Handbook of Semiotics
Advances in Semiotics
ISSN: (Print) (Online) E-Book homepage: https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv14npk46
Critical Book Review (CBR)
Handbook of Semiotics : Advances in Semiotics
Winfried Noth,, University of Kassel, Germany, 1990, X + 576 pp., ISBN: 0253209595,
9780253209597
Nadiyya Anis Khairani
Nadiyya Anis Khairani (2024): Critical Book Review (CBR), Handbook of
To cite this article:
Semiotics : Advances in Semiotics, Indiana University Press, DOI: 2692-0409
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Published online: 22 Sept 1990.
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JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR TEACHING
BOOK REVIEW
Language, social media and ideologies: translingual englishes, facebook
and authenticities, Sender Dovchin, Perth, WA, Australia, Springer, 2020, X +
83 pp.,
€49.99 (soft cover), ISBN: 978-3-030-26138-2, (eBook), ISBN: 978-3-030-
26139-9
The present book explores the role of English on social media by scrutinising the EFL
university learners in Mongolia and Japan. The book consists of several sections
including an acknowl- edgement, an abstract, nine chapters, and a
bibliography. The whole book presents a comprehensive examination of the
active role of English in social media, especially in an East Asia context.
Chapter 1, Peripheralized Englishes, Social Media and (In)Authenticity, introduces
two main aspects of the entire work. In the first aspect, the author tries to explore the
complex relation- ship between English and transnational EFL university
students as social media users. She recognises the language used on social media
as ‘peripheralized Englishes.’ The second aspect, however, emphasises some
strong claims regarding the authenticity and legitimacy of the social media
English used by EFL students in Mongolia and Japan. The widespread language
ideology was addressed in a letter to Mongolian Parliament, 2007, written by a
number of Mongolian scholars. The fundamental hint of this letter was to defend the
Mongolian language from English and other foreign languages, because they
were considered threats to the general national security, linguistic and cultural
authenticity, and legitimacy of Mongolia as an independent nation (Dovchin
2018). This idea is highly appreciated in that we should preserve languages
from distinction through various language policies and strategies.
Chapter 2, Translingual Englishes and the Global Spread of Authenticity, elaborates
on the concept of ‘Translingual Englishes’ by exploring how the concept of
authenticity is trans- gressed as a result of different processes. Canagarajah (2013)
asserts that translingual English is about how individuals mobilise different
semiotic resources and adopt different negotiation strategies to make
meanings across linguistic boundaries, rather than focusing on fixed
grammar, forms and discrete language systems. Overall, as author suggests,
“the prevailing ethos of [translingual] approaches implies that language is
organically organised around miscellaneous semiotic resources, whilst operating in
a discursively integrative universe (P.13). Chapter 3, Synchronous and
Asynchronous Participants of Facebook, presents the ethno- graphic qualitative
research method conducted in order to examine the online digital lan- guage
used on Facebook. Mongolian students participated in the synchronous social
media interactions (e.g. chat rooms and live updates on Facebook); meanwhile,
Japanese students took part in the asynchronous social media interactions (e.g.
emails and discussion boards) that channelled a one-way connection. In this
vein, Gillin (2007, i) truly expresses, ‘the real influencers are no longer
marketing experts, nor the traditional media that has always con- trolled and
filtered marketing messages, but millions of ordinary people who are determining
in direct and powerful ways what people hear, say, and believe.’ At last, the concept
of ‘trans-’
textual and modal analysis is highlighted as the main tool to code the materials.
Chapter 4, African American Vernacular English, Hip-Hop and ‘Keepin’ It Real’,
Chapter 5, Heavy Englishes and the Enactment of Authentic Self, and Chapter 6, Inverted
Englishes, ‘In-Group’ Talks and Authenticity, illustrate the ways Mongolian EFL
university students are involved in a synchronic use of English on Facebook.
Students use translingual English in a unique and creative way through
different strategies such as the relocalization of multiple hip-hop
2 BOOK REVIEW
oriented transnational sources, the heavy import of English, or inverting
English mainly through syllabic inversion. However, the metalinguistic
conceptions behind these translingual uses of English are claimed to be
linguistically authentic and legitimate and to express their language identities.
These three chapters truly demonstrate the systematic use and changes of language
under different environmental factors. As a result, these data considerably ascertain
and highlight the claims raised in the previous chapters.
Chapter 7, ‘Ghost Englishes’, Realness, Native Speakerism, and Authenticity, and
the penulti- mate chapter, Idiomatic Englishes, Onomatopes, Authenticities,
present how Japanese EFL students are engaged in an asynchronic use of
translingual Englishes through the reinvention of different linguistic and cultural
materials within their linguistic practices. They idealise the language used by the
native speakers on social media, what is called ghost Englishes, and
experience a mischievous learning environment by trusting the real context
and see this experience as using the authentic language.
The last chapter, Translingual Englishes, Social Media, Language Ideologies, Critical
Pedagogy, intertwines all of the aforementioned themes of the book to
comprehend the vision and insight of learners’ community. Dovchin praises
the outlook expressed by EFL university students’ on sociolinguistic realities.
She criticises the high dependency on idealised forms of language that will
trigger ‘monolingualism and monoculturalism’ and recommends a
descending emphasis on the concept of linguistic authenticity. To update the
pedagogical system, then, adding translingual Englishes in social media as a topic to
the present curriculum seems essential, considering the rapid growth of social
media and its impact on language.
The book provides an excellent approach to the critically minded community
of applied linguists, serving as a refreshing and much needed contribution to the
field. Engaging a variety of Facebook data, the book predominantly highlights the
presence of English on social media as a mode of translinguality, by providing a
manifold combination of sources, genres, modes, styles, and productions, and by
explicitly addressing comprehensive sociocultural, historical, and ideological
venues focusing on EFL university students in East Asia (Mongolia and Japan). The
scope of the book underlines the significance of multifarious ideologies of
linguistic authenticity considering their usage of ‘translingual Englishes’ on social
media.
Overall, Dovchin’s rich and deep contribution to the study of language on
social media paves new and challenging paths for researchers, bringing to the
fore the significance of the diverse criteria, identities, beliefs, and ideas about
the notion of linguistic authenticity. Her project could inspire explorations of the
notion of ‘translingual Englishes’ on social media in critical EFL educational
contexts despite the complexity of modern linguistic experiences.
References
Canagarajah, S. 2013. Translingual Practice: Global Englishes and Cosmopolitan Relations. London:
Routledge. Dovchin, S. 2018. Language, Media and Globalization in the Periphery: Routledge
Studies in Sociolinguistics.
New York: Routledge.
Gillin, P. 2007. The New Influencers: A Marketers Guide to Social Marketing. Sanger, CA: Quill Driver
Books/Word Dancer Press.
Amin Karimnia
Department of English, Fasa Branch, Islamic Azad University, Iran
[email protected]
© 2020 Amin
Karimnia
https://doi.org/10.1080/02607476.2020.18415
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