Multilingualism, (Im)mobilities and Spaces of Belonging

Underlines that language can be a double-edged sword in that it may be the site of struggle while also being the means to overcome struggle

The chapters in this volume investigate how diverse forms of (im)mobility and multilingualism are (re-)negotiated in relationship to space, identity and power. The volume will be of particular interest to scholars taking ethnographic and critical sociolinguistic approaches to the study of language and belonging in the context of globalisation.

Kristine Horner is a sociolinguist at the University of Sheffield, UK, whose research focuses on the politics of language, language ideologies and multilingualism. She is the co-author (with Jean-Jacques Weber) of Introducing Multilingualism: A Social Approach (2017, Routledge).

Jennifer Dailey-O’Cain is a sociolinguist at the University of Alberta, Canada, with a research focus on everyday language in use, but always with an eye toward how this use relates to broader social phenomena such as identity, ideology, and globalisation. She is the author of Trans-National English in Social Media Communities (2017, Palgrave MacMillan).

Kristine Horner is a sociolinguist at the University of Sheffield, UK, whose research focuses on the politics of language, language ideologies and multilingualism. She is the co-author (with Jean-Jacques Weber) of Introducing Multilingualism: A Social Approach (2017, Routledge).

Jennifer Dailey-O’Cain is a sociolinguist at the University of Alberta, Canada, with a research focus on everyday language in use, but always with an eye toward how this use relates to broader social phenomena such as identity, ideology, and globalisation. She is the author of Trans-National English in Social Media Communities (2017, Palgrave MacMillan).

With a broad spectrum of research conducted in a wide range of contexts, this volume presents a vivid picture of multilingualism, (im)mobilities and spaces of belonging. It will serve as a highly recommended resource to readers who wish to understand the pivotal issue of language, empowerment and boundary making as well as breaking from a social-spatial perspective in the era of late modernity.

This book uniquely challenges notions of identity, authenticity, (un)belonging and (im)mobility. Several theories and methodologies, from linguistic landscapes to discourse analysis, address contexts of borders, transnational migration, and super-mobility. In dealing with some of today’s most burning issues, including place as shifting rather than fixed, the book stresses unpredictability as key to understanding today’s world.

The politics of belonging: Who belongs? Who does not? Who decides? This much-needed book invites us to explore such questions by looking into the complex intersectionality of space, language, identity and power. Insightful contributions are brought together to provide rigorous and lucid sociolinguistic analyses of processes of mobility and forms of immobility in rich and varied sites.