Language and identity in linguistic ethnography

Abstract

The study of language and identity from the perspective of linguistic ethnography has received increasing attention during the last decade. Resting upon the social and discursive turns in social sciences since the mid-twentieth century, this UK-originated framework has ontological and epistemological consequences for the way researchers conceptualize and approach fundamental issues concerned with language, culture and community. Most importantly, this approach has been particularly relevant in the last few years due to the theoretical and methodological challenges of the social, institutional and cultural conditions of late modernity. Such conditions have made instability, uncertainty and unpredictability a more salient feature of social life, invalidating many of the modernist assumptions (and toolkits) that many sociolinguists and applied linguists used to work with. This chapter reviews these major shifts with focus on the ongoing debates and directions. Attention is also paid to variability, and to the existing tensions between some of the different approaches within this and in other traditions in the social sciences.