Аннотация:This article presents the ideas behind informal text analytics (ITA) and the methodology for expert text analysis (META) as a tool of informal text analytics. The author addresses the interconnections between the text and the context in analytics. Immanuel Kant's ideas are considered as a methodological framework for ITA. At the same time, the article provides a comparative analysis of formal and informal analytics and emphasises the role of ITA in analytical practices and the possibility to hold a 'dialogue through centuries', particularly, with texts dating back to eras of the past. In this work, the author interprets the concept of text as any possible semiotic situation. The article stresses the decisive contribution made by Mikhail Bakhtin to formulating the theoretical problem of dialogue-based relations between the author and the reader. It is shown that there is always a conceptual framework behind a professional vision of the world.