This paper attempts to shed some light on the problem of correlation of such ontological categories as quality, quantity and relation in similes. The matter in question is significant since it relates to the problem of anthropocentrism in language. It shows the speaker's attitude to the information encoded in a simile by consciously choosing a…

A sociolinguistic style consists of a set of linguistic resources that carry specific meaning within a social context (Campbell-Kibler 2011). One such resource is the use of phonetic variants that do not change the denotative meaning of a word, but are different enough to be recognized as unique. This type of socially constrained phonetic…

This Perspectives article proposes a renewed vision of teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) through a translanguaging (TL) stance, grounded in critical sociolinguistic inquiry and embodied practice. A TL theory of language asserts an activist agenda to dismantle mono/lingualism, inviting a more dynamic and expansive view of…

This article puts forth new ways of thinking about "becoming multilingual" in transnational and contemporary times by investigating the significance of multilingualism for multilingual student teachers enrolled in French language teacher education programs within the provinces of Alberta and Ontario. As more diversity is present in…

Situated in an English as a foreign language (EFL) context, this study navigates the intersection of language learner identity and foreign language engagement. Specifically, drawing on the concept of voice (Canagarajah, 2013; Johnstone, 1996; Kramsch, 2003), Bakhtin's (1981) theory of language, and the notion of investment (Darvin & Norton,…

Despite the accumulated body of debates surrounding English as an international language (EIL), and stronger orientations towards mutual intelligibility, little research has been done on teachers' attitudes towards English pronunciation pedagogy in ELT classes. To address this gap, this study explores the perceptions of 352 English teachers from…

The traditional Philadelphia allophonic /ae/ system (henceforth: PHL shown in (1) below) is characterized by a set of complicated conditioning factors and a dramatic acoustic distinction between the two allophones. In recent years, some Philadelphians have begun to exhibit a new allophonic system (NAS, shown in (2) below). Like PHL, NAS is…

Social sustainability embraces literacy development as a means by which children integrate their knowledge in society and become powerful and meaningful. In this context, the development of writing among young children requires the design of new teaching strategies that allow for the multimodal repertoire brought by children into the classroom.…

Political theorists, generally non-experts in the language sciences, whose principal aim is often to advance normative theories on desirable states of affairs within liberal democratic states, tend to deal with language as a stable nominal category, as something that one "has" or "doesn't have", that can be labeled as one…

The purpose of this paper is to examine how Russian became a commodity in the global service industry in the decade between 2004 and 2014 and, in some places, much earlier. I will begin with a discussion of sociolinguistic theory of "commodification of language", focusing on aspects critical for this case study. Then, I will trace the…

In this article, we examine our own doctoral supervisory dialogue as it has been institutionally interrupted due to Ahmad's application for asylum in the UK. As we find ourselves lacking the conditions of recognisability required for our actions to be institutionally understood (or made intelligible) as part of a doctoral supervisory relationship,…

This study examines the discourses of educators in Pakistan through the lens of Critical Multilingual Language Awareness (CMLA) to demonstrate how their lack of critical awareness reinforces and reproduces subtractive language policies and practices in a diverse multilingual setting. CMLA stands for the understanding of the social, political and…

Written examinations represent one of the most common assessment tools in education. Though typically perceived as measurement instruments, written examinations are primarily texts that perform a communicative function. To complement existing research, this study viewed written examinations as a distinct form of communication (i.e. 'register').…

Muysken's article is a timely call for us to seek deeper regularities in the bewildering diversity of language contact outcomes. His model provocatively suggests that most such outcomes can be subsumed under four speaker optimization strategies. I consider two aspects of the proposal here: the formalization in Optimality Theory (OT) and the…

Recently, attention in modern linguistic theory has been shifted to facilitating a broader understanding of the world, in which language is a tool to establish a bridge between the interlocutor and the recipient. To do so, the development of linguistic, communicative and sociopragmatic competences enriched with socio-cultural inputs in English as…