Acknowledging and challenging the difficult heritage of linguistics as a colonial discipline, this volume presents examples of how (in)hospitality may emerge in contexts of language encounters and language research. It considers how a more hospitable approach might shape and define the ways we interact with languages and language communities. The authors examine how we might re-imagine language as being hospitably open to the unexpected, to moments of crisis, surprise, and revelation, instead of being under control. This book presents alternative, Indigenous and critical approaches to language research and language encounters in case studies and contexts all over the world, from Shetland and the Viking Hebrides to the trans-Atlantic slave trade, from research encounters in Nigeria, Namibia and Kenya to the situations of migrants in Glasgow and Ghana. The authors describe their attempts to establish connectedness and resonance, as well as how they have negotiated ways of making sense of these exchanges in the midst of violence, disruption and ruination. Based on such acts of exchange and resonant connection, the volume presents a fresh definition of language in its most inclusive, least domesticated sense, challenging the boundaries of linguistics as a field, to explore the possibilities of a “hospitable linguistics”.

Table of Contents:
Foreword, Nicholas Faraclas (University of Puerto Rico), Anne Storch (University of Cologne, Germany) and Viveka Velupillai (University of Giessen, Germany) 1. Introduction: Towards Wandering – and Wondering, Anne Storch (University of Cologne, Germany) and Nicholas Faraclas (University of Puerto Rico) Part 1: Language as a Gift 2. Sunset at a Place Visited for No Ordinary Reason, Anne Storch (University of Cologne, Germany) 3. The Decline of Hospitality and the Rise of Linguistic Imperialism, Arpad Szakolczai (University of Limerick, Ireland) 4. Linguistics and Nigerian Language Studies in Nigeria, Judith Mgbemena (University of Wukari, Nigeria) 5. The Trans-Atlantic Shipments of Gypsies/Romanies to the Americas, Ian Hancock (University of Texas at Austin, USA) 6. (Not) Speaking to a German Africanist in Namibia in 1954, Renathe Meroro (Windhoek, Namibia) and Anette Hoffmann (University of Cologne, Germany) 7. The Pew Inscriptions at First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia, Fiona McLaughlin (University of Gainsville, USA) Part 2: Language and Sharing 8. The Art and Role of Listening and Verbal Gestures in Tobagonian, Charleston Thomas (University of the West Indies, Trinidad, and University of Trinidad and Tobago) 9. Dagaaba Travel Experience Names, Dannabang Kuwabong (University of Puerto Rico) 10. La Carta que te Escribo sobre Festivales de Cine y Hospitalidad, Federico Oliveri(Cultural Manager, Journalist and Researcher, Puerto Rico) 11. “Paradise”, “Hospitality”, and the Transformative Power of Environmental Music, Priya Parrotta (Language & the Earth International, Puerto Rico) 12 Pluri-living in the “In” Hospitable Deep South of the US, Melinda Maxwell-Gibb (InterAmerican University of Puerto Rico) Part 3: Language, Resisting, and Undoing Enclosures 13. Shetland Stories in Knitting, Alison Rendall (Shetland-based Fair Isle Knitter, Scotland, UK) 14. The Fieldworker as a Human Being, Andrea Hollington (University of Mainz, Germany) 15. Resistance et Hospitalité, Fatou Cissé Kane (University of Cologne, Germany) 16. Pastiche: A Conversation between Kenyan Sheng and South African Tsotsitaal Youth Language Speakers, Sheng and Tsotsitaal Speakers, Ellen Hurst-Harosh (University of Cape Town, South Africa) and Fridah Kanana Erastus (Kenyatta University, Kenya) 17. Women: The Hospitable “Race” who were “Already There”, Nalini Natarajan (University of Puerto Rico) 18. On Strike on Mother Language Day, Alison Phipps (University of Glasgow, Scotland, UK) Part 4: Language and Reassuming Sovereignty 19. Narratives of Reciprocity and Envy in a Digo Community in Tiwi, Kenya, Angelika Mietzner (University of Cologne, Germany) 20. Au?ur the Deep Minded, Meg Rodger (Environmental Artist, Isle of Berneray, Scotland, UK) 21. Childhood Memories and the Call to Being Hospitable, Penelope Allsobrook (University of Cologne, Germany) 22. Giving Voice to the Witches of the Orkney Witchcraft Trials, Ragnhild Ljosland (University of the Highlands and Islands, Scotland, UK) 23. A World Glasgow Minding on the International Day of Peace, Alison Phipps (University of Glasgow, Scotland, UK) Afterword, Nico Nassenstein and Jan Knipping (University of Mainz, Germany) List of abbreviations Index