Language and Subjectivity

Given the renewed interest in “identity” within applied linguistics and sociolinguistics, and the difficulty and relative unfamiliarity of current theories of subjectivity for students in these fields, this book meets a clear need: an accessible introduction to theories of subjectivity and the way they arise in fields of interest to students of language. The focus of the book is on conceptualizations of the subject, and how subjectivity is constructed, performed and indexed in language and language behaviour. Theories of subjectivity offering a critique of the notion of “identity” are a specific focus. The contexts within which the theoretical issues are presented are immediate and accessible: language and gender, sexuality, nationalism, ethnicity, racism, disability; subjectivity in second language learning; language and identity in face-to-face settings, language and institutional identities, language tests of identity, and language and identity in forensic settings. The book also provides a critical examination of methodologies used to explore language and subjectivity, including Conversation Analysis, Membership Categorization Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis, Discursive Psychology, corpus analysis, and narrative analysis.