Nikolas Coupland is Professor and Director of the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University.Srikant Sarangi is Reader in Language and Communication at the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, and Christopher N. Candlin is Chair Professor of Applied Linguistics and Director of the Centre for English Language Education and Communication Research, City University of Hong Kong.

• Introduction; 1: Language, theory and the social; 1: A comparative perspective on social theoretical accounts of the language–action interrelationship; 2: Dynamics of differentiation; 3: Sociolinguistics, cognitivism, and discursive psychology; 2: Language and discourse as social practice; 4: Dynamics of discourse or stability of structure; 5: Discourse, accumulation of symbolic capital and power; 6: Co-membership and wiggle room; 3: Language, ideology and social categorisation; 7: Age in social and sociolinguistic theory; 8: Undoing the macro/micro dichotomy; 9: The social categories of race and class; 10: Language crossing, cross-talk, and cross-disciplinarity in sociolinguistics; 11: Discourse theory and language planning; 4: Retrospective commentaries; 12: ‘Critical' social theory; 13: Who needs social theory anyway?; 14: ‘Motivational relevancies'

Nikolas Coupland is Professor and Director of the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University.Srikant Sarangi is Reader in Language and Communication at the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, and Christopher N. Candlin is Chair Professor of Applied Linguistics and Director of the Centre for English Language Education and Communication Research, City University of Hong Kong.

• Introduction; 1: Language, theory and the social; 1: A comparative perspective on social theoretical accounts of the language–action interrelationship; 2: Dynamics of differentiation; 3: Sociolinguistics, cognitivism, and discursive psychology; 2: Language and discourse as social practice; 4: Dynamics of discourse or stability of structure; 5: Discourse, accumulation of symbolic capital and power; 6: Co-membership and wiggle room; 3: Language, ideology and social categorisation; 7: Age in social and sociolinguistic theory; 8: Undoing the macro/micro dichotomy; 9: The social categories of race and class; 10: Language crossing, cross-talk, and cross-disciplinarity in sociolinguistics; 11: Discourse theory and language planning; 4: Retrospective commentaries; 12: ‘Critical' social theory; 13: Who needs social theory anyway?; 14: ‘Motivational relevancies'

Nikolas Coupland is Professor and Director of the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University.Srikant Sarangi is Reader in Language and Communication at the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, and Christopher N. Candlin is Chair Professor of Applied Linguistics and Director of the Centre for English Language Education and Communication Research, City University of Hong Kong.

• Introduction; 1: Language, theory and the social; 1: A comparative perspective on social theoretical accounts of the language–action interrelationship; 2: Dynamics of differentiation; 3: Sociolinguistics, cognitivism, and discursive psychology; 2: Language and discourse as social practice; 4: Dynamics of discourse or stability of structure; 5: Discourse, accumulation of symbolic capital and power; 6: Co-membership and wiggle room; 3: Language, ideology and social categorisation; 7: Age in social and sociolinguistic theory; 8: Undoing the macro/micro dichotomy; 9: The social categories of race and class; 10: Language crossing, cross-talk, and cross-disciplinarity in sociolinguistics; 11: Discourse theory and language planning; 4: Retrospective commentaries; 12: ‘Critical' social theory; 13: Who needs social theory anyway?; 14: ‘Motivational relevancies'