How the learning of languages constitutes an important part of how social subjects are constituted.
What is it about?
I explore how people travel metaphorically across languages, not necessarily by combining language in speech, but by actually appropriating languages and using them to participate in different linguistic communities. I call "muda" such a process, which expresses a form of identity work that has received little attention in terms of what it means from the perspective of people's biographies.
Why is it important?
Learning and using languages is a widespread experience of contemporary life. It requires substantial personal investment and risk for people, and it may be consequential. However, it is commonly undervalued in a world very much ruled by monolinguals. Understanding processes of linguistic appropriation may makes us more aware of how exclusion and inequality is produced in contemporary societies.