Book Reviews by Tom Van Hout
At the intersection of discourse and media studies lies media linguistics (from German Medienling... more At the intersection of discourse and media studies lies media linguistics (from German Medienlinguistik ), an umbrella term for the study of mediated language in society. Two approaches can be discerned within media linguistics. Work on language of the media examines how (news) media use language to represent social life. Work on language in the media investigates how language standards, ideologies, and change are represented in the media. The popularity of media linguistics is spurred on by two developments: the shifting ecology of media organizations and their fragmented audiences, and the proliferation of mediated communication in society. The book under review addresses both developments through a timely sociolinguistic lens. By focusing on sociolinguistic change in mediated communication, Jannis Androutsopoulos argues that sociolinguists can study speakers' linguistic repertoires, their language practices around digital media, their agency visàvis institutional policies, languageideological change, and linguistic flows across media and institutional contexts.
have embarked on an ambitious theoretical and crossdisciplinary enterprise. Theoretically, their ... more have embarked on an ambitious theoretical and crossdisciplinary enterprise. Theoretically, their edited volume aims to draw the contours of an anthropology of writing, loosely defined as "the comparative study of writing as social and cultural practice" (p9) and largely inspired by literacy studies. As the editors argue in the opening chapter, anthropology is a latecomer to the field of writing research, but its theories and methods offer valuable insights into the sociocultural complexity of writing. To illustrate this point in depth, the editors draw on, and for the first time, bring together two research traditions from two linguistic regions: anglophone research on literacy studies and francophone research on writing. The former draws on a social theory of literacy (as articulated in which sees literacy as a textually mediated interpretive process, rather than the ability of read and write. The latter is a disciplinary amalgam of applied linguistics, history and anthropology that finds synthesis in questions of how, where and why writing matters in the workplace, in the public sphere and in postcolonial societies.
Journal of Writing Research, Jan 1, 2009
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Book Reviews by Tom Van Hout