Language and Social Justice: Global Perspectives - A Conversation

Book Talk Summary

Language, whether spoken, written, or signed, is a powerful resource that is used to facilitate social justice or undermine it. The first reference resource to use an explicitly global lens to explore the interface between language and social justice, this volume expands our understanding of how language symbolizes, frames, and expresses political, economic, and psychic problems in society, thus contributing to visions for social justice.

Investigating specific case studies in which language is used to instantiate and/or challenge social injustices, each chapter provides a unique perspective on how language carries value and enacts power by presenting the historical contexts and ethnographic background for understanding how language engenders and/or negotiates specific social justice issues. Case studies are drawn from Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America and the Pacific Islands, with leading experts tackling a broad range of themes, such as equality, sovereignty, communal well-being, and the recognition of complex intersectional identities and relationships within and beyond the human world.

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Speaker Bio

Inmaculada M. García-Sánchez is Professor of Social Research Methodology and Associate Director of the Center for the Study of International Migration at the University of California, USA. She is also Co-Director of the Language, Literacy, & Learning Collaborative at UCLA’s School of Education and Information Studies.