Faculty members in the Department of Languages, Literatures & Linguistics (Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies) have released new books that investigate the intricacies and influences of language.
Professor Philipp Angermeyer uncovers the biases and disadvantages facing non-English speakers in New York City’s small claims courts. In his new book, Speak English or What? Codeswitching and Interpreter Use in New York City Courts, Angermeyer focuses on the litigants who speak Haitian Creole, Polish, Russian or Spanish and the judges and court interpreters with which they interact.
In Professor Susan Ehrlich’s new book, Discursive Constructions of Consent in the Legal Process, Ehrlich and her co-editors, Professor Diana Eades from the University of New England (Australia) and Professor Janet Ainsworth from Seattle University, showcase the ways in which linguistic perspectives and methodologies can illuminate inadequacies in how consent is understood within the legal system.
Professor James A. Walker advocates the sociolinguist’s view in his new book, Canadian English: A Sociolinguistic Perspective. He combines the societal study of language with variation and change in language use, and he highlights the different ways in which sociolinguists collect and analyze data.
Professor Emiro Martínez-Osorio weaves a narrative of conquest and poetry in his book Authority, Piracy, and Captivity in Colonial Spanish American Writing: Juan de Castellanos’s Elegies of Illustrious Men of the Indies.