Language and materiality: ethnographic and theoretical explorations

Machine generated contents note: 1. Introduction: approaching language materially Shalini Shankar and Jillian R. Cavanaugh; 2. Curated conversation: materiality: it's the stuff! Webb Keane and Michael Silverstein; Part I. Texts, Objects, Mediality: 3. Essay: Japan's trendy word grand prix and Kanji of the year: commodified language forms in multiple contexts Laura Miller; 4. Essay: fontroversy! Or, how to care about the shape of language Keith M. Murphy; 5. Comment: physicality and texts Jennifer Dickinson; 6. Essay: spelling materiality: the branded business of competitive spelling Shalini Shankar; Part II. Transformation, Aesthetics, Embodiment: 7. Comment: why bodies matter Mary Bucholtz; 8. Essay: how the sausage gets made: food safety and the mediality of talk, documents, and food practices Jillian R. Cavanaugh; 9. Essay: 'your mouth is your lorry!' How honk horns voice the acoustic materiality of reputation in Accra Steven Feld; 10. Comment: language, music, materiality (and immateriality) Paja Faudree; 11. Essay: transduction in religious discourse: vocalization and sound reproduction in Mauritian Muslim devotional practices Patrick Eisenlohr; Part III: Time, Place, Circulation: 12. Essay: making and marketing in the bilingual periphery: materialization as metacultural transformation Nikolas Coupland and Helen Kelly-Holmes; 13. Comment: can language be a commodity? Monica Heller; 14. Essay: word-things and thing-words: the transmodal production of privilege and status Crispin Thurlow and Adam Jaworski; 15. Essay: language and materiality in the re-naming of Indigenous North American languages and peoples Robert E. Moore; 16. Comment: history, artifacts, and the language of culture change in archaeology Mark Hauser; 17. Essay: the semiotic ecology of drinks and talk in Georgia Paul Manning; 18. Afterword: materiality and language, or material language? Dualisms and embodiments Judith T. Irvine

"Language and Materiality integrates linguistic anthropological and sociolinguistic scholarship on a range of topics: semiotic approaches to language, language commodification, sound, embodiment, mediatization, and aesthetics. Empirically rigorous, the volume engages scholars and students interested in language, its use, and meanings. It consists of three sections - "Texts, Objects, Mediality," "Sound, Aesthetics, Embodiment," and "Time, Place, Circulation" - containing chapters and short commentaries, framed by a curated conversation about semiotics and materiality in anthropology. Each section theorizes intersections, connections, and relationships between language and materiality across diverse topics and ethnographic contexts. The volume shows that materiality may be approached as a feature of political economy, sensual experience, aesthetics, and affective relationships in its relation to language as talk, register, genre, ideology, and acoustic object. It consists of new perspectives on materiality as a vital dimension of social life and signification in global capitalism, connecting inquiries on subjects as diverse as food, media, fonts, and music"