November 5, 2013 10:00:00 - 16:00:00
Jyväskylä Discourse Studies Forum presents:
(Re)considering the Concept of “New Speaker”
by Professor Joan Pujolar, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya
Guest Lecture and Seminar
Tuesday, November 5th 2013, 10.00–16.00
Puutarhurintalo building, University of Jyväskylä Main Campus
The Jyväskylä Discourse Studies Forum is an initiative of Discourse Studies at the University of Jyväskylä, Department of Languages. The forum is intended as a space for presenting and discussing new topics, methodological innovations and original research in the multidisciplinary area of Discourse Studies. Our next forum will be hosted by Professor Joan Pujolar, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (http://www.uoc.edu/webs/jpujolar/EN/curriculum/index.html), a visiting scholar with the Peripheral Multilingualism project (SA).
The lecture will address the concepts of “new speakers” and “linguistic muda” which are being developed in order to expand our understanding of the ways in which multilinguals relate to languages and linguistic varieties. It brings into focus the challenges and opportunities facing social actors who adopt and use language varieties other than their native ones. We will further explore these concepts in the seminar by asking questions such as these: What is the actual agenda of research on new speakers? What are the consequences of creating a new linguistic category? The lecture is open to the general public. The seminar is designed for PhD and post doc researchers. Attendance at the seminar requires pre-registration (kati.dlaske@jyu.fi).
You are warmly welcome.
Preliminary programme
Tuesday, 5th November, 2013 10-16. Puutarhurintalo building, main campus, Univ. of Jyväskylä
10.00-11.30 Linguistic “mudes”: on becoming a new speaker
Guest lecture by Professor Joan Pujolar
Open invitation; no registration required
Lunch
13.00-16.00 “New speakers”: definitions, agendas, and consequences
Seminar led by Professor Joan Pujolar
Pre-registration required (by Oct. 9th, 2013, to kati.dlaske@jyu.fi)
Lecture Abstract
Linguistic “mudes”: on becoming a new speaker
The concept of “new speakers” has recently been coined and is being developed in order to expand our understanding of the ways in which multilinguals relate to languages and linguistic varieties. It brings into focus the challenges and opportunities facing social actors who adopt and use language varieties other than their native ones. In this paper, I will show one of the ways in which some colleagues and myself have sought to develop this perspective, i.e. through the concept of “linguistic muda”, which we define as changes in the use of the linguistic repertoire of individuals at particular biographical moments. To do so, I will begin with a brief overview of the “new speakers” topic and discuss its theoretical and political implications. After this, I will move on to show the results of recent research on how people’s repertoire change across the life cycle in the Catalan context. The notion on “linguistic muda” will be described and used to analyze these linguistic changes.
Examples of new speakers can include: a) People who learn minority languages outside the family context, typically through immersion schools, adult education or language activism; b) Immigrants who generally need to adopt new languages in their new places of residence; and c) Other multiple profiles of people who learn languages for professional, educational or leisure reasons. In the Catalan context, “mudes” or language changes often happen at secondary school, the university or the workplace. In the light of these findings, I shall reflect on the political underpinnings of the news speaker approach, which basically involves questioning the essentialist language ideologies we have inherited as linguists; but also raises questions about how language is implicated in new forms of inequality brought about by globalization.