Language, Immigration and Naturalization

Discussing in great detail the clever and delicate interplay of the desired, the feared, the imaginary and the legally enforced, this book exposes the use and abuse of linguistic and discursive border control in immigration and citizenship. It builds on decades of scholarship on similar techniques elsewhere, fuses them with fundamental reflections on modernist notions of citizenship, and offers us the most advanced statements on record.

* Jan Blommaert, Tilburg University, Netherlands *

As citizenship becomes geopolitically charged, contemporary definitions must resolve tensions between participation and inclusion, and community and legality, in the context of transnationalism and mobility. As these tensions are often negotiated through language in everyday life, this book brings a much-needed linguistic focus on institutions, communities, and classrooms in diverse geographical locations.

* Suresh Canagarajah, Pennsylvania State University, USA *

This book presents a much-needed challenge to the established binary of the immigrant and the settled population, and to banal discourses of integration and social cohesion, as well as adding weight to arguments for dissociating citizenship from legal status: language policies, national identities and feelings of belonging affect all citizens and would-be citizens, settled populations as well as new arrivals.

-- James Simpson, University of Leeds, UK * Journal of Language and Politics 17:4 *

Language, Immigration and Naturalization is topical, thoughtprovoking, and immaculately edited; it stands as a collection of important ideas and methods
investigating language and citizenship and will be an excellent addition to a range of classes for years to come, in addition to being essential in its own right as a collection of scholarship on this important subject.

-- Emily Moline, University of California, Davis, USA * Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 17:1 *

All contributions in this volume work very well together to provide the reader with substantial information regarding the investigated topics, as well as a rigorous elaboration of the key concepts that this volume deals with (...) This volume represents a significant contribution to rigorous scientific research focusing on both the legal and social implications of the interplay between language, immigration, citizenship, and naturalization.

-- Sanja Škifić, University of Zadar, Croatia * Lengua y migración 8:2 (2016), 137-141 *

The studies in this book offer valuable insights into issues of belonging
and (dis-)citizenship.

-- Neda Salahshour, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand * Language in Society 47 (201