Lending bureaucracy voice: negotiating English in institutional encounters
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Abstract
This study explores how English, used in the context of university internationalisation, is habitually called upon to verbalize concepts and practices which are intimately tied to local settings but which do not necessarily have direct equivalents in English. Focusing on institutional encounters at a Danish university, the study illustrates how speakers negotiate expressions for local bureaucratic terms and procedures as well as their meaning, and argues that such instances of joint meaning making carry the potential to contribute to the hyper-local emergent register of English found in the setting. A key finding of the analysis is that speakers in the data are afforded different epistemic rights and obligations with relation to the lingua franca being used, depending on their institutional role, (inter)national status and general familiarity with the linguistic resources mobilised. English first language speakers are shown to be positioned as linguistic norm providers in several cases, but participants who use English as a foreign language also introduce new terms and re-define old ones, particularly when they use English to lend bureaucracy voice in interactional roles associated with institutional power. Methodologically, the chapter makes a case for the detailed study of social interaction in transient multilingual communities as a window on linguistic and social change, which may, as one avenue of future research, stimulate cross-fertilization between sociolinguistics and the emerging body of research on the use of English in lingua franca scenarios.
Abstract
This study explores how English, used in the context of university internationalisation, is habitually called upon to verbalize concepts and practices which are intimately tied to local settings but which do not necessarily have direct equivalents in English. Focusing on institutional encounters at a Danish university, the study illustrates how speakers negotiate expressions for local bureaucratic terms and procedures as well as their meaning, and argues that such instances of joint meaning making carry the potential to contribute to the hyper-local emergent register of English found in the setting. A key finding of the analysis is that speakers in the data are afforded different epistemic rights and obligations with relation to the lingua franca being used, depending on their institutional role, (inter)national status and general familiarity with the linguistic resources mobilised. English first language speakers are shown to be positioned as linguistic norm providers in several cases, but participants who use English as a foreign language also introduce new terms and re-define old ones, particularly when they use English to lend bureaucracy voice in interactional roles associated with institutional power. Methodologically, the chapter makes a case for the detailed study of social interaction in transient multilingual communities as a window on linguistic and social change, which may, as one avenue of future research, stimulate cross-fertilization between sociolinguistics and the emerging body of research on the use of English in lingua franca scenarios.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Table of contents v
- List of abbreviations vii
- Changing English: global and local perspectives xi
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I. Towards the study of Global English
- Editors’ Introduction to Part I 3
- Crisis of the “Outer Circle”? – Globalisation, the weak nation state, and the need for new taxonomies in World Englishes research 5
- The Ecology of Language and the New Englishes: toward an integrative framework 25
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II. Ongoing changes in Englishes around the globe
- Editors’ Introduction to Part II 59
- The Present Perfect as a core feature of World Englishes 63
- Innovative structures in the relative clauses of indigenized L2 Asian English varieties 89
- Morphosyntactic typology, contact and variation: Cape Flats English in relation to other South African Englishes in the Mouton World Atlas of Variation in English 109
- Omission of direct objects in New Englishes 129
- The definite article in World Englishes 155
- Aspects of Verb Complementation in New Zealand Newspaper English 169
- Extended uses of the progressive form in Inner, Outer and Expanding Circle Englishes 191
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III. Expanding the horizons: lingua franca, cognitive, and contact-linguistic perspectives
- Editors’ Introduction to Part III 219
- A glimpse of ELF 223
- Lending bureaucracy voice: negotiating English in institutional encounters 255
- On the relationship between the cognitive and the communal: a complex systems perspective 277
- Transfer is Transfer; Grammaticalization is Grammaticalization 311
- Subject index 331
- Languages and Varieties index 340
- Author Index 343
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Table of contents v
- List of abbreviations vii
- Changing English: global and local perspectives xi
-
I. Towards the study of Global English
- Editors’ Introduction to Part I 3
- Crisis of the “Outer Circle”? – Globalisation, the weak nation state, and the need for new taxonomies in World Englishes research 5
- The Ecology of Language and the New Englishes: toward an integrative framework 25
-
II. Ongoing changes in Englishes around the globe
- Editors’ Introduction to Part II 59
- The Present Perfect as a core feature of World Englishes 63
- Innovative structures in the relative clauses of indigenized L2 Asian English varieties 89
- Morphosyntactic typology, contact and variation: Cape Flats English in relation to other South African Englishes in the Mouton World Atlas of Variation in English 109
- Omission of direct objects in New Englishes 129
- The definite article in World Englishes 155
- Aspects of Verb Complementation in New Zealand Newspaper English 169
- Extended uses of the progressive form in Inner, Outer and Expanding Circle Englishes 191
-
III. Expanding the horizons: lingua franca, cognitive, and contact-linguistic perspectives
- Editors’ Introduction to Part III 219
- A glimpse of ELF 223
- Lending bureaucracy voice: negotiating English in institutional encounters 255
- On the relationship between the cognitive and the communal: a complex systems perspective 277
- Transfer is Transfer; Grammaticalization is Grammaticalization 311
- Subject index 331
- Languages and Varieties index 340
- Author Index 343
