This article uses data from interviews conducted in western North Carolina in order to examine the ways in which speakers enact authoritative, evaluative, and interactional stances to construct individual identity. In this data, we find a subtle interplay between the content of explicit statements, narrative content, and the use of grammatical features associated with Appalachian English (e.g. a-prefixing, nonstandard past tense), and the use of physical artifacts as sources of stance-taking. This article focuses on two speakers' use of (present and not-present) physical artifacts (a placemat, a Civil War era sword, a lock of hair, and a piece of wood with a bullet hole in it) to enact stances that construct individual versions of an Appalachian identity. What this analysis suggests is that it is not just linguistic choices that contribute to stance enactment, but physical objects as well. (Sociolinguistics, stance-taking, Appalachian English, material culture, language and idenity)*

American Stuttering English (ASE) speakers (or ‘persons who stutter’ in pathological perspectives) have historically had tense relationships with comedic representations of their speech. Mainstream representations pathologize and ridicule stuttering, rather than appreciate it as a legitimate language variety. These depictions also increase non-ASE speakers' ‘possessive investment’ (Lipsitz 1995) in Standard American Fluent English as the dominant language variety. Recently, some ASE speakers have reinterpreted ASE and comedic portrayals of their speech using stand-up comedy. This article analyzes the comedic work of Rona B, an ASE comedienne. Using data on her YouTube channel, I argue that Rona B draws on her intersectional experiences as a female ASE speaker to construct a voice that critiques both the political agendas of anti-linguistic discrimination, which downplays gender, and of antisexism, which minimizes sociolinguistic differences. This study expands on contemporary calls in sociolinguistics that position intracategorical intersectionality as key for analyzing performances on language variation. (Gender, variation, American Stuttering English, performance, stand-up comedy, language ideologies)*

In this article, the collective language shift from Swedish to Ukrainian in the traditionally Swedish-speaking community of Gammalsvenskby is studied particularly through interview data from sixteen first-generation nonspeakers of the heritage language. The article argues that it is not enough to study collective language shift merely from the point of view of the last-speaker generation, but that the nonspeaker generation's views are also needed to understand and describe language shift, since they are also participants in language shift. Two themes, seemingly central in language shift research, are explored: agency in language nontransmission, and external pressure on heritage-language speakers to conform linguistically. The conclusion of the study is that most of the interviewed nonspeakers see the language shift mainly as a pragmatic development, although some also quote external pressure as a factor. (Language shift, Gammalsvenskby, nonspeaker)*

This article proposes the term interactional straining for the strategic manipulation of interaction as grounded in neoliberal governmentality. The interactional practice was observed among adult English learners in Yangshuo, which, through mobilizing English-speaking foreigners and commodifying English, has been attracting Chinese nationals seeking to improve their English, the gate-keeping language in global workplaces in China. Based on ethnographic observations and interviews, it is shown that what appears to be naturally occurring interactions with foreigners actually involves reflexive thinking at the backstage (Goffman 1959), which is aimed at the strategic manipulation of interactional contents and/or structure so as to establish oneself as (pass for) a legitimate interlocutor. This study shows that interaction constitutes a key site where the contradictions and tensions of neoliberalism are lived out. It also argues that as reflexivity becomes a key morality under neoliberal globalization, metadiscourses provide important insights for our critique of neoliberalism. (English, language ideology, interaction, neoliberalism, work, globalization, China)*

This study focuses on the tensions around Portugal's language policies and citizens’ perceptions of their linguistic rights in the context of the current orthographic reform. Unlike other linguistic rights studies, this enquiry does not focus on endangered languages or linguistic minorities. Instead, there are three major ingredients that embody linguistic-rights claims by European Portuguese speakers: the right to be heard on orthographic reform in a democratic society, ownership and authenticity of the Portuguese language, and the need for protection against external (or, more specifically, Brazilian) hegemony. A critical discourse analysis approach to the arguments put forward by European Portuguese opponents of the orthographic reform shows that the ongoing discussion: (i) is neither about language nor about rights, but about competition; (ii) is based on linguistic dichotomies and recategorization of speakers and languages; (iii) manipulates the rhetoric of threat, endangerment, linguistic rights, and democracy; and (iv) opens up intra-linguistic and inter-variety spaces for conceptualizing linguistic rights claims. (Language ideological debate, public understanding, language planning, linguistic rights, orthographic reform)