Jan Blommaert

An ethnographically revised linguistic landscape study can be used as a sensitive methodological tool for detecting the complexities of urban space in superdiverse areas. The data used in this book are from an inner-city neighborhood in Antwerp (Belgium), which has become superdiverse over the past decade and a half. Rather than analyzing the contemporary patterns in terms of synchronically juxtaposed 'pluralities' of scripts as indexes of cultural 'belonging', this new methodology enables us to historicize individual signs and complexes of signs, so that they begin to inform us of the multiple histories that coincide in superdiverse space. Multiplicity is thus replaced by complexity: nonlinear, multifiliar and stochastic patterns of presence, entitlement and power in social space.

There is a long tradition in which “phatic” forms of interaction are seen as (and characterized by) relatively low levels of “information” and “meaning”. Yet, observations on social media interaction patterns show an amazing density of such phatic interactions, in which signs are shared and circulated without an a priori determination of the meaning. We address the issue of “virality” in this paper: the astonishing speed and scope with which often “empty” (i.e. not a priori determined) signs circulate on the internet. We address “memes” – signs that have gone viral on the Internet – as cases in point. Virality as a sociolinguistic phenomenon raises specific issues about signs, meanings and functions, prompting a shift from “meaning” to “effect”. This effect, we can see, is conviviality: the production of a social-structuring level of engagement in loose, temporal and elastic collectives operating in social media environments.

The papers in this volume all address aspects of communication that are often dismissed as "trivial" or "small talk", and argue that such forms are in actual fact crucial instruments for sustaining a Goffmanian level of social cohesion through conviviality. Contributors: Jan Blommaert, Piia Varis, Fie Velghe, Zane Goebel, Tilmann Heil and Ben Rampton.

Two of my maîtres à penser died relatively young. Michel Foucault was 57, Erving Goffman was 60. It is highly likely that I shall die relatively young as well. I'm 58 now, and I have been diagnosed with cancer stage 4 in mid-March 2020. Since there is suddenly very little future left to plan, speculate or dream about, one tends to use such landmark moments as a prompt to reflect on the past. The guiding question in this-quite an obvious one-is: what was important?

The term chronotope can help us to examine the validity of existing terms such as 'context'. Seen as a merging of Gofffman's notion of the social situation and Bakhtin's literary chronotope, it provides us with a very accurate tool for describing the units of language and social life.

Recent developments in the study of language in society have moved the field increasingly away from linear models towards complex models. The complexity of timespace as an aspect of what is called “context” is of key importance in this development, and this article engages with two possibly useful concepts in view of this: chronotope and scale. Chronotope can be seen as invokable chunks of history organizing the indexical order of discourse; scale, in turn can be seen as the scope of communicability of such invocations. Thus, whenever we see chronotopes, we see them mediated by scales. The cultural stuff of chronotopes is conditioned by the sociolinguistic conditions of scale. This nuanced approach to timescale contextualization offers new directions for complexity-oriented research in our fields.

Recent developments in the study of language in society have moved the field increasingly away from linear models towards complex models. The complexity of timespace as an aspect of what is called “context” is of key importance in this development, and this article engages with two possibly useful concepts in view of this: chronotope and scale. Chronotope can be seen as invokable chunks of history that organizeing the indexical order of discourse; scale, in turn, can be seen as the scope of communicability of such invocations. Thus, whenever we see chronotopes, we see them mediated by scales. The cultural stuff of chronotopes is conditioned by the sociolinguistic conditions of scale. This nuanced approach to timescale contextualization offers new directions for complexity-oriented research in our fields.

In un discorso pubblico segnato da pulsioni nazionaliste e sentimenti di ostilità, l'analisi delle decisioni delle Commissioni territoriali per il riconoscimento della protezione internazionale e della giurisprudenza restituisce la crisi di credibilità del richiedente asilo. La difficile compatibilità tra astrazioni giuridiche novecentesche e biografie moderne – irregolari, caotiche, spiazzanti – è peraltro ben nota in letteratura: Crepeau descrive «narrazioni grezze, che non rispettano un ordine cronologico, con vuoti, non detti, aspetti apparentemente marginali […] esagerazioni e immagini che non corrispondono al nostro senso della realtà», evidenziando quella che Beneduce e Taliani definiscono una «dimensione spesso frammentaria, contraddittoria e amnesica, talora propriamente onirica dei racconti». Ciò che ancora manca, sul tavolo della riflessione, è lo studio delle modalità di dialogo, confronto e verbalizzazione dei colloqui e dei processi decisionali, esperienza che suggerisce piuttosto l'inadeguatezza del sistema di valutazione delle domande di protezione internazionale.

While growing feelings of nationalism and hostility mark out the public discourse, investigating case-law from territorial Commissions and national Courts on international protection sheds a light on the crisis of the asylum seeker's credibility. The struggle to fit modern, irregular, puzzling biographies into 20 th century legal definitions is a well known fact in literature: Crepeau describes «rough narratives, disregarding chronological order, proving incomplete, ambiguous, inconsistent […] exaggerations and images not matching our sense of reality», revealing what Beneduce and Taliani highlight as «the often fragmentary, contradicting, amnesiac, at time truly dreamlike character of accounts». What the debate is still missing is the analysis of real life interviews, transcripts and actual praxis from adjudicators, an experience suggesting shortcomings and inadequacy of the decision making system.

A paper describing the theoretical effects of considering globalizarion as a sociolinguistic phenomenon. Two steps in the re-imagining of sociolinguistic phenomena are described: (1) from stability to mobility and (2) from mobility to complexity. Implications for the development of new methods are discussed.

Blommaert cogently argues throughout the book for a broad-based approach to language in society. Taking globalization seriously means we have to rid ourselves of assumptions about sharedness, community, functionality in speaking and make those things questions for analysis. Blommaert admits that his discussion moves far away from what is typically understood as “discourse analysis” but that is his point, and that is why I like this book so much. I find Blommaert’s book an exciting and timely publication taking vital arguments to Europe, where all too often I encounter colleagues who dismiss my attention to language use as “linguistics,” that is, not relevant to social anthropology. I can only hope that this addition to Cambridge’s catalogue will convince social scientists everywhere that sociolinguistics is more than the correlation of accent with social class and ethnicity. Understanding language use in the round is critical to understanding any and all meaningful human activity.

This short paper seeks to reformulate and refine the notion of sociolinguistic scales as relative scope of understandability, thus drawing the notion fully into the realm of semiotics, rather than in the rather unproductive sphere of spatiotemporal and distributional interpretation where it has been deployed. Differences in scope of understandability are differences in the presupposability of signs, and such differences are not equivalent but stratified in a polycentric environment. Scales, in that sense, point towards the non-unified and hierarchical-layered nature of the sign and of meaning making practices. Scalar effects, once established, can furthermore be carried over into different indexical orders deployed on different topics. We draw on the results of a recent study of hip-hop culture in Finland to establish these points.