Pragmatics. Quarterly Publication of the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA)
Metapragmatic comments are crucial in lawyers’ attempts at managing legal advice communication wi... more Metapragmatic comments are crucial in lawyers’ attempts at managing legal advice communication with asylum seekers. Drawing on linguistic-ethnographic fieldwork in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, this paper aims to demonstrate how/when/why textual features which tell interactants how to interpret the ongoing speech are used in the context of lawyer-client communication in the field of immigration law. The data analysis reveals how lawyers frame the discursive conditions (i.e. linguistic diversity, the institutional need for efficiency and the presence of emotional lifeworld concerns) of the local interaction in the lawyer’s office. This is necessary as clients are not always acquainted with the discursive routines of the legal consultation, nor aware of its position within the wider chain of discursive asylum events. As many aspects of the legal advice context resemble the interactional conditions of the government-asylum seeker communication, it proves key yet challenging for l...
Bloomsbury Academic: an award-winning and leading global publisher of prestigious works of schola... more Bloomsbury Academic: an award-winning and leading global publisher of prestigious works of scholarship, pedagogy and digital resources in the fields of arts, humanities and social sciences. We have a reputation for excellence and originality in serving our communities of students, scholars, educators, instructors and professionals and a growing portfolio of digital products including Bloomsbury Collections, Bloomsbury Popular Music, Cultural Histories Online and Screen Studies.
This study examines interactional management practices and narrative co-construction in lawyer-as... more This study examines interactional management practices and narrative co-construction in lawyer-asylum seeker consultations in Flanders, Belgium. Drawing upon linguistic-ethnographic fieldwork, it presents a case study of a consultation between an Afghan applicant for international protection, his adviser, and his lawyer. The purpose of the consultation is to prepare the applicant for testifying at the upcoming asylum hearing. Data analysis focuses on (i) the reorientation of the asylum narrative from an authentic-experiential towards a more objectified formal-institutional account; (ii) the participants’ positioning work that indexes this reorientation process; and (iii) their fluctuating alignment of local-interactional and translocal-gatekeeping perspectives. In the discussion, we analyse the consultation in terms of competing legal and experiential voices and views on participant roles/responsibilities. We reflect on how this ambiguity of roles and ideologies relates to the const...
Abstract The constitutive role of discourse in asylum determination procedures cannot be underest... more Abstract The constitutive role of discourse in asylum determination procedures cannot be underestimated. Legal decision-making in the domain of asylum and international protection is essentially discourse-based: spoken and written discourse form the main input for the (re)production and the assessment of asylum applications. As these proceedings can have a direct bearing on the lives of individual applicants, critical reflection and analysis of these discursive dynamics can be considered a core task for researchers in this area. But not a straightforward one. Issues of voice—in the Hymesian sense as the freedom of having one's voice heard—and linguistic-narrative inequality, are central to much of the data that we analyze in this field, but also apply to the impact of language research at policy level, where language is not given priority. We draw from our own experiences as ethnographic fieldworkers in the Belgian asylum and migration context to examine the dynamics of research design, access and dissemination of research findings. We argue for the strength of grassroots initiatives and public engagement in local organizations as fruitful arenas for developing a voice that can be heard locally, and, potentially, also having an impact higher up the institutional hierarchy.
Transformative Pedagogical Perspectives on Home Language Use in Classrooms, 2021
The effects of immersive strategies and the benefits of a multilingual language policy have been ... more The effects of immersive strategies and the benefits of a multilingual language policy have been extensively explored in the literature; however, it is valuable to look at the actual application of a multilingual policy. Putting linguistic-educational research into practice by implementing a transformative pedagogical approach is characterized by a process of trial and error, which has remained understudied. This chapter aims to fill this gap by adopting a case study approach that focuses on the implementation of a multilingual/cultural policy at a preschool in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. More than half of the children attending the preschool come from a multilingual background. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, consisting of observations, participations, interviews, and focus group discussions with different stakeholders, this chapter analyzes the mechanisms behind the preschool's switch from negatively undergoing multilingualism to positively engaging with it.
Discursive input functions as the core decisive element in answering the legal dilemma of whether... more Discursive input functions as the core decisive element in answering the legal dilemma of whether someone is eligible for international protection. This pleads in favour of strengthening the narrative-discursive component in migration studies by offering a micro-sociolinguistic analysis of interactional data from diverse legal encounters with applicants for international protection. This article adopts a case study approach, bringing together two different data sets collected in a Belgian context. In focusing on asylum claims based on reasons of sexual orientation and gender identity, the article foregrounds discursive tensions emblematic for the treatment of disclosure in and around the asylum procedure. The first part of our article draws on data from the guidance and counselling side of the asylum procedure in examining legal consultations which took place in the lawyer’s office. The second part of our article turns to the communication that takes place during asylum interviews b...
Pragmatics. Quarterly Publication of the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA)
Metapragmatic comments are crucial in lawyers’ attempts at managing legal advice communication wi... more Metapragmatic comments are crucial in lawyers’ attempts at managing legal advice communication with asylum seekers. Drawing on linguistic-ethnographic fieldwork in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, this paper aims to demonstrate how/when/why textual features which tell interactants how to interpret the ongoing speech are used in the context of lawyer-client communication in the field of immigration law. The data analysis reveals how lawyers frame the discursive conditions (i.e. linguistic diversity, the institutional need for efficiency and the presence of emotional lifeworld concerns) of the local interaction in the lawyer’s office. This is necessary as clients are not always acquainted with the discursive routines of the legal consultation, nor aware of its position within the wider chain of discursive asylum events. As many aspects of the legal advice context resemble the interactional conditions of the government-asylum seeker communication, it proves key yet challenging for l...
Bloomsbury Academic: an award-winning and leading global publisher of prestigious works of schola... more Bloomsbury Academic: an award-winning and leading global publisher of prestigious works of scholarship, pedagogy and digital resources in the fields of arts, humanities and social sciences. We have a reputation for excellence and originality in serving our communities of students, scholars, educators, instructors and professionals and a growing portfolio of digital products including Bloomsbury Collections, Bloomsbury Popular Music, Cultural Histories Online and Screen Studies.
This study examines interactional management practices and narrative co-construction in lawyer-as... more This study examines interactional management practices and narrative co-construction in lawyer-asylum seeker consultations in Flanders, Belgium. Drawing upon linguistic-ethnographic fieldwork, it presents a case study of a consultation between an Afghan applicant for international protection, his adviser, and his lawyer. The purpose of the consultation is to prepare the applicant for testifying at the upcoming asylum hearing. Data analysis focuses on (i) the reorientation of the asylum narrative from an authentic-experiential towards a more objectified formal-institutional account; (ii) the participants’ positioning work that indexes this reorientation process; and (iii) their fluctuating alignment of local-interactional and translocal-gatekeeping perspectives. In the discussion, we analyse the consultation in terms of competing legal and experiential voices and views on participant roles/responsibilities. We reflect on how this ambiguity of roles and ideologies relates to the const...
Abstract The constitutive role of discourse in asylum determination procedures cannot be underest... more Abstract The constitutive role of discourse in asylum determination procedures cannot be underestimated. Legal decision-making in the domain of asylum and international protection is essentially discourse-based: spoken and written discourse form the main input for the (re)production and the assessment of asylum applications. As these proceedings can have a direct bearing on the lives of individual applicants, critical reflection and analysis of these discursive dynamics can be considered a core task for researchers in this area. But not a straightforward one. Issues of voice—in the Hymesian sense as the freedom of having one's voice heard—and linguistic-narrative inequality, are central to much of the data that we analyze in this field, but also apply to the impact of language research at policy level, where language is not given priority. We draw from our own experiences as ethnographic fieldworkers in the Belgian asylum and migration context to examine the dynamics of research design, access and dissemination of research findings. We argue for the strength of grassroots initiatives and public engagement in local organizations as fruitful arenas for developing a voice that can be heard locally, and, potentially, also having an impact higher up the institutional hierarchy.
Transformative Pedagogical Perspectives on Home Language Use in Classrooms, 2021
The effects of immersive strategies and the benefits of a multilingual language policy have been ... more The effects of immersive strategies and the benefits of a multilingual language policy have been extensively explored in the literature; however, it is valuable to look at the actual application of a multilingual policy. Putting linguistic-educational research into practice by implementing a transformative pedagogical approach is characterized by a process of trial and error, which has remained understudied. This chapter aims to fill this gap by adopting a case study approach that focuses on the implementation of a multilingual/cultural policy at a preschool in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. More than half of the children attending the preschool come from a multilingual background. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, consisting of observations, participations, interviews, and focus group discussions with different stakeholders, this chapter analyzes the mechanisms behind the preschool's switch from negatively undergoing multilingualism to positively engaging with it.
Discursive input functions as the core decisive element in answering the legal dilemma of whether... more Discursive input functions as the core decisive element in answering the legal dilemma of whether someone is eligible for international protection. This pleads in favour of strengthening the narrative-discursive component in migration studies by offering a micro-sociolinguistic analysis of interactional data from diverse legal encounters with applicants for international protection. This article adopts a case study approach, bringing together two different data sets collected in a Belgian context. In focusing on asylum claims based on reasons of sexual orientation and gender identity, the article foregrounds discursive tensions emblematic for the treatment of disclosure in and around the asylum procedure. The first part of our article draws on data from the guidance and counselling side of the asylum procedure in examining legal consultations which took place in the lawyer’s office. The second part of our article turns to the communication that takes place during asylum interviews b...
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Papers by Marie Jacobs