Contact Talk

Reviews / Votes

"This is an immensely important volume in which a synthesis is achieved of decades of theoretical debate, now integrated in an original and innovative framework for a sociolinguistics of complexity. Offering a range of richly documented studies within a coherent framework, this book is compelling reading for anyone interested in the contemporary dynamics of language and society." - Professor Jan Blommaert, Director of Babylon, Department of Culture Studies, Tilburg School of Humanities and Digital Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, the Netherlands

"This book shows that although Indonesia has arguably the world's most successful national language in one of the world's most linguistically diverse countries, the problem of contact languages has not been 'solved'. With ethnographically rich examples and introducing the concepts of 'scalar shifter' and 'contact register', the authors show beautifully how language remains a pivotal resource for the construction of difference and sameness in the midst of massive decentralization and globalization." - Joel Kuipers, Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, George Washington University, USA "This is an immensely important volume in which a synthesis is achieved of decades of theoretical debate, now integrated in an original and innovative framework for a sociolinguistics of complexity. Offering a range of richly documented studies within a coherent framework, this book is compelling reading for anyone interested in the contemporary dynamics of language and society." - Professor Jan Blommaert, Director of Babylon, Department of Culture Studies, Tilburg School of Humanities and Digital Sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, the Netherlands

"This book shows that although Indonesia has arguably the world's most successful national language in one of the world's most linguistically diverse countries, the problem of contact languages has not been 'solved'. With ethnographically rich examples and introducing the concepts of 'scalar shifter' and 'contact register', the authors show beautifully how language remains a pivotal resource for the construction of difference and sameness in the midst of massive decentralization and globalization." - Joel Kuipers, Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, George Washington University, USA