Language, Migration and Social Inequalities

A Critical Sociolinguistic Perspective on Institutions and Work

Edited by Alexandre Duchêne, Melissa Moyer, Dr. Celia Roberts

Publication date:

12 November 2013

Publisher

Multilingual Matters

Dimensions:

210x148mm
6x8"

ISBN-13: 9781783091003

Migration and the mobility of citizens around the globe pose important challenges to the linguistic and cultural homogeneity that nation-states rely on for defining their physical boundaries and identity, as well as the rights and obligations of their citizens. A new social order resulting from neoliberal economic practices, globalisation and outsourcing also challenges traditional ways the nation-state has organized its control over the people who have typically travelled to a new country looking for work or better life chances. This collection provides an account of the ways language addresses core questions concerning power and the place of migrants in various institutional and workplace settings. It brings together contributions from a range of geographical settings to understand better how linguistic inequality is (re)produced in this new economic order.

1. Alexandre Duchêne, Melissa Moyer & Celia Roberts: Introduction: Recasting Institutions and Work in Multilingual and Transnational Spaces

Part I: Sites of Control

2. Eva Codó: Trade Unions and NGOs under Neoliberalism: Between Regimenting Migrants and Subverting the State

3. Kori Allan: Skilling the Self: The Communicability of Immigrants as Flexible Labour

Part II: Sites of Selection

4. Celia Roberts: The Gatekeeping of Babel: Job Interviews and the Linguistic Penalty

5. Ingrid Piller & Kimie Takahashi: Language Work aboard the Low-Cost Airline

6. Luisa Martín Rojo: (De) Capitalising Students through Linguistic Practices. A Comparative Analysis of New Educational Programmes in a Global Era

7. Vally Lytra: From Kebabçı to Professional: The Commodification of Language and Social Mobility in Turkish Complementary Schools in the UK

Part III: Sites of Resistance

8. Werner Holly & Ulrike Hanna Meinhof: ‘Integration hatten wir letztes jahr.’ Official Discourses of Integration and their Uptake by Migrants in Germany

9. Melissa G. Moyer: Language as a Resource. Migrant Agency, Positioning and Resistance in a Health Care Clinic

10. Cécile B. Vigouroux: Informal Economy and Language Practice in the Context of Migrations

11. Maria Sabaté i Dalmau: Fighting Exclusion from the Margins: Locutorios as Sites of Social Agency and Resistance for Migrants

Mike Baynham: Postscript

Contributors

Language, Migration and Social Inequalities is a welcome addition to the growing literature on language and globalization. This volume can be easily incorporated in an upper-level undergraduate or graduate course in sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology. Chapters can be regrouped to reveal different issues...All in all, this volume offers a productive way into examining the intersections of language, migration, and social inequality especially in late-capitalist social democratic states.