Ingrid Piller, a leading voice on language and migration, joins her co-authors, including Donna Butorac and Loy Lising, to discuss their groundbreaking book on the language learning experiences of 130 migrants in Australia. They examine how monolingual ideologies affect low-skilled migrants and explore the barriers imposed by rigid language standards in immigration. The conversation also highlights the importance of collaboration in scholarly work and the need for a multilingual mindset to enhance migrant integration into society.

Brynn Quick speaks with Dr. Ella van Hest (Ghent University, Belgium) about her ethnographic research related to language diversity at an abortion clinic in Belgium. The conversation focusses on a co-authored paper entitled Language policy at an abortion clinic published in Language Policy in 2023.For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

The podcast discusses the experiences of migrants in Australia over 20 years, focusing on language learning, settlement, work, family, and identity. It explores how migration reshapes family dynamics and language choices, highlighting challenges faced by parents. The episode also delves into collaborative writing, linguistic diversity, and efforts to address language barriers in healthcare for marginalized groups.

Ingrid Piller, Donna Butorac, Emily Farrell, Loy Lising, Shiva Motaghi Tabari, and Vera Williams Tetteh each co-authored a book focusing on the language learning journeys of African migrants in Australia. They delve into personal narratives of resilience faced during migration, tackling cultural barriers and educational challenges. The conversation also highlights the importance of embracing diversity within migrant communities and efforts to promote African languages, fostering empowered and stable environments.

In How Things Count as the Same: Memory, Mimesis, and Metaphor (Oxford UP, 2019), Adam B. Seligman and Robert P. Weller address a seemingly simple question: What counts as the same? Given the myriad differences that divide one individual from another, why do we recognize anyone as somehow sharing a common fate with us? For that matter, how do we live in harmony with groups who may not share the sense of a common fate? Such relationships lie at the heart of the problems of pluralism that increasingly face so much of the world today.Note that "counting as" the same differs from "being" the same. Counting as the same is not an empirical question about how much or how little one person shares with another or one event shares with a previous event. Nothing is actually the same. That is why, as humans, we construct sameness all the time. In the process, of course, we also construct difference.Creating sameness and difference leaves us with the perennial problem of how to live with difference instead of seeing it as a threat. How Things Count as the Same suggests that there are multiple ways in which we can count things as the same, and that each of them fosters different kinds of group dynamics and different sets of benefits and risks for the creation of plural societies. While there might be many ways to understand how people construct sameness, three stand out as especially important and form the focus of the book's analysis: Memory, Mimesis, and Metaphor.Theo Stapleton is a PhD student in Social Anthropology at Cambridge University, whose fieldwork was conducted at the first Chinese Buddhist temple in Tanzania. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Ingrid Piller, a leading voice in migration and language studies, is joined by her co-authors Donna Butorac, Emily Farrell, Loy Lising, and Shiva Motaghi Tabari, who collaboratively examine the experiences of 130 migrants in Australia. They tackle the significant barriers these individuals face in securing employment due to perceived language proficiency. The conversation emphasizes the need for systemic changes to better integrate skilled migrants and recognizes the resilience and empathy required in navigating their new environments.

Ingrid Piller, Donna Butorac, Emily Farrell, Loy Lising, Shiva Motaghi Tabari, and Vera Williams Tetteh are co-authors of a compelling new book on migrants' language and settlement experiences in Australia. They delve into how migration reshapes identities, exploring personal and emotional challenges faced by newcomers. The discussion touches on societal biases, the impact of language barriers on employment, and the vital role of collaboration in academia. Their insights illuminate the intricate ties between language, identity, and community in a multicultural context.

In this debut conversation, we speak to Dr. Nina Beguš, a researcher at UC Berkeley and the founder of InterpretAI who holds a PhD in Comparative Literature from Harvard University. Listen to learn about Nina’s path at the intersection of AI and the humanities, the challenges and rewards of working across disciplines, what questions to ask as an ethical researcher, and practical advice for how to succeed in a multifaceted, multidisciplinary career in today’s fast-changing digital landscape.Beguš' first book, titled Artificial Humanities: A Fictional Perspective on Language in AI, is currently under an advance contract with the University of Michigan Press.Towards Knowledge is a Latent Knowledge podcast series where we interview industry and academic leaders about research in the real world — from career development to the most pressing philosophical questions in today’s changing research landscape. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Brynn Quick speaks with best-selling author and linguist Gretchen McCulloch about her 2019 New York Times bestselling book Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language (Riverhead Books, 2020). Gretchen has written a Resident Linguist column at The Toast and Wired. She is also the co-creator of Lingthusiasm, a wildly popular podcast that’s enthusiastic about linguistics.Because Internet is for anyone who’s ever puzzled over how to punctuate a text message or wondered where memes come from. It’s the perfect book for understanding how the internet is changing the English language, why that’s a good thing, and what our online interactions reveal about who we are.For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Emily Pacheco speaks with writer and researcher Jessica Kirkness about her memoir, The House with All the Lights on: Three Generations, One Roof, a Language of Light (Allen & Unwin, 2023). Jessica has published in Meanjin and The Conversation, as well as other outlets. Her PhD focused on the ‘hearing line’: the invisible boundary between Deaf and hearing cultures. She is also a teacher of nonfiction writing at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.The House With All The Lights On explores linguistic and cultural dynamics within Deaf-hearing families. Jessica shares her experience having Deaf grandparents and navigating the cultural borderline between Deaf and hearing cultures. It is a wonderful memoir about family, the complexities of identity, and linguistic diversity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language