authentic online conversations between a stalker and a victim. Drawing on a dataset of 33,929 words collected over a 60-day period, the analysis examines how routine conversational practices function interactionally to sustain access, normalise persistence, and erode relational boundaries over time. The findings identify a set of overlapping interactional patterns, including superficial normalcy, repeated offers and invitations, trust-building practices, excessive concern, and the emergence of surveillance-indexing knowledge claims. These patterns do not operate as fixed stages or overtly coercive acts, but co-occur and intensify cumulatively within an apparently benign conversational frame. The study further demonstrates how localised features of Malaysian English, such as discourse particles and localised tense marking, function as interactional resources that project familiarity and shared identity, contributing to the construction of pseudo-intimacy. To account for these dynamics, the study proposes the Malaysian English-based Linguistic Stalking and Localised Speech (MELLS) framework as an analytical scaffold for examining linguistic manipulation in digitally mediated stalking contexts, advancing linguistic approaches to technology-facilitated harm and offering tools relevant to forensic analysis and early intervention.</p>

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Linguistic manipulation and behavioural patterns of stalking: a case analysis in Malaysia

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  • 发表日期：

    2026年8月1日

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  • Azianura Hani Shaari,
  • Nur Baneen Natasya Mohd Fairul Aswan,
  • Mohamad Shazlan Mohd Ali Piah

摘要

Stalking has become an increasingly recognised concern in Malaysia since its criminalisation in 2023, yet its early manifestations often remain difficult to identify because they are embedded in ordinary, informal digital interaction. Defined as repeated and unauthorised intrusion into an individual’s life, stalking frequently unfolds through conversational practices that appear benign, socially acceptable, and relationally oriented. While existing research has examined stalking from behavioural, psychological, and legal perspectives, limited attention has been given to the linguistic mechanisms through which manipulation is enacted in everyday interaction. This study addresses this gap through a forensic-pragmatic analysis of authentic online conversations between a stalker and a victim. Drawing on a dataset of 33,929 words collected over a 60-day period, the analysis examines how routine conversational practices function interactionally to sustain access, normalise persistence, and erode relational boundaries over time. The findings identify a set of overlapping interactional patterns, including superficial normalcy, repeated offers and invitations, trust-building practices, excessive concern, and the emergence of surveillance-indexing knowledge claims. These patterns do not operate as fixed stages or overtly coercive acts, but co-occur and intensify cumulatively within an apparently benign conversational frame. The study further demonstrates how localised features of Malaysian English, such as discourse particles and localised tense marking, function as interactional resources that project familiarity and shared identity, contributing to the construction of pseudo-intimacy. To account for these dynamics, the study proposes the Malaysian English-based Linguistic Stalking and Localised Speech (MELLS) framework as an analytical scaffold for examining linguistic manipulation in digitally mediated stalking contexts, advancing linguistic approaches to technology-facilitated harm and offering tools relevant to forensic analysis and early intervention.