Pragmatics and Society - Volume 17, Issue 4, 2026

Abstract

This article studies the development of changes in language use and digital place making in relation to workplaces emerging during the Covid-19 pandemic. Most of the working population in the Nordic countries were strongly affected by the crisis and many started working from home, which led to a complete reorganization of daily work routines and introduction of new digital tools. In this article, we explore how these changes influenced cultural practices of placemaking and language use. Analyzing the data from an online survey with participants from Denmark, Finland and Sweden, we discuss: (a) to what extent the view of what linguistically can be referred to as a (working) place was extended to digital environments, (b) to what extent materiality of the digital plays a role in the making of a digital workplace, and (c) how individuals use naming as a strategy to creatively form and make stances regarding analogue, digital, and hybrid workplaces. Our conclusions point at commencing re-negotiations of the dichotomies work-home and digital-analogue being expressed through linguistic practices.

Abstract

Foreign relations law, as a genre that aims to build bridges between domestic and international law, is an understudied field in the studies of language use in legal contexts. Drawing on the method of critical genre analysis and the theory of legal speech acts, this comparative genre-pragmatic study between foreign relations laws of the U.S. and China examines foreign relations law as a master speech act and an intertextual and interdiscursive practice. Through analysis of regulative speech acts as well as the intertextual and interdiscursive elements used by drafters, the findings show that the genre of foreign relations law is an interdiscursive continuum with domestic and international legal discourse at two poles, U.S. foreign relations law leans toward the side of international legal discourse while Chinese foreign relations law demonstrates a defensive domestic law orientation, but their position on the continuum is never static but dynamic.

Abstract

This study explores impairment talk in robot-assisted walking involving young adults with mobility impairments, drawing on Ethnomethodology, Conversation Analysis, and Membership Categorization Analysis. We define impairment talk as descriptions and evaluations of performance in relation to an impairment visible to all participants, addressing either bodily abilities or appearance. The study shows that impairment talk is a recognizable phenomenon that the participants treat as a delicate matter that shapes the social identities of young adults. A central feature of impairment talk is its indirect nature. Based on video recordings from two settings, this study analyzes how participants design and respond to impairment talk, and what this accomplishes in the interaction. We suggest that the indirect nature of impairment talk results from embodied actions, sequential organization, and spatiotemporal contingencies being reflexively entwined with participants’ category work which invokes the overall activity and its categories.

Abstract

This study employs the local grammar approach to unveil sex differences and their diachronic changes of thanking in contemporary spoken British English. Using data taken from Spoken BNC1994 and Spoken BNC2014, the study found that sex differences do exist and change over time. In particular, the study revealed that in the 1990s male speakers performed thanking more frequently than their female counterparts and that female speakers tended to use formulaic expressions for thanking, which challenges the stereotypical view that women are more polite in their language use. These differences and diachronic changes have been accounted for in terms of (changing) social perceptions of sex roles, communicative conventions and socio-cultural norms. The study concludes that changes in speech act realisations correspond to changes in broader social contexts and as such (diachronic) investigation into speech act realisations could contribute to revealing the (trans)formation of socio-cultural norms in a given society.

Abstract

In 2022, a protest movement in Iran was triggered by the death of a woman who had been arrested for not covering her hair in the way required by the government. The movement spread but was then squashed. Media coverage was intense and showed many images employing visual metaphors and metonymies, often in combination. While there are now many studies analyzing multimodal metaphors in political contexts, no study has, yet, dealt with the metaphors and metonymies used in the media during the 2022 protests. This study uses a framework proposed by Ruiz de Mendoza and colleagues (2002; 2014; 2020), to analyze the structural integration of metaphor and metonymy and their joint role in meaning-making during the protests. The analysis of nine images in social media including Instagram and X reveals that Iranian political groups strategically employed the blending of visual metaphors and metonymies to legitimize their own ideological positions and delegitimize opposing viewpoints. The findings highlight the complex interrelations and interactions between these multimodal devices, demonstrating their critical function in shaping political discourse and communicative intent.

This article reviews The Linguistic Landscape in China: Commodification, Image Construction, Contestations and Negotiations978-981-99-8752-8

This article reviews Categories in Social Interaction9780367637668

This article reviews Persuasion in Specialized Discourse9789027215901