International Journal of the Sociology of Language

Published by De Gruyter Mouton

Volume 2022 Issue 275 - Special Issue: Spaces of upset in the Nordic region: Sociolinguistics beyond cohesion and consensus in Denmark, Finland, and Sweden; Issue Editors: Linus Salö, David Karlander, Sirpa Leppänen and Elina Westinen

Issue of International Journal of the Sociology of Language

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Publicly Available May 11, 2022

Frontmatter

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Open Access May 11, 2022

Introduction: spaces of upset in the Nordic region

Linus Salö, David Karlander, Sirpa Leppänen, Elina Westinen, Janus Spindler Møller

Page range: 1-19

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Abstract

This introductory article opens the thematic issue Spaces of Upset in the Nordic Region . It introduces the contributions of the issue, outlines the concepts that unite them, and discusses the sociolinguistic area in which they are set: the Nordic region. Centering on Denmark, Finland and Sweden, the article offers an overview of some of the sociolinguistic, ideological and political characteristics of the region and the countries it comprises. The Nordic region is widely seen as a paradigm case of social stability, consensus and cohesion. This vision is, however, a mirage. To be sure, upset often lingers below the discursive veneer of Nordic harmony, concord and agreement. Breaking with this outlook, this thematic issue takes a closer look at some of the antipodes of this sociolinguistic and ideological condition. Its contributions engage with ‘spaces of upset’, that is, with manifestations and experiences of sociolinguistic rupture, upheaval or change, in and through which visions of sociolinguistic stability and cohesion are disrupted and challenged. These spaces of upset bear witness to social, ideological and linguistic tensions and changes, be they incipient, enduring or surpassed. They accordingly provide a new take on processes of continuity and change, pointing out the ideological faultlines of the orders they disrupt, or upset.

May 11, 2022

Chaos in court: mediatized expressions of upset in relation to Danish courtroom interpreting

Martha Sif Karrebæk, Marta Kirilova

Page range: 21-41

Abstract

This paper discusses a disturbance to the Danish legal system, a cornerstone in the state of law. We focus on ‘expressions of upset’ during a reorganization of Danish legal interpreting, which was followed closely by the Danish media. We analyze these expressions as ‘communicative uptakes’ and we discuss how they made different elements of the interpreting affair salient. The elements include assumptions about what legal interpreting is or should be, its societal role and relevance. We argue that the uptakes integrated the interpreting situation with the institutionalized aim of the social space in which they occurred, and we draw on Agha’s theory of ‘mediatization’ to account for the relations between the overall situation and the various expressions of upset, and between the institutional roles of participants and mediatized aspects of the spaces. Data come from a trial, a meeting in the Danish Parliament, and a blog thread. The study thereby illustrates a communicative (thus, social) process in a modern (thus, complex) society in which a social event at societal level (so-called large-scale) is received and made meaningful by many different social actors in a variety of ways, thereby creating links between otherwise unconnected spaces.

Open Access May 11, 2022

Broadcasting the skeptron: the upset of sociolinguistic closure in Swedish public service television

Linus Salö

Page range: 43-64

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Abstract

This article explores upset reactions to purportedly deviant language use in the newsroom of the Swedish public service television company SVT. Adopting a historical gaze to contemporary struggles, it focuses on the news anchor Dina Haddad (an alias selected by me for the sake of anonymity) and the injurious, bigoted complaints she receives from detractors by virtue of speaking Swedish with a foreign accent. Through historical contextualization, the article casts Swedish public service television as a system of sociolinguistic closure, sustained through individual and institutional efforts of correction. Conceptually, it invokes the image of the skeptron to illustrate how linguistic authority is exerted through an interplay between delegators and holders. Against this backdrop, drawing on interview data and a selection of scornful emails, Haddad’s broadcast appearance is grasped as indexing the symbolic recognition of unsolicited change. Her foreign accent is perceived as revealing the countervailing upset of sociolinguistic closure, sanctioned by the establishment. For detractors, this is at once a critique against the skeptron -delegator, SVT, and the skeptron-bearer, Haddad. While the verbal attacks she receives are more about social change than language per se, I argue that the efficacy of producing linguistic complaints pertains to SVT’s historical role in sustaining doctrines of correctness.

May 11, 2022

“We just want the language tone”: when requests to use minority languages lead to interactional breakdown in multilingual classrooms

Heini Lehtonen, Janus Spindler Møller

Page range: 65-88

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze two instances of interactional breakdown in linguistically and culturally diverse classrooms in Copenhagen and Helsinki. Our focus is situations where teachers request the use of minority languages from pupils, and pupils react reluctantly and display embarrassment. These situations represent sociolinguistic spaces of upset understood as disruptions of prevailing language ideologies and sociolinguistic regimes. We argue that pupils’ reluctance to comply with teachers’ attempts to include minority languages exemplifies such a disruption, and meta-communicative exchanges represent a window into the language ideologies influencing such situations. We analyze the interactions sequentially through the theoretical lens of enregisterment, linguistic legitimacy, and raciolinguistic microaggressions. The Helsinki data are drawn from a sociolinguistically informed action research project in an elementary school. The Copenhagen data involve lower-secondary-level pupils and consist of observations and recordings collected as part of a long-term ethnographic study. Despite the differences in projects and field sites, we found a striking similarity both in the language ideologies displayed by teachers and in pupils’ reactional patterns. Consequently, we argue that both examples represent the same type of sociolinguistic space of upset characterized by an intrinsic dilemma in Nordic public schools, which are simultaneously expected to secure the continuation of mainstream culture and embrace linguistic diversity.

Open Access May 11, 2022

Language for work and work for language: linguistic aspirations in the marketing of domestic work

Maria Rydell, Linnea Hanell

Page range: 89-109

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Abstract

Language inevitably plays a key part in the infrastructure of transnational domestic work. Many who work and have worked in the domestic sector in Sweden have Swedish as their second language. The object of this study is to investigate the ways in which this fact is reflected in the marketing of domestic work historically as well as currently. Drawing on two datasets – personal advertisements by job seekers published in a Swedish daily during the twentieth century, and corporate marketing by contemporary cleaning agencies – the study discusses how references not only to language competence, but also to prospective language learning are used in the marketing of domestic work. While the phenomenon of domestic work, especially when performed by migrants, has been a resilient space of upset in the Swedish society for the last hundred years, the article argues that references to language are used to navigate tensions.

May 11, 2022

Media panic, medical discourse and the smartphone

Lian Malai Madsen

Page range: 111-128

Abstract

This article investigates a space of upset related to the smartphone with its communicative affordances and implications. The notion of moral panic can be seen as a way of conceptualizing spaces of upset and their discursive frames. Informed by this concept and accounts of the panic discourses particularly directed at media, I examine the upset articulated in Danish media panic discourses, which grants authority from a medical perspective. In addition, I draw on the concept of medicalization and discuss how it becomes sayable within the space of upset related to digitally mediated communication that human interaction through a technological device is not (always) communication, but habit or addiction, to unpack the socio-cultural and sociolinguistic assumptions and implications of this perspective. Empirically, the article focuses on a particularly preeminent voice in the public debate in Denmark about the impact of social media and smartphone use, namely the voice of a medical doctor who has been granted the authority as “digital health expert” and frequently appears in Danish print, broadcast and social media.

May 11, 2022

Sociolinguistic upsets and people of color in social media performances

Sirpa Leppänen, Elina Westinen

Page range: 129-151

Abstract

Particularly since the refugee “reception crisis” in 2015, Finland has started transforming into a more diverse and multicultural society. These societal changes have also been accompanied by sociolinguistic change, as well as language ideological debates and tensions, often manifesting in explicitly racist and xenophobic bursts of upset. In this article, our focus is on social media as a space where such societal and sociolinguistic upsets are articulated and re-worked. Drawing on recent sociolinguistic and discourse analytic work on transformative and critical popular cultural practices in social media, and studies on rap and belonging, we discuss how, in a mediatized society such as Finland, social media serve as a forum for antagonism and conflict, but also as a site for ‘talking back’. As our illustrative cases, we investigate two heteroglossic social media performances by entertainers and artists of color. In our analysis, we will show how these performances highlight and contest ideological notions of the way particular language resources are considered a key to Finnishness, as well as their role in the racialization and othering of people of color.

May 11, 2022

Nordicity, language and the nation-state

Monica Heller

Page range: 153-157

Varia

April 8, 2022

Foreign language ideology and American Sign Language in US public education

Russell Scott Rosen

Page range: 159-185

Abstract

American Sign Language has been used at schools and programs for signing deaf and hard of hearing students in US history. Recently, American Sign Language (ASL) was offered as a foreign language to students who speak and hear for foreign language credit at American secondary schools. The movement of the language from its place in deaf education to one of the foreign languages taught in public general education is due to changing ideologies about ASL as a language and as a foreign language. Studies in spoken foreign language ideologies in education presumed ties between languages and national and sub-national ethnic and migrant language groups. No national and sub-national ethnic and migrant language groups have sign language as their mother tongue or are dominated by a signing populace. It raises theoretical issues in foreign language ideology, education, and sign language. Theoretical implications of this study for foreign language ideologies in education are discussed.

April 15, 2022

Making the case for linguicism: revisiting theoretical concepts and terminologies in linguistic discrimination research

Trang Thi Thuy Nguyen, John Hajek

Page range: 187-220

Abstract

In an effort to foreground the concept of linguicism, this article provides a critical review of the research literature on linguistic discrimination, focusing on common concepts and terms applied to characterise the issue. Giving particular attention to studies which directly consider discrimination based on language or linguistic factors, we identify three main groups of concepts and terms which are widely used, including (a) race-based concepts, (b) language variation-based concepts and (c) general terms. The construction, meaning and usage of the concept of ‘linguicism’ are discussed separately from these three groups. Although race-based concepts, language variation-based concepts and general terms are extremely useful for particular research purposes, they may not be applicable to describe all or other forms of linguistic discrimination. It is argued that linguicism is a powerful theoretical construct, which can be used as an umbrella concept to capture the full range of linguistic discrimination issues. Suggestions are also presented for future research in relation to social factors associated with linguistic discrimination and research context, which is important to shed light on otherwise potentially unheard voices in linguistic discrimination scholarship.

About this journal

The International Journal of the Sociology of Language (IJSL) is dedicated to the development of the sociology of language as a truly international and interdisciplinary field in which various approaches – theoretical and empirical – supplement and complement each other, contributing thereby to the growth of language-related knowledge, applications, values and sensitivities. Five of the journal's annual issues are topically focused, all of the articles in such issues being commissioned in advance, after acceptance of proposals. One annual issue is reserved for single articles on the sociology of language. Selected issues throughout the year also feature a contribution on small languages and small language communities.

Call for Submissions: Joshua A. Fishman Award
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