New Books in Language

Catriona McKinnon is Professor of Political Theory at the University of Exeter. Her research focuses on climate ethics and environmental justice. Much of her recent work aims at addressing denialism about climate change. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Future of Truth project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Jennifer Mercieca is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at Texas A&M University. She is the author of Demagogue for President: The Rhetorical Genius of Donald Trump. You can follow her on Twitter: @jenmercieca. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Future of Truth project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

John Corvino is Professor of Philosophy at the Wayne State University in Detroit. His academic work focuses on topics in moral, social, and legal philosophy surrounding sexuality, gender, marriage, religious conviction, and discrimination. But John is also an active public philosopher who frequently participates in public debates over these topics. He produces and appears in a popular YouTube series of short videos devoted to the philosophical discussion of controversial topics. He is the author of What’s Wrong with Homosexuality?, co-author (with Maggie Ghallagher) of Debating Same Sex Marriage, and.co-author (with Ryan Anderson and Sherif Girgis) of Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination, all published with Oxford University Press. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Sandy Goldberg is Professor of Philosophy at Northwestern University. He specializes in epistemology and philosophy of language, with particular interest in the social aspects of knowledge and speech; these foci converge in his ongoing work on testimony. Sandy has written several books including Relying on Others (Oxford 2010) and, more recently, Assertion (Oxford 2015); his forthcoming book is titled To the Best of Our Knowledge, and is forthcoming with Oxford University Press. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Seana Shiffrin is Professor of Philosophy and Pete Kameron Professor of Law and Social Justice at UCLA. She defends the “thinker theory” of freedom of speech, which holds that a central reason for upholding a moral and legal system of free speech is that such a system is necessary for free thought and reflective action. This view is articulated in her book, Speech Matters:On Lying, Morality, and the Law (Princeton 2014). The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Trudy Govier is Emerita Professor of Philosophy at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada. Her research is focused on the nature of argumentation and questions concerning social trust, forgiveness, and reconciliation. She is also the author of a highly influential informal logic text,  A Practical Study of Argument (7th edition, Cengage), as well as Forgiveness and Revenge (Routledge 2002) and Victims and Victimhood (Broadview 2015). The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

The ‘ideological odd couple’ of Robert George and Cornel West jointly authored a statement defending free speech on campus and elsewhere. Find out why. Robert George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Professor of Politics at Princeton University, and the founding director of Princeton’s James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions. His research focuses on issues in ethics, political philosophy, and philosophy of law. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Brynn Quick speaks with Dr Elizabeth Peterson about language ideologies and what we think when we hear different varieties of English. The conversation centers around Dr Peterson’s 2020 book Making Sense of 'Bad English': An Introduction to Language Attitudes and Ideologies (Routledge, 2019). The book discusses how the notions of “good” versus “bad” English came about, and some of the consequences of these views of language. The book is a must-use for teachers and professors who introduce their students to sociolinguistics as it contains discussion questions at the end of each chapter as well as recommendations for further reading. However, you don’t have to be a Linguistics student to enjoy this book. Making Sense of “Bad English” is for anyone who has ever wondered how it’s possible to have so many different varieties of one language, what the Standard Language Ideology has to do with Santa Clause, and why English spelling is so chaotic. For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

A candid conversation with renowned Sanskritist and online teacher Antonia Ruppel on her love of the language, teaching philosophy, views on academia, and online programs, here and here. Antonia Ruppel is a researcher on the project Uncovering Sanskrit Syntax. She did her PhD in Classics at the University of Cambridge and was subsequently the Townsend Senior Lecturer in the Greek, Latin and Sanskrit Languages at Cornell University. Her research interests include comparative philology, syntax, compounding, the history of linguistics, and language pedagogy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller speaks with James McElvenny about his new book A History of Modern Linguistics: From the Beginnings to World War II (Edinburgh UP, 2024). This book offers a concise history of modern linguistics from its emergence in the early nineteenth century up to the end of World War II. Written as a collective biography of the field, it concentrates on the interaction between the leading figures of linguistics, their controversies, and the role of the social and political context in shaping their ideas and methods. In the conversation we focus on the national aspects of the story of modern linguistics: the emergence of the discipline in 19th century Germany and passing of the baton to make it an American science in the 20th century. For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

While the topic of relationships in professional sports teams is gaining greater attention from researchers and practitioners, the role that coach and athlete language plays in shaping these relationships remains largely unexplored. How Language Shapes Relationships in Professional Sports Teams: Power and Solidarity Dynamics in a New Zealand Rugby Team (Bloomsbury, 2022) by Dr. Kieran File addresses this gap by examining how every day, authentic language patterns used by coaches, captains and players shape relationships in a professional New Zealand rugby team. More specifically, through a discourse analysis of taken-for-granted ritual language practices in training sessions, team meetings and match-day interactions, the chapters of this book illustrate how coaches, captains and players shape particular interpersonal dynamics of power and solidarity between themselves in and through language and, in the process, reflect and reconstruct shared and underlying ideologies about how relationships of power and solidarity work in their team. Offering an evidence-based discussion of the silent and pervasive ideologies that underpin how relationships work in professional sports teams, this book extends research on this important topic by providing largely missing illustrations of consequential interpersonal dynamics that actively shape professional relationships in sports teams. Written in an approachable style, this book offers linguists, social scientists and sports practitioners a frame of reference for greater understanding of how language directly shapes relationships of power and solidarity. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose forthcoming book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

The fascinating, untold story of how the Chinese language overcame unparalleled challenges and revolutionized the world of computing. A standard QWERTY keyboard has a few dozen keys. How can Chinese—a language with tens of thousands of characters and no alphabet—be input on such a device?  In The Chinese Computer: A Global History of the Information Age (MIT Press, 2024), Thomas Mullaney sets out to resolve this paradox, and in doing so, discovers that the key to this seemingly impossible riddle has given rise to a new epoch in the history of writing—a form of writing he calls “hypography.” Based on fifteen years of research, this pathbreaking history of the Chinese language charts the beginnings of electronic Chinese technology in the wake of World War II up through to its many iterations in the present day. Mullaney takes the reader back through the history and evolution of Chinese language computing technology, showing the development of electronic Chinese input methods—software programs that enable Chinese characters to be produced using alphanumeric symbols—and the profound impact they have had on the way Chinese is written. Along the way, Mullaney introduces a cast of brilliant and eccentric personalities drawn from the ranks of IBM, MIT, the CIA, the Pentagon, the Taiwanese military, and the highest rungs of mainland Chinese establishment, to name a few, and the unexpected roles they played in developing Chinese language computing. Finally, he shows how China and the non-Western world—because of the hypographic technologies they had to invent in order to join the personal computing revolution—“saved” the Western computer from its deep biases, enabling it to achieve a meaningful presence in markets outside of the Americas and Europe. An eminently engaging and artfully told history, The Chinese Computer is a must-read for anyone interested in how culture informs computing and how computing, in turn, shapes culture. Thomas S. Mullaney is Professor of Chinese History at Stanford University and a Guggenheim Fellow. Caleb Zakarin is Editor at the New Books Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Narratives of Mistranslation: Fictional Translators in Latin American Literature (Routledge, 2023) offers unique insights into the role of the translator in today’s globalized world, exploring Latin American literature featuring translators and interpreters as protagonists in which prevailing understandings of the act of translation are challenged and upended. It looks to the fictional turn as a fruitful source of critical inquiry in translation studies, showcasing the potential for recent Latin American novels and short stories in Spanish to shed light on the complex dynamics and conditions under which translators perform their task.  Kripper unpacks how the study of these works reveals translation not as an activity with communication as its end goal but rather as a mediating and mediated process shaped by translators’ unique manipulations and motivations and the historical and cultural contexts in which they work. In exploring the fictional representations of translators, the book also outlines pedagogical approaches and offers discussion questions for the implementation of translators’ narratives in translation, language, and literature courses. Ibrahim Fawzy is a literary translator and academic based in Egypt. His interests include translation studies, Arabic literature, ecocriticism, and disability studies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller speaks with Jim Hlavac about interpreting to bridge language barriers. About 5% of the Australian population do not speak English or do not speak it well. In this conversation, Dr Jim Hlavac, an experienced interpreter and interpreting trainer, explains how professional interpreters, language mediators, and language brokers help to support fair and equitable access to healthcare and other forms of social participation. We explore how interpreting works in practice in a hospital setting: who gets to interpret? How is the need for an interpreter identified? Who pays? What is the role of policy vis-à-vis bottom-up practice? Is the process the same for all languages? The conversation closes with the million-dollar question: will AI take interpreters’ jobs? For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

The ideal of ‘conversation’ recurs in modern thought as a symbol and practice central to ethics, democratic politics, and thinking itself. Interweaving readings of fiction and philosophy in a ‘conversational’ style inspired by Stanley Cavell, Fiction, Philosophy and the Ideal of Conversation (Edinburgh UP, 2023) clarifies this lofty yet vague ideal, while developing a revitalizing model for interdisciplinary literary studies. It argues that conversation is key to exemplary responses to sceptical doubt in ordinary language and political philosophy – where scepticism threatens ethics and democratic politics – and in works of British fiction spanning from Jane Austen through Ali Smith. It shows that for these writers, conversation can shift attention from metaphysical doubts regarding our capacity to know ‘reality’ and other people, to ethical, democratic, and aesthetic action. The book moreover proposes – and models – ‘conversational criticism’ as a framework linking literary studies to broader political and ethical commitments, while remaining responsive to aesthetic form. Erin Elizabeth Greer is an Assistant Professor of Literature at the University of Texas at Dallas. She teaches and writes about modern and contemporary British and Anglophone literature, ordinary language philosophy, political philosophy, feminist theory, and critical new media studies. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Contemporary Literature, JML, Camera Obscura, Salmagundi, and Stanley Cavell and Aesthetic Experience. Tong He is Lecturer of English at Central China Normal University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Hanna Torsh speaks with Alexandra Grey about good governance in linguistically diverse cities. Linguistic diversity is often seen through a deficit lens. Another way of saying this is that it's perceived as a problem, particularly by institutions and governments. However, it doesn’t have to be that way and shouldn’t be that way in a participatory democracy. This conversation addresses 3 questions: Why does governance in a multilingual urban environment such as Sydney matter? How do you investigate good governance in multilingual urban environments? How did public health communication during the Covid-19 pandemic fail some linguistic communities and how can it be improved? “Chats in Linguistic Diversity” is a podcast about linguistic diversity in social life brought to you by the Language on the Move team. We explore multilingualism, language learning, and intercultural communication in the contexts of globalization and migration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller speaks with Piers Kelly about a fascinating form of visual communication, Australian message sticks. What does a message stick look like? What is its purpose, and how has the use of message sticks changed over time from the precolonial period via the late 19th/early 20th century and into the present? Why do we know so little about message sticks, and how has colonialism shaped our knowledge about message sticks? How did message sticks fit into the multilingual communication ecology of precolonial Australia? And, of course, the million-dollar question: are message sticks a form of writing? First published on August 18, 2020. “Chats in Linguistic Diversity” is a podcast about linguistic diversity in social life brought to you by the Language on the Move team. We explore multilingualism, language learning, and intercultural communication in the contexts of globalization and migration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Swearing can be a powerful communicative act, for good or ill. The same word can incite violence or increase intimacy. How is swearing so multivalent in its power? Is it just all those harsh “c” and “k” sounds? Does swearing take its power from taboo meaning? Why is swearing sometimes so funny? In For F*ck’s Sake: Why Swearing Is Shocking, Rude, and Fun (Oxford University Press, 2023), Rebecca Roache, host of the podcast The Academic Imperfectionist, offers us rich insights into the complex importance of swearing to help us understand who gets judged too harshly for doing it, why it’s important to be able to offend with swearing, why we might need to advocate for some swear words, and so much more. Sarah Tyson is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado, Denver. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller speaks with Aneta Pavlenko about multilingualism through the ages. We start from the question whether the world today is more multilingual than it was ever before. Spoiler alert: we quickly conclude that no, it is not. One of the reasons why the world may seem more multilingual today than in the past lies in the European nationalist project, which culminated in the “population exchanges” of the 20th century – the great “unmixing of peoples”, as Lord Curzon called it. As a result, languages became associated with nations and this linguistic nationalism continues to guide views of language today. Can linguistic nationalism ever be unthought? Maybe because languages are now so deeply intertwined with nationalist projects, we have become much more emotional about language and languages than people may have been in the past. This is true even of academic research, where there can be significant pressure to bring our emotions into our research, too. How to deal with such pressures is another thread that runs through our conversation. We reflect on our own academic careers and what lessons they may or may not hold for early career researchers today. First published on October 04, 2021. “Chats in Linguistic Diversity” is a podcast about linguistic diversity in social life brought to you by the Language on the Move team. We explore multilingualism, language learning, and intercultural communication in the contexts of globalization and migration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller speaks with Adam Jaworski about his research in language and mobility. Adam is best known for his work on “linguascaping” – how languages, or bits of languages, are used to stylize a place. A welcome sign may index a tourist destination, artistic arrangements of word blocks like “love”, “peace”, or “joy” may index consumption and leisure spaces, multilingual signage may index a cosmopolitan space, and the absence of language may suggest the quiet luxury of the super-rich. As these examples suggest, Adam’s focus, often in collaboration with his colleague Crispin Thurlow, has been on privileged mobilities: European tourists in West Africa, business class travelers, and those frequenting the consumption temples of our time, upmarket shopping malls. Such research is vital to understanding the intersection between language and inequality, as Adam explains in our interview. Privilege is the other side of the inequality coin, and a side that sociolinguists have often neglected. First published on January 17, 2022.  “Chats in Linguistic Diversity” is a podcast about linguistic diversity in social life brought to you by the Language on the Move team. We explore multilingualism, language learning, and intercultural communication in the contexts of globalization and migration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language