Language and world's limits (original) (raw)
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Language, Culture and Identity in the Global Age
DIgitHum, 13, 2011
Research into language, culture and identity in the global age requires an interdisciplinary approach in order to understand the phenomena of identification in the contemporary world. This article provides critical analysis of the discourses on language and identity in modernity, based on the work of Pierre Bourdieu, and explores the new theoretical frameworks that question the sociological and anthropological traditions that assume that the phenomena of identity is intrinsically linked to territory. In a globalised context characterised by mobility, we need new paradigms in social sciences that are not based on the static geographic nature of human formations. Among other aspects, attention needs to be paid to the timeframe for social phenomena. For this reason, we set out the need to develop understanding of this temporality in our disciplines in order to learn to historicise or place in time the social and cultural processes involved in today’s construction of identities.
Rajakumar calls for “a more inclusive conversation” within academic cultures to take greater account of linguistic and cultural difference. She argues that even within a single-language-use setting, especially with a dominant world language such as English, there can be multiple linguistic and identity formations. She frames her argument with Pennycook’s (2010) understanding of language as a dynamic, socially constructed and locally specific form of human interaction. Building on the work of Nunan and Choi (2010) and Rivers and Houghton (2013), she draws parallels between language and communication styles. With examples of gendered speech in the workplace ( Llamas and Watt 2009) and a more contemporary context internet communications ( Nakamura, Chow-White, and Nelson 2011), Rajakumar makes a passionate case for educators to open the communicative space of academic settings to these diverse cultural experiences.
From language shift to language revitalization and sustainability. A complexity approach to linguistic ecology. (Edicions de la Universitat de Barcelona)., 2019
It is increasingly common to find the two elements 'language' and 'identity' united in a single discourse, one in which they appear as an increasingly common syntagm. In the past this was commonplace in the context of minoritized groups or migration, usually within the most subordinate group, but nowadays it is also appearing in the discourse of majority groups or those in a position of superiority. This is clearly a result of the greater contact between human groups produced by technological and economic globalization, a process which is extending the traditional areas of inter-relationship not only to a continental but also to a planetary level. As a consequence, groups that previously would not have recognised and/or would have given short shrift to the claims of sub-groups within their nation state over language and identity, now find themselves obliged to take on board these discourses, since the new situation in which they find themselves can begin to seem unsettling in this regard. Thus, the ‘defence’ of language and identity has entered international debate as never before, particularly as regards the spread of English as the language of global relations, but also with respect to the new political and economic unions that cross individual state borders. The new ‘fears over identity’ aroused through globalization, and their association with language, rest fundamentally on the dual social function of language, namely communication and identification (or identity-building).
Linguistic and cultural identity: epistemological review
RESEARCH RESULT Theoretical and Applied Linguistics
The article is intended to analyze and review the current state of "identity" as the category in modern social science. The main objective of the survey is to specify and position the term "identity" within the epistemological space of the concepts of "language", "culture", "personality" in line with the dominant ideas of the social science. The purpose of the article is to outline and analyze the research into the concepts of "identity" and "linguistic identity" in the humanities and, particularly, in linguistics. An attempt is made to comprehend the epistemological foundations of a new linguistic identity. Modern scientific trends are viewed in terms of content oriented linguistics and cognitive science. The interdisciplinary potential of epistemology is considered crucial for modern linguistic and ethnolinguistic studies. Among the approaches to the study of identity are those of Shaposhnikova, Karasik, Kristev...
Language and Culture: Global Flows and Local Complexity
Journal of Pragmatics, 2007
While dealing with pedagogical contexts and analyzing them as examples of multilingual and multicultural experiences, this book thematically focuses on 'language', 'culture' and their relationship, and explores theoretical understandings and actual practices of language and culture in the age of 'glocalization'. In a nutshell, the author advances the following interrelated theses: (1) language, culture, and nations (nation-states) are independent variables that only partially overlap with one another, in contradiction to the modern nationalist formula 'one nation, one language, one culture', (2) language and culture are to be understood in terms of 'flow' through social networks, rather than 'bounded territory' or de-contextualized 'structure'; and linguistic and cultural flows, which only partially overlap with each other, go within and across national boundaries, and (3) localities, such as supra-national regions, nation-states, communities, homes and classrooms, are loci where a number of such linguistic and cultural flows come and go, and complexly intermingle with one another, so that multilingualism and multiculturalism are rather natural states of language and culture in society, although they have been considered exceptional, secondary or even pathological by the modern nationalistic understandings of language and culture. Thus, Risager advances an account of language and culture that is characterized by glocalism (versus nationalism), diffusionism (versus structuralism) and multi-(versus mono-) lingua/ culturalism, a set of ideas that nicely fits the age of glocalization, especially as experienced in the European Union, and resonates with the current understandings of 'culture', 'society' and 'language' in social sciences, especially globalization studies: e.
Languages for Specific Purposes and Dynamics of National Identity
Journal of Teaching English for Specific and Academic Purposes
Creating and using language for special purposes reflects a rather high level of human needs in the hierarchy proposed by an American psychologist A. Maslow through creative activities and self-actualisation. The understanding of one’s own belonging and identity as a manner of self-actualisation may happen through specific language usage. The article focuses on the review of the emerging European identity patterns found in the professional lexis of three sample European languages from the perspective of such disciplines as philosophy and linguistic history. In the first part of the article authors reflect on the key traceable characteristic features of European identity forms: a closed form of identity, an open form of identity and a destructive denial of identity as a transition device from one form into another. On the basis of the linguistic survey of historical experiences as traced in British, Lithuanian and Russian legal language vocabulary formation, it is concluded that cha...
globalization, language and identity
Globalisation and increased patterns of immigration have turned workplace interactions to arenas for intercultural communication entailing negotiation of identity, membership and 'social capital'. For many newcomer immigrants, this happens in an additional language and culture -English. This paper presents interaction experiences of four non-native English language teachers with other institutional members. It uses a sociocultural perspective of second language to map their approaches to negotiations of professional and institutional identities in and through these interactions. Their discussions highlight the role of language, cultural practices and the emic sociopolitical factors embedded within institutional interactions in individuals' identity negotiation and integration.