Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T14:54:09.389Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Semiotic spaces in antidiscriminatory political discourse: Naming practices as indexes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 July 2019

Mats Landqvist
Mats Landqvist*
Affiliation:
Södertörn University, Sweden
*
Address for correspondence: Mats Landqvist Södertörn UniversitySchool of Culture and LearningAlfred Nobels Allé 1514189 Huddinge, Swedenmats.landqvist@sh.se
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article explores the semiotic spaces occupied by organizations working against discrimination in Sweden. Expressions of identity, norm critique, and political goals are studied in relation to word production and language policy and planning. The study departs from interviews with representatives from three organizations within the hbtqi, antiracist, and disability movements. Other resources connected to them have also been analyzed, such as glossaries. Theoretically, this study draws on Yuri Lotman's concept of semiospheres, allowing the analysis to weigh in the whole semiotic process, including meaning production, policy work, and concrete word production. This approach completes an analysis of indexical orders. The results show that (a) organizations are aware of the importance of linguistic choices, (b) when new concepts and words are spread to the public, tension can arise and sometimes objections, and (c) word meanings change when used in public discourse. (Language policy and planning, semiosphere, indexical order, hbtqi, antiracism, disability, discrimination)

Type
Articles
Information
Language in Society , Volume 48 , Issue 5 , November 2019 , pp. 721 - 743
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Ahmed, Sara (2006). The nonperformativity of antiracism. Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism 7(1):104–26.Google Scholar
Alexandersson, AnnaSofia (2015). Crip is hip: En intervjustudie om funktionsvarierades aktivism och motståndsstrategier i Göteborg. Göteborgs: Göteborgs universitet, Institutionen för kulturvetenskaper Genusvetenskap thesis.Google Scholar
Allan, Keith, & Burridge, Kate (1991). Euphemism and dysphemism: Language used as shield and weapon. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Althusser, Louis (2006). Ideology and ideological state apparatuses (notes towards an investigation). In Sharma, Aradhana & Gupta, Akhil (eds.), The anthropology of the state: A reader, 86–98. Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
American Psychiatric Association (1994). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. 4th edn. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.Google Scholar
American Psychiatric Association (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. 5th edn. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.Google Scholar
Bakhtin, Mikhail M. (1986). Speech genres and other late essays. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Blommaert, Jan (2015). Chronotopes, scales, and complexity in the study of language in society. Annual Review of Anthropology 44(1):105–16.Google Scholar
Butler, Judith (1997). Excitable speech: A politics of the performative. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Butler, Judith (2011a). Bodies that matter: On the discursive limits of sex. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Butler, Judith (2011b). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Cameron, Deborah (1995). Verbal hygiene. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Cameron, Deborah (2003). Gender and language ideologies. In Holmes, Janet & Meyerhoff, Miriam (eds.), The handbook of language and gender, 447–67. Hong Kong: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Cameron, Deborah (2006). Ideology and language. Journal of Political Ideologies 11(2):141–52.Google Scholar
Campbell, Fiona A. Kumari (2008). Exploring internalized ableism using critical race theory. Disability & Society 23(2):151–62.Google Scholar
Cooper, Robert L. (1989). Language planning and social change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Cosenza, Julie (2010). SLOW: Crip theory, dyslexia and the borderlands of disability and ablebodiedness. Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies 6(2):1–11.Google Scholar
Daniels, Jessie (2016). White lies: Race, class, gender and sexuality in white supremacist discourse. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Davidson, Deanna (2007). East spaces in West times: Deictic reference and political self-positioning in a post-socialist East German chronotope. Language & Communication 27(3):212–26.Google Scholar
Del Vicario, Michela (2016). The spreading of misinformation online. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(3):554–59.Google Scholar
Devlieger, Patrick J. (1999). From handicap to disability: Language use and cultural meaning in the United States. Disability and Rehabilitation 21(7):346–54.Google Scholar
Dunn, Dana S., & Andrews, Erin E. (2015). Person-first and identity-first language: Developing psychologists' cultural competence using disability language. American Psychologist 70(3):255–64.Google Scholar
Fairclough, Norman (1992). Language and social change. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Fairclough, Norman (2003). Political correctness: The politics of culture and language. Discourse & Society 14(1):17–28.Google Scholar
Fairclough, Norman (2015). Critical language awareness. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel (1982). The subject and power. Critical Inquiry 8(4):777–95.Google Scholar
Hornscheidt, Lann, & Landqvist, Mats (2014). Språk och diskriminering. Lund: Studentlitteratur.Google Scholar
Irvine, Judith T. (2001). Style as distinctiveness: The culture and ideology of linguistic differentiation. In Eckert, Penelope & Rickford, John R. (eds.), Style and sociolinguistic variation, 21–43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Irvine, Judith T., & Gal, Susan (2009). Language ideology and linguistic differentiation. In Alessandro Duranti (ed.), Linguistic anthropology: A reader, 402–34. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Jette, Alan M. (2006). Toward a common language for function, disability, and health. Physical Therapy 86(5):726–34.Google Scholar
Kailes, June Isaacson (2010). Language is more than a trivial concern! 10th edn. Pomona, CA: Harris Family Center for Disability and Health Policy. Online: https://www.resourcesforintegratedcare.com/sites/default/files/Language%20Is%20More%20Than%20A%20Trivial%20Concern.pdf.Google Scholar
Kostogriz, Alex (2006). Putting ‘space’ on the agenda of sociocultural research. Mind, Culture, and Activity 13(3):176–90.Google Scholar
Landqvist, Mats (2015a). A professional-cultural approach to discrimination: Constructions of police discrimination in two European countries. Journal of Multicultural Discourses 10(3):313–31.Google Scholar
Landqvist, Mats (2015b). Vad är språklig diskriminering? En analytisk prövning av några pejoriseringsteorier. In Landqvist, Mats (ed.), Från social kategorisering till diskriminering: Fyra studier av språk och diskriminering och ett modellförslag, 97–122. Huddinge: Södertörns högskola.Google Scholar
Landqvist, Mats (2018). Språkpolitik som ett inslag i kampen mot diskriminering. Språk & Stil 28:176–202.Google Scholar
Lorcan, Kenny; Hattersley, Caroline; Molins, Bonnie; Buckley, Carole; Povey, Carol; & Pellicano, Elizabeth (2016). Which terms should be used to describe autism? Perspectives from the UK autism community. Autism 20(4):442–62.Google Scholar
Lotman, Juri (2005). On the semiosphere. Sign Systems Studies 33(1):205–29.Google Scholar
Lotman, Mikhail (2002). Umwelt and semiosphere. Sign Systems Studies 30(1):33–40.Google Scholar
Lotman, Yuri M. (1990). Universe of the mind: A semiotic theory of culture. London: I. B. Taurus.Google Scholar
Lykke, Nina (2010). Feminist studies: A guide to intersectional theory, methodology and writing. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Mey, Jacob L. (2001). Pragmatics: An introduction. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Meyer, Jenny (2016). Unik studie visar på ökande boendesegregation i svenska storstäder [Press release]. Online: https://www.gu.se/omuniversitetet/aktuellt/nyheter/detalj//unik-studie-visar-pa-okande-boendesegregation-i-svenska-storstader.cid1376179.Google Scholar
Milani, Tommaso M. (2013) Are ‘queers’ really ‘queer’? Language, identity and same-sex desire in a South African online community. Discourse & Society 24(5):615–33.Google Scholar
Milles, Karin (2006). En jämställd kroppsdel? Om lanseringen av ett neutralt ord för flickors könsorgan. Språk & Stil 16:149–77.Google Scholar
Milles, Karin (2013). En öppning i en sluten ordklass? Den nya användningen av pronomenet hen. Språk & Stil 23:107–40.Google Scholar
Mills, Sara (2003). Caught between sexism, anti-sexism and ‘political correctness’: Feminist women's negotiations with naming practices. Discourse & Society 14(1):87–110.Google Scholar
Mills, Sara (2007). Geography, gender and power. In Crampton, Jeremy W. & Elden, Stuart (eds.), Space, knowledge and power: Foucault and geography, 49–51. Hampshire: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Myers, Anna M., & Rothblum, Esther D. (2005). Coping with prejudice and discrimination based on weight. In Chin, Jean Lau (ed.), The psychology of prejudice and discrimination: Disability, religion, physique, and other traits, 112–34. Westport, CT: Greenwood.Google Scholar
Ochs, Elinor (1996). Linguistic resources for socializing humanity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Pauwels, Anne (1998). Women changing language. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Pauwels, Anne (2003). Linguistic sexism and feminist linguistic activism. In Holmes, Janet & Meyerhoff, Miriam, (eds.), The handbook of language and gender, 550–70. Hong Kong: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Michael, Silverstein (2003). Indexical order and the dialectics of sociolinguistic life. Language & Communication 23:193–229.Google Scholar
Sinclair, Jim (2013). Why I dislike ‘person first’ language. Autonomy, the Critical Journal of Interdisciplinary Autism Studies 1(2):1–2.Google Scholar
Sprachpraxis, AK Feministische (2011). Feminismus schreiben lernen. (Tranzdisziplinäre Genderstudien 3.) Frankfurt: Brandes & Apsel.Google Scholar
Tomlinson, Matt, & Millie, Julian (2017). Introduction: Imagining the monologic. In Tomlinson, Matt & Millie, Julian (eds.), The monologic imagination, 1–18. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Torop, Peeter (2005). Semiosphere and/as the research object of semiotics of culture. Sign Systems Studies 33(1):159–71.Google Scholar
Urban, Greg (2017). Cultural replication: The source of monological and dialogical models of culture. In Tomlinson, Matt & Millie, Julian (eds.), The monologic imagination, 19–46. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Vogel, Anna (2010). Laddade ord. In Svenskans beskrivning 30: Förhandlingar vid Trettionde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning, Stockholm den 10 och 11 oktober, 358–67. Stockholm: Institutionen för nordiska språk, Stockholms universitet.Google Scholar
Vogel, Anna (2014). Laddade ord: Hur nya uttryck, som kategoriserar människor, tas in i svenskan. Språk & Stil 24:72–100.Google Scholar
Wirtz, Kristina (2017). With unity we will be victorious! A monologic poetics of political ‘conscientization’ within the Cuban revolution. In Tomlinson, Matt & Millie, Julian (eds.), The monologic imagination, 89–120. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wojahn, Daniel (2015). Språkaktivism: Diskussioner om feministiska språkförändringar i Sverige från 1960-talet till 2015. Uppsala: Uppsala universitet dissertation.Google Scholar
Woolard, Kathryn A. (2013). Is the personal political? Chronotopes and changing stances toward Catalan language and identity. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 16(2):210–24.Google Scholar