Dialogues with Ethnography

Once again, Jan Blommaert advances the field of sociolinguistics in this indispensable collection of insightful and thought-provoking essays on the importance of ethnography in helping us make sense of language, culture, and society in our complex and fascinating world. Written in a clear and accessible style, this book will become essential reading for its intellectual rigor, scope and depth.

* Christian W. Chun, University of Massachusetts Boston, USA *

Dialogue lies at the heart of Jan Blommaert’s invitation to conceive of ethnography as epistemology. In this elegant collection Blommaert enters into intriguing dialogues with a number of foundational thinkers in ethnography and sociolinguistics. In engaging with the ‘classics’ as he calls them, he lays out his challenging vision of a sociolinguistics that takes inequality and voice as central problematics. This is scholarship at its best.

* Catherine Kell, University of Cape Town, South Africa *

This volume is packed with ideas, historical and contemporary, all made fresh through Jan Blommaert’s insightful connections and lucid prose. Hymes, Kress, Bakhtin, Bourdieu, and many others are here together in a conversation about ethnography, what it is, and what it can do. A stunning homage to – and meditation on – Blommaert’s intellectual heroes.

* Betsy Rymes, University of Pennsylvania, USA *

[This] collection offers an intellectually engaging and thought-provoking discussion of ethnography as theory. Through his clearly articulated analysis and reflection, Blommaert provides the reader with a more accessible reading of the foundational works in the field of sociolinguistics [...] ‘Dialogues with Ethnography’ is a welcome addition to the field of sociolinguistic ethnography, and a must-have for experienced readers who take an avid theoretical interest in ethnography.

-- Xiaofang Yao, University of Melbourne, Australia * LINGUIST List 30.40