Art of Language

This book contributes to opening up disciplinary knowledge and offering connections between different approaches to language in contemporary linguistics. Rather than focusing on a particular single methodology or theoretical assumption, the volume presents part of the wealth of linguistic knowledge as an intertwined project, which combines numerous practices, positionalities and perspectives. The editors believe¸ together with the contributors to this volume¸ that it is a crucial and timely task to emphasize the relevance of linguistic knowledge on power, hospitality, social class, marginalization, mobility, history, secrecy, the structures of discourse, and the construction of meaning, as knowledge that needs to be brought together – as it is brought together in personal discussions, conversations and encounters. To work along traces of linguistic connectivity, marginalized narratives, in and on lesser studied (often stigmatized) language practices and to shed light on the tasks of linguistics in making diverse knowledges transparent—this offers spaces for critical discussion on the ethics of linguistics, its challenges, contributions and tasks. These are the approaches that are characteristic for the work of Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, to whom this book is dedicated.