Volume 45, Issue 1

In the context of minoritised languages, efforts to strengthen the use of these languages and to gain new speakers tend to offer interesting research topics. Linguistic mudas related to activating speakers are also located in this context. This study examines the linguistic mudas of university students. Participants in the study were pre-service primary school teachers at the Donostia/San Sebastián campus of the University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, and both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to gather the data (292 questionnaires and 15 focus group discussions). The results show that the university setting can be an ideal context for linguistic mudas to take place. The participants said that they did not notice any significant muda, but did note a tendency to use Basque more than they had prior to entering university. The findings, thus, indicate that specific plans must be designed and implemented in order to foster mudas towards Basque.

The public health communication strategies of the Aotearoa New Zealand government during the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic have been widely commended; however, for linguistic minorities, experiences of this communication were conflicted. We examine these experiences by drawing on 85 in-depth interviews conducted in 14 languages, showing that, while participants widely appreciated the clear visuals and regular COVID-19 updates in the English language, they reported significant challenges in multilingual communication. Four primary issues were identified: (1) the limited amount of timely multilingual information provided by the government; (2) minimal awareness within communities of this information; (3) problems with the accessibility of these resources; and (4) the low adaptability of translated information to cultural nuances. These challenges not only exacerbated existing linguicism but also hindered effective disaster response within linguistic minority communities. The findings emphasise the importance of proactive engagement with these groups by government, suggesting co-designing communication strategies and integrating cultural understanding into multilingual crisis communication practices. This research contributes to the broader scholarship on disaster linguicism, multilingual communication and public health equity.

This article analyses the participatory dynamics and methodological challenges of engaging the Moldavian Csángó community in co-created linguistic research through the “Therapy of the soul” project. Using participatory research as a framework, the study explores how storytelling and memory-sharing in a non-hierarchical setting fostered collaboration among researchers and local participants. The Csángó community, often portrayed through essentialist narratives of linguistic and cultural “relics”, actively redefined their identity through shared emotional experiences. We highlight how the Therapy of the soul project navigated the tension between participatory ideals and implicit hierarchies in research, with researchers balancing roles as facilitators, co-participants, and vulnerable contributors. The findings underscore the transformative potential of participatory research in creating methodologically rich points that illuminate power dynamics, language ideologies, and identity construction. Ultimately, the Therapy of the soul project provides a novel perspective on participatory research as an emotional, community-based practice fostering mutual discovery and support.

Public debates on language use often take on moral overtones. Observing how moral concerns permeate these debates has led scholars to interpret them as a rhetorical strategy or as an indicator of a link between morality and language beliefs. Yet, it remains unclear whether such a link truly exists and, if so, in what ways. This study applies Moral Foundations Theory to examine associations between six moral foundations and three language ideologies in Turkey using a validated survey-based design ( N  = 275). Findings show that language ideologies align consistently with how individuals prioritize certain moral values. Participants prioritizing moral foundations associated with in-group interests, social hierarchies, and purity (binding foundations) were significantly more likely to hold more restrictive language ideologies, compared to those prioritizing moral foundations concerning well-being, equality, and liberty (individualizing foundations). Contrary to the hypotheses, moral purity (which emphasizes avoiding physical and/or spiritual contamination) did not emerge as a significant predictor of linguistic purism, nor did moral deference to authority and tradition significantly predict the belief that there must be a legitimate authority in language use. The findings indicate that effectively addressing linguistic inequality must account for the role of moral reasoning. Future directions for research on morality and language as an area of inquiry are discussed.

This article examines the interaction between the welfare state and the nation state in Danish parliamentary politicians’ discourse on migrants. The focus is on public healthcare. Drawing on Critical Sociolinguistics and Critical Discourse Analysis, we look at two debates in the parliamentary health committee, and we examine how the two categories of migrants patients and doctors are represented discursively. We show that migrant patients are portrayed as disloyal and societal burdens due to insufficient Danish language skills. These skills get articulated as resulting from patients’ own choices, and therefore some politicians find it reasonable and legitimate to restrict their rights to healthcare interpreting. In contrast, migrant health professionals are portrayed as valuable and as willing resources for a healthcare system in crisis. Yet this category of migrants are seen as faced with bureaucratic obstacles which the state is articulated as responsible of failing to remedy. We argue that it is difficult for the state to handle its new role as employer for international professionals as for decades the focus has been on keeping migrants out. Furthermore, we show a general lack of understanding of what language learning implies for adult learners.