AILA 2024 in Kuala Lumpur: Day 3 Highlights

Engaging debate at the “Multilingual Crisis Communication” Symposium organized by Profs LI Jia and ZHANG Jie

Highlights of Day 3 of the 21^st AILA World Conference: Southern epistemologies, real-life catch-ups, and the Korean translation of Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice.

Southern Epistemologies

Wednesday’s keynote by Professor Sinfree Makoni engaged with decolonizing linguistics and Southern epistemologies. Drawing our attention to the efforts of the African Virtual Studies Global Forum, Professor Makoni called on the field to embrace pluralistic perspectives on key concepts from “language” to “native speaker.” He showed how literacy-centric views of language have led to the exclusion of oracy-based practices from mainstream linguistics.

Another call for “unbooking” – to create and share knowledge through diverse modalities. Makoni showed a video PhD project about multilingualism in Ghana (we’ll share a link here as soon as we find it). The new Language on the Move Podcast is another example 😊

One symposium that engaged deeply with language and communication in a context in the Global South was led by Professors LI Jia and and ZHANG Jie, both key members of the Language-on-the-Move team.

Their symposium about multilingual crisis communication was devoted to exploring the lived experiences of linguistic minorities in China during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Love the opportunity to catch up with old and new friends. Here with Profs In Chull Jang (Seoul National University) and Guofang Li (University of British Columbia)

The symposium was a new outcome of the Language on the Move Covid-19 Archives, which we have been building since early 2020.

Presenters took a variety of critical sociopolitical approaches to conceptualize multilingual crisis communication from three dimensions, namely identifying communication barriers, engaging communication repertoires, and empowering communication justice. All the speakers are also contributors to the forthcoming book Multilingual Crisis Communication: Insights from China, which will be out from Routledge later this year.

Overall, the tone of the symposium was hopeful about the future of multilingual crisis communication, building as it did on engaged, co-designed, and participatory research with local communities.

Real-life catch-ups

At a conference such as AILA with close to 2,000 delegates a multiplicity of perspectives emerges not only in the academic program but, perhaps even more importantly, in all the informal conversations going on during breaks, in the corridors, and while exploring the amazing city of Kuala Lumpur.

“Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice” has been translated into Korean by Prof In Chull Jang (Seoul National University)

While the many parallel sessions can feel overwhelming, many of the real highlights that shift perspectives and allow us to see things in different ways are happening outside the academic program.

A huge shout-out is due to the conference organizers who have pulled out all the stops to have these meetings, dialogues and conversations take place in a setting with a wow factor – the Petronas Twin Towers overlook the conference venue – and supported by amazing food that keeps body and soul together.

Korean translation of Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice

The most amazing present I received during the conference has been the Korean translation of my 2016 book Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice, which has just been published by Sahoi Pyoungnon Publishing in Seoul. The translator, In Chull Jang from Seoul National University, brought along an advance copy for me. The book is called Linguistic Diversity and Inequality in Korean and I hope the translation will bring its call to take linguistic diversity seriously as part of the social justice agenda of our time to a new audience.

And a bit of nerdy linguistics conferencing fun:

Just overheard at #AILA2024:
“I’m from @Macquarie_Uni/@MQLinguistics”
“Wow, Halliday.”
“yes, it’s a nice tropical holiday for us.”
🤣🤣🤣

— Language on the Move (@Lg_on_the_Move) August 14, 2024