Liquid Languages
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- Publisher:
- Cambridge University Press
- Publication date:
- 28 July 2025
- 14 August 2025
- ISBN:
- 9781009249850
- 9781009249874
- Dimensions:
- (229 x 152 mm)
- Weight & Pages:
- 0.57kg, 294 Pages
- Dimensions:
- Weight & Pages:
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Book description
Which ideas about language are prevalent in cultures that are not framed in Western nationalist and literate traditions? How do people conceptualise language if speakers of the same community are multilingual, have access to different language resources and only partially share ideas about what is right and wrong in language? This book explores the 'liquid' properties of language, highlighting how languages, as discursive-material assemblages, can differ in their degree of fixity. It provides a linguistic anthropological study of the language ideologies in Belize, where ethnic belonging and language practice do not necessarily match and where stable language norms are not always considered a value. Scrutinising ethnographic data and examinations of local performances of English, it shows that languages emerge in relation to belonging, prestige and material culture. Bringing to the fore liquid language cultures, it provides important additions to our understanding of late modern language assemblages in a globalising world.
Reviews
‘Schneider’s critical engagement with European modernist perspectives on language through the lens of the linguistically diverse context of Belize shines new light on the situatedness of language ideological discourses, the complex ways that they are intertwined with the local social order, and their non-linear impact on language practices. Written in an accessible style, it is an indispensable read for anyone interested in socially grounded approaches to language.’
Bettina Migge - University College Dublin, Editor of the Journal of Pidgin and Creoles Languages
‘How do languages, like puddles and ponds, become temporarily stable, asks Britta Schneider in this rich and thoughtful book, when their most obvious state is liquid? It is the material language practices and discourses of belonging and prestige, she convincingly argues, that give the many languages on an island off the coast of Belize some degree of social stability. A significant contribution to contemporary discussions of how languages are assembled.’
Alastair Pennycook - Professor Emeritus, University of Technology Sydney
‘Polycentric, non-hegemonic sociolinguistic worlds deserve the rich, close-up view that Britta Schneider’s study of Belize provides. This is an eye-opening look at multiplex language ideologies and indexicalities, a timely counterweight to much standard-centric research.’
Susan Gal - Distinguished Service Professor of Anthropology and Linguistics, University of Chicago
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