The social and the cultural orders are dual – that is, they constitute each other. To understand either we need to account for both. Socio-semantic network analysis brings together the study of relations among actors (social networks), relations among elements of actors’ cultural structures (their semantic networks), and relations among these two orders of networks. In this introductory essay, we describe how the duality of the social and semantic networks that constitute each other, as well as other related dualities (including material / symbolic, micro / macro, computational / qualitative, in-presence contexts / online contexts, ‘Big’ data / ‘thick’ data), have evolved in recent decades to mold socio-semantic network analysis into its present form. In doing so, we delineate the current state of the art and the main features of socio-semantic network analysis as highlighted by the papers included in this Special Issue. These articles range from in-depth analysis of ‘thick’ data on small group interactions to automated analysis of ‘Big’ online data in contexts extending from Renaissance parliamentary discussions to cutting-edge global scientific fields of the 21^st century. We conclude by delineating current problems of and future prospects for socio-semantic network analysis.

社会和文化秩序是双重的，也就是说，它们是相互构成的。要理解这两种情况，我们都需要考虑两者。社会语义网络分析汇集了参与者之间的关系（社会网络），参与者文化结构要素之间的关系（其语义网络）以及这两个网络顺序之间的关系。在这篇介绍性文章中，我们描述了彼此构成的社交网络和语义网络的对偶性，以及其他相关对偶性（包括物质/符号，微观/宏观，计算/质性，在场上下文/在线上下文，'大数据/厚数据）在最近几十年中得到了发展，以将社会语义网络分析塑造成目前的形式。在此过程中，我们描述了本期特刊以及社会语义网络分析的主要特征，这本特刊中的论文对此进行了重点介绍。这些文章的范围从深入“分析厚的小团体互动，从文艺复兴到21的前沿全球科学领域的议会讨论延长上下文的“大”在线数据自动分析”数据^ST世纪。最后，我们概述了社会语义网络分析的当前问题和未来前景。