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This essay is an experiment in figuring the pandemic through its reconfigurations of Chineseness. It departs from the Sinophobic cliché that conflates race, geopolitics, and epidemiology: the "China Virus" and its cloud of cognate slurs. It considers the slogan-slur as both an epithet and a conceptual and political challenge to imagine the pandemic as it is lived, still, as a disorientation of Asian and Asian American life, time, and death. The essay pauses at each of the three Lunar New Years of the pandemic, so far, to consider how Chineseness—as a national example, as a mode of racialization, and as a site of racial suspicion—might upset a US-based accounting of the pandemic, which frames it only through its arrival on American shores. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the concept of trans language activism (TLA) and its role in achieving sociolinguistic justice for trans communities. The author argues that TLA should not only challenge misogyny, heteronormativity, and transphobia, but also address other systems of oppression such as ableism, capitalism, colonialism, fatphobia, HIV status, imperialism, incarceration, Islamophobia, poverty, racism, sexism, Survivorship, and xenophobia. The article emphasizes the importance of creating safe spaces for language play and collective discussion, as well as the need for political education to connect forms of oppression across different identities and geographies. The concept of euphoric transmutation is introduced as a strategy for liberation through language, involving the play, juxtaposition, innovation, and resignification of lexicon to challenge hegemonic power. The article also proposes the creation of a multilingual database to compare and name systems of oppression, promoting linguistic materialism and self-determination. Overall, the article advocates for TLA to center the joyful self-determination of oppressed people and promote linguistic innovation for collective liberation. [Extracted from the article]

The article discusses the importance of language activism in relation to the transgender community. It highlights the changes in norms around gender-inclusive language and the innovations in linguistic forms by trans, queer, and gender nonconforming individuals. The article emphasizes the need for intersectional coalitions in addressing linguistic issues faced by trans people, as transphobia is intensified by other forms of oppression. It also explores the challenges faced by trans language activism, including limited circulation, language ideologies, and the unequal impact of trans-affirming language. The article concludes by discussing the complex relationship between trans-affirming language and resistance to colonialism and cultural imperialism. [Extracted from the article]

The article discusses the complexities of using language to describe transgender individuals in different cultural contexts. It highlights examples of debates surrounding the use of pronouns and terminology, such as the case of a Japanese trans man being referred to as "she" in an article. The author argues that while trans-affirming language is important, it should be understood within its sociocultural context and not imposed universally. The article calls for a recognition of diverse perspectives and a move away from Eurocentric thinking in discussions of trans issues. [Extracted from the article]

We investigate experimentally whether the perceived offensiveness of slurs survives when they are reported, by comparing Italian slurs and insults in base utterances (Y is an S), direct speech (X said: "Y is an S"), mixed quotation (X said that Y is "an S"), and indirect speech (X said that Y is an S). For all strategies, reporting decreases the perceived offensiveness without removing it. For slurs, but not insults, indirect speech is perceived as more offensive than direct speech. Our hypothesis is that, because slurs constitute hate speech, speakers employ quotation marks to signal their dissociation from slur use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Muriel Spark (1918–2006) travelled from Scotland to Africa and stayed there from 1937 to 1944. Africa is a recurrent presence in her work. Critics focus mainly on her African-themed poems and stories. They pay less attention to depictions of that continent in her other work and tend to gloss over her problematic use of language. This article addresses Spark's representation of the African landscape and her different portrayals of Africans, white settlers, and missionaries. It also explores her deployment of the familiar colonial tropes of cannibalism and 'witch doctors'. It argues that Spark's representations of Africa in her works are at once ironic, comedic, satirical, and wittily arch, yet remain open to charges of being stereotypical and problematic, particularly at a time of public scrutiny and media concern with discriminatory language. These representations reveal that Spark mainly speaks for white missionaries rather than the downtrodden Africans in her writings. This article aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of Scottish involvement in colonialism in the modern period by untangling the connections between race, religion, and literary culture in Spark's writings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Migrants' children face challenges when returning to their parent's home country, which is usually unfamiliar to them. This qualitative study explores this phenomenon to understand more about the experiences of returnee children regarding their social-educational (re)integration and adaptation, the challenges they faced, and the mechanisms they have developed to overcome them. Results are discussed from the perspective of acculturative stress and social networks, identifying the struggle that returnees have to adapt and acculturate to their new home because of the lack of competence in the Spanish language and the consequences of the discrimination they suffer in the social environment, namely school and in their parents' hometowns. However, results also shed light on how returnees create social networks with classmates and family members who help them overcome these challenges, fears, and feelings of alienation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Longstanding philosophical debate over the semantics of proper names has yet to examine the distinctive behavior of deadnames, names that have been rejected by their former bearers. The use of these names to deadname individuals is derogatory, but deadnaming derogates differently than other kinds of derogatory speech. This paper examines different accounts of this behavior, illustrates what going views of names will have to say to account for it, and articulates a novel version of predicativism that can give a semantic explanation for this derogation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This summary is about a dissertation that focuses on the sign language Kata Kolok used in a rural enclave in Northern Bali, Indonesia. The dissertation explores how phonology is used and acquired in the community, examining variation within the language, cross-linguistic variation, and individual variation in acquisition settings and patterns. The research is based on fieldwork and includes data from adult signers and deaf children. The findings contribute to our understanding of variation in sign languages and the acquisition of phonology, emphasizing the importance of linguistic diversity in research. [Extracted from the article]

Objectives: Language brokering (LB) often occurs in public places, putting youth who broker at risk for experiencing discrimination while engaging in brokering. Guided by the risk and resilience theoretical framework, the present study goals were twofold: (a) to examine the association between discrimination and LB, and (b) to explore moderating abilities of ethnic identity and family dynamics. Method: Data were collected from 458 young adults (Mage = 21.36, 80% female). Participants were from a diverse region in the United States, and a majority of them self-identified as Latino (66.2%). Participants were invited to complete a one-time online survey about their LB and family experiences. Results: We found that discrimination was negatively associated with LB for these young people. Specifically, discrimination was related to higher LB burden and higher LB role reversal, and lower LB efficacy. In addition, we found that ethnic–racial identity (ERI) acted as a moderator of LB role reversal against discrimination, and that negative family dynamics moderated the association between discrimination and LB. Positive family dynamics were not successful in buffering against negative effects of discrimination. Conclusions: Our findings indicate that young people who broker seem to be negatively impacted by discrimination. The effects of discrimination on LB role reversal could be alleviated by strong ERI; however, the same is not true for LB burden and LB efficacy. Furthermore, negative family dynamics exacerbated the negative effects of discrimination on LB, and positive family dynamics did not serve as a buffer against discrimination. Implications for those working with language brokers are discussed. Public Significance Statement: Young people who language broker for their parents may experience discrimination. While some factors, such as a strong ethnic–racial identity, can protect against negative effects of discrimination, being involved in family conflict can make the negative effects of discrimination even worse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The AKMB Autumn Training 2023 took place on November 9th and 10th and focused on the topic "Everything in the Green Zone? Sustainability in Art and Museum Libraries". The event was organized by the Working Group of Art and Museum Libraries (AKMB) in cooperation with the German Society for Information and Knowledge (DGI). Various lectures and discussions were held on topics such as climate protection in museums, sustainable use of resources in libraries, and networking and participation in consortia as a strategy. There was also a discussion on the implementation of sustainability in the library of the German Literature Archive in Marbach and the long-term preservation of digital content. The article describes the contributions of museum libraries to social sustainability. Concrete examples from the DHM library are discussed, such as equal access to resources, the library as a meeting place, and working conditions. It emphasizes that dealing with social sustainability depends on the users, staff, available media and facilities, as well as the institution's focus. Other topics addressed in the lectures include volunteer management at the Technoseum Mannheim, dealing with racist and discriminatory language in image databases, and knowledge transfer in libraries and cultural archives. The concept of Library Carpentry, which teaches data and programming skills, is also introduced. The article concludes with a mention of further opportunities for in-depth exploration of the topics covered. [Extracted from the article]

Exposure to hate speech (HS) leads to desensitization of listeners. Yet, most evidence of this process has been obtained using self‐report measures. In this paper, we examined desensitization to HS using an unobtrusive, psychophysiological measure. In an experimental electrocardiogram study (N = 56), we observed heart rate (HR) deceleration after reading comments that contained HS. This suggested a substantive psychophysiological reaction of participants to hateful comments. However, such HR deceleration was not observed among participants preexposed to HS. People exposed to hateful comments thus appeared to show different HR responses to HS compared to people who were not previously exposed to such comments. Consequently, not only does frequent exposure to HS influence an individual's beliefs as observed in earlier studies, but it also impacts psychophysiological reactions to derogatory language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: While the economic literature mostly tackled discrimination looking at labour costs, this work focuses on its relation to labour productivity, arguing that discrimination may worsen the performance of female employees. In this view, it represents a source of allocative inefficiency, which contributes to reducing output. Design/methodology/approach: Female discrimination is both a social and an economic problem. In social terms, consolidated gender stereotypes impose constraints on women's behaviour, worsening their overall well-being. In economic terms, women face generally worse labour market conditions. Using long-run Italian data spanning from 1861 to 2009, the authors propose a novel measure of female discrimination based on the observed frequency of discriminating epithets. Following social capital theory, the authors distinguish between structural and voluntary discrimination, and use Data Envelopment Analysis for time series data to assess the extent of inefficiency that each component of discrimination induces in the production process. Findings: The results draw the trajectory of female discrimination in Italy and provide evidence in favour of the idea that female discrimination reduces productive efficiency. In particular, the structural component of female discrimination, although less sizeable than the voluntary component, plays a major role, especially in recent years, where more stringent beauty standards fuel looks-based discrimination. Originality/value: The contribution of this work is twofold. First, based on contributions from social sciences different from economics, it proposes a novel theoretical framework that explores the effect of discriminatory language on labour productivity. Second, it introduces a novel and direct measure of female discrimination at the country level, based on the bidirectional link between language and culture. The indicator is easily understood by policymakers and may be used to evaluate the effectiveness of anti-discrimination policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes implicit racist rhetoric in Japan after the Hate Speech Elimination Act was enacted in 2016. While the law brought about the deradicalization and decline of hate groups, it has been ineffective in regulating covert hate speech. Zainichi Koreans, the primary victims of such speech, have struggled to have the illegality of racial discrimination recognized in litigation. By analyzing the case of Shin Sugok versus DHC TV, this article addresses the question of how racists use hateful rhetoric against Zainichi Koreans in the post-HSEA era. Shin filed a lawsuit in 2018 claiming defamation by DHC TV and won substantial compensation; however, the initial court decision in 2021 did not find racial discrimination against her, and the discrimination was only recognized by the Appeals Court in 2022. This blurring of judicial decisions was due to the expressions of racial discourse being subtle, which is referred to as strategic racism. The TV program did not use discriminatory language but stimulated the interest of racist viewers by persistently referring to the ethnic origin of the plaintiff. In this sense, Japan has entered an era in which it is necessary to analyze implicit racial codes, similarly to the situation with racist discourse in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, systems have been developed to monitor online content and remove abusive, offensive or hateful content. Comments in online social media have been analyzed to find and stop the spread of negativity using methods such as hate speech detection, identification of offensive language or detection of abusive language. We define hope speech as the type of speech that is able to relax a hostile environment and that helps, gives suggestions and inspires for good to a number of people when they are in times of illness, stress, loneliness or depression. Detecting it automatically, in order to give greater diffusion to positive comments, can have a very significant effect when it comes to fighting against sexual or racial discrimination or when we intend to foster less bellicose environments. In this article we perform a complete study on hope speech, analyzing existing solutions and available resources. In addition, we have generated a quality resource, SpanishHopeEDI, a new Spanish Twitter dataset on LGBT community, and we have conducted some experiments that can serve as a baseline for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In our study we assess the responsiveness of Hungarian local governments to requests for information by Roma and non-Roma clients, relying on a nationwide correspondence study. Our paper has both methodological and substantive relevance. The methodological novelty is that we treat discrimination as a classification problem and study to what extent emails written to Roma and non-Roma clients can be distinguished, which in turn serves as a metric of discrimination in general. We show that it is possible to detect discrimination in textual data in an automated way without human coding, and that machine learning (ML) may detect features of discrimination that human coders may not recognize. To the best of our knowledge, our study is the first attempt to assess discrimination using ML techniques. From a substantive point of view, our study focuses on linguistic features the algorithm detects behind the discrimination. Our models worked significantly better compared to random classification (the accuracy of the best of our models was 61%), confirming the differential treatment of Roma clients. The most important predictors showed that the answers sent to ostensibly Roma clients are not only shorter, but their tone is less polite and more reserved, supporting the idea of attention discrimination, in line with the results of Bartos et al. (2016). A higher level of attention discrimination is detectable against male senders, and in smaller settlements. Also, our results can be interpreted as digital discrimination in the sense in which Edelman and Luca (2014) use this term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: While the global incidence of breast cancer is increasing, there is also an increase in the numbers of breast cancer survivors and in survival duration, as early detection programs are implemented, and treatments are optimized. Breast cancer survivors in several countries commonly struggle with a range of symptoms (fatigue, insomnia, depression) with 25–80% of survivors suffering from chronic pain. There is a paucity of literature reporting on breast cancer survivors in South Africa. In this pilot study we aimed to determine the prevalence of chronic pain in female breast cancer survivors attending the breast oncology clinic. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted of all breast cancer survivors attending the Groote Schuur Hospital Breast Unit during one month in 2019. 44 female breast cancer survivors (median age 60.5y) completed a sociodemographic questionnaire, the Brief Pain Inventory, Pain Catastrophizing Scale and measures for neuropathic pain (DN4), health related quality of life (HRQoL; EQ-5d-3 L), physical activity (IPAQ), depression and anxiety (PHQ4), and screening questions to evaluate sleep, happiness and perceived discrimination in the language of their choice. Results: The prevalence of chronic pain (pain on most days for more than three months) was 59% (95%CI 44–72), a significantly higher number than the 18,3% prevalence of chronic pain reported by South African adults. 39% of the women were classified as having neuropathic pain. The median pain severity score was 3.75 (IQR = 2.75-5) and the median pain interference with function score was 4 (IQR = 2.9–5.4). The women were experiencing pain in a median of 2 different body sites (IQR = 1–3). The women with pain were more likely to be unemployed or receiving a disability grant, had significantly worse HRQoL, and significantly worse scores for risk of depression and anxiety. Conclusion: The results of this pilot study suggest that chronic pain may be a significant burden for South African breast cancer survivors. Routine screening for chronic pain in breast cancer survivors is recommended with a larger study indicated to explore this issue further. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A very common argument against restrictions on hate speech says that since such restrictions curtail freedom of speech, they cause more harm than they prevent. A no less common reply has it that the harms caused by hate speech are sufficiently great to justify legal restrictions on free speech. In 'Freedom of Expression and Derogatory Words', West questions a common assumption of both arguments concerning the use of slurs, i.e. that restricting the use of slurs necessarily curtails freedom of speech. According to West, everything that can be said with a slur can be said with its neutral counterpart. Given the psychological and social harms of slurs, this would give us a compelling reason to put legal restrictions on their use. However, in this article, I will argue that, according to the main theories of slurs, slurs can be used to express derogatory information which cannot be expressed by their neutral counterparts. This will leave us with two options when it comes to avoiding the negative effects of slurs: (i) to restrict freedom of speech or (ii) to argue that the derogatory information expressed by slurs is not covered by free speech. Both options will depart significantly from West's argument. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The treatment of insults –understood as words within offensive language whose function is hurting the addressee's feelings (Ávila-Cabrera, 2016)– in audiovisual translation (AVT) always poses a challenge to audiovisual translators: because of the semantic/pragmatic load these terms have in the source text (ST), the effect caused in the target text (TT) and culture, and because of the difficulty in transferring them in an idiomatic way. Certain formulas do not always maintain the effect that some words have in the ST. In addition, the translation techniques used may not even be faithful to the original dialogue exchanges. This paper aims to analyse all the insults uttered in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (Tarantino, 2019), and in its dubbed and subtitled versions into European Spanish. In order to do so, I will pay particular attention to the speaker's intention (Grice, 1969), whether the insults found in the ST can be viewed as examples of friendly banter or whether, by contrast, the speaker's intention was offending. Ávila-Cabrera's (2023) taxonomy of translation techniques will be used to delve into the manner in which insults were translated to the TT to determine whether or not the semantic/pragmatic load of these terms is transferred (being toned up, maintained or toned down) or not (being neutralised or omitted). The point of departure of this case study resorts to the initial hypothesis that dubbing transfers more insults into European Spanish than subtitling due to the technical features of the former. The aims of the study are: to determine (1) how faithful the dubbed and subtitled version insults were towards the ST, that is, whether or not the load of the insults is transferred to the TT and to what degree; (2) which AVT mode transfers the greatest number of insults to the TT; (3) if the insults transferred had the intention of offending or not; and (4) if the insults tend to foreignisation or domestication. In order to do so, a multidisciplinary methodology will be used based on a descriptive translation studies (DTS) and pragmatics approach. • Dubbing and subtitling transfer insults to European Spanish mostly faithfully. • Dubbing has slightly transferred more insults than subtitling. • The function of insults depends on its linguistic form, sociopragmatics and context. • Insults aimed at offending have been present in the TT closely in both AVT modes. • The audio and visual channels help distinguish insults as offence vs. friendly banter. • The same professional did the dubbing and subtitling, hence the similar results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the historical evolution of the word "faggot," tracing its origins from its primary meaning as a bundle of sticks to its derogatory use referring to homosexuals. Topics include the etymology of the word, its association with heresy and public shaming, and its emergence in the entertainment world of the early twentieth century, suggesting a self-mocking reinterpretation within gay society.

The article critically examines the impact of text recommender systems, like Grammarly and Microsoft's Editor, on public discourse, revealing how they shape language, influence writing styles, and potentially perpetuate biases. Topics include the historical development of these systems, their role in norming writing styles, and the proposal to view them as "memory infrastructures," urging English scholars to scrutinize their influence on public writing and rhetoric.

While in theory frowned upon, comments on the (regional) provenance of scholars frequently found their way into the scholarly debates of the Republic of Letters. This article uses early responses to Galileo Galilei's Sidereus Nuncius as a case study to explore various broader assumptions and associations underlying the use of such comments on provenance. Presenting a typology of these arguments, the article contends that provenance was used as a rather flexible marker of credibility, which allowed seventeenth‐century scholars to employ it to either advocate for, or against credibility. Scholars made full use of the rhetorical possibilities that origin‐based associations offered, demonstrating their flexible – if not to say opportunistic – attitude towards scholarly credibility in the process. This article furthermore investigates the motives Galileo's contemporaries had for invoking surreptitious boasts or slurs about provenance. In doing so, it illuminates a crucial mechanism informing the selection of specific arguments: competition on a personal, regional and national level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An editorial is presented which explores the concept of counterspeech in the context of addressing hate speech and the challenges it poses to free speech and democratic discourse. It delves into various aspects of counterspeech, such as its theoretical and practical implications, the role of individuals and institutions, and the moral and legal dimensions of responding to derogatory expressions in public communication and everyday conversations.

Growing evidence is demonstrating the connection between the microbiota gut-brain axis and neurodevelopment. Microbiota colonization occurs before the maturation of many neural systems and is linked to brain health. Because of this it has been hypothesized that the early microbiome interactions along the gut-brain axis evolved to promote advanced cognitive functions and behaviors. Here, we performed a pilot study with a multidisciplinary approach to test if the microbiota composition of infants is associated with measures of early cognitive development, in particular neural rhythm tracking; language (forward speech) versus non-language (backwards speech) discrimination; and social joint attention. Fecal samples were collected from 56 infants between four and six months of age and sequenced by shotgun metagenomic sequencing. Of these, 44 performed the behavioral Point and Gaze test to measure joint attention. Infants were tested on either language discrimination using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS; 25 infants had usable data) or neural rhythm tracking using electroencephalogram (EEG; 15 had usable data). Infants who succeeded at the Point and Gaze test tended to have increased Actinobacteria and reduced Firmicutes at the phylum level; and an increase in Bifidobacterium and Eggerthella along with a reduction in Hungatella and Streptococcus at the genus level. Measurements of neural rhythm tracking associated negatively to the abundance of Bifidobacterium and positively to the abundance of Clostridium and Enterococcus for the bacterial abundances, and associated positively to metabolic pathways that can influence neurodevelopment, including branched chain amino acid biosynthesis and pentose phosphate pathways. No associations were found for the fNIRS language discrimination measurements. Although the tests were underpowered due to the small pilot sample sizes, potential associations were identified between the microbiome and measurements of early cognitive development that are worth exploring further. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The initial goal of this I Dædalus i issue is to demonstrate the vast array of social and political disparity manifested in language inequality, ranging from ecological conditions such as climate change, social conditions of interand intralanguage variation, and institutional policies that promulgate the notion and the stated practice of official languages and homogenized, monolithic norms of standardized language based on socially dominant speakers. 4 Cecilia Menjívar, "The Racialization of 'Illegality,'" I Dædalus i 150 (2) (Spring 2021): 91-105, https://www.amacad.org/publication/racialization-illegality; Jessica F. Green, "Less Talk, More Walk: Why Climate Change Demands Activism in the Academy", I Dædalus i 149 (4) (Fall 2020): 151-162, https://www.amacad.org/publication/climate-change-demands-activism-academy; D. James Greiner, "The New Legal Empiricism & Its Application to Access-to-Justice Inquiries", I Dædalus i 148 (1) (Winter 2019): 64-74, https://www.amacad.org/publication/new-legal-empiricism-its-application-access-justice-inquiries; Irene Bloemraad, Will Kymlicka, Michèle Lamont, and Leanne S. Son Hing, "Membership without Social Citizenship? It also specifically mentions needed support for I heritage languages i so these languages can "persist from one generation to the next", and for targeted programming for Native American languages.[15] While it effectively interrupted the monolingual, English-only ideologies that permeate ideas on language in the United States, the conceptualization of language undergirding the report needs to be greatly expanded. [Extracted from the article]

Tove and her husband and partner in the joys and tragedies of life, research and academia, Robert Phillipson, often worked together. She was one of the 20th and 21st Centuries great intellectuals, an advocate and activist on linguistic rights, the rights of minorities and indigenous peoples, as well as those of users of Sign Languages. There is no better way to summarise Tove Skuttnabb-Kangas' impact on so many of us than Bernand de Chartres' 12th Century metaphor, known in English as to "stand on the shoulders of giants". [Extracted from the article]

Research into the mental health of female sport match officials is scarce, despite verbal and physical abuse being commonplace. Twelve female match officials officiating male and female matches took part in semistructured interviews, investigating their experiences and understanding of their mental health. Deductive thematic analysis identified four overarching themes: male and female football environments; abuse, sexism, and homophobia in football; formal and informal support networks; and mental health knowledge and experience—accessing services. The results revealed toxic, abusive, male-dominated environments that included sexist and derogatory language, negatively affecting their mental health. The female match officials struggled to ascertain mechanisms for support and identified that the educational courses and local organizations did not provide mental health information or training, and match officials often experienced poor mental health during and after matches. Increased engagement with mental health literacy and policy change from governing bodies is required, given the unique challenges female match officials face. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to analyze the critical language of racism in political communication reflected through online media. The analysis is focused on the elements of meaning and content structure of political statements and the context in which they are used. The analysis highlights the use of words with an intensity of meaning toward negative connotation, which manages to produce the harsh language of racism. Political communication develops an interactive discourse, which is simultaneously related not only to linguistic behavior but also to human behavior. Various political statements regarding immigration issues, the intensity of news published by media on the statements of politicians, as well as the influence they have on public opinion will be at the center of the discussion. Through descriptive and analytical methods, the article will argue and highlight the hostile, racial, and discriminatory language used by politicians, which is contradictory to the international framework on human rights and policies of the European Parliament which are focused on eliminating this approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Slurring expressions display puzzling behaviour when embedded, such as under negation and in attitude and speech reports. They frequently appear to retain their characteristic qualities, like offensiveness and propensity to derogate. Yet it is sometimes possible to understand them as lacking these qualities. A theory of slurring expressions should explain this variability. We develop an explanation that deploys the linguistic notion of focus. Our proposal is that a speaker can conversationally implicate metalinguistic claims about the aptness of a focused slurring expression. This explanation of variability relies on independently motivated mechanisms and is compatible with any theory of slurring expressions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some philosophers believe that swearing is morally innocent insofar as it is non‐abusive and vulgarities are being used, such as when people exclaim "s**t!" or "f**k!" This article shows this view to be mistaken. I start by arguing that taking offense at non‐abusive vulgar swearing is not irrational, before arguing that, even if it were, such swearing would still not always be justified. The fact that many of us find it hard to overcome profanity‐induced offense, along with the fact that its existence is necessary for swearing to be possible, is sufficient to render even non‐abusive vulgar swearing sometimes wrong. I go on to assess the opposite view, according to which swearing, including non‐abusive vulgar swearing, is never justified, whereby two objections to this activity are addressed. According to the instrumentalization objection, the fact that swearing is possible only if at least some people are sometimes offended by the words that are used means that swearers treat those who are offended by their profanity as mere means. And according to the Ersatz objection, the fact that we can use inoffensive words to raise the emotional content of our speech renders swearing gratuitously offensive. Neither objection is found to be convincing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the indifference to the language of scholarly or academic research journals amid the critiques from scholars such as Jonathan Rosa who have drawn attention to raciolinguistic and racist ideologies supporting accepted norms for published research prose. Topics include the author's brief account of her revision of the stylesheet for the journal "Monatshefte" after taking over as editor, her thoughts on the politics of citation and arguments on reproducing harmful language.

Beliefs based on patriarchy have different manifestations, from gender-insensitive language to discriminatory and prejudiced behavior. While the consequences of patriarchal beliefs are observable and well-studied, more attention is required to unravel the role of societal actors that contribute to both their development and their suppression. The present research applies the novel Socio-cognitive Discourse Studies to investigate how the media acts as a significant mediating public structure that has the potential to enable or disable the reproduction of patriarchy. I investigate the media discourse on sex-selective abortion (SSA)—the practice of the targeted elimination of female fetuses. The study takes the case of Montenegro, listed among the leading countries in the world with a significantly distorted sex ratio at birth. Besides confirming that the majority of the media encourage the status quo through its passive approach to SSA, the socio-cognitive analysis also established the relationship between the media and consumers, revealing how the different discourse strategies the journalists use trigger different cognitive responses among their audience. This study discovered discursive patterns in the public presentation of women while pointing out the crucial role the media plays in disseminating analytical and balanced information on significant and worrisome tendencies, such as SSA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The gender dimension of violent extremism is under-studied; and "women terrorists" are stereotyped as either men's dupes or (internet) warriors. Applying a gender lens, this study uses content analysis to examine Islamist extremist websites in Indonesia. Analysis reveals distinct recruitment language targeted at women and men, and rigid gender segregation of content and spaces. Extremists co-opt the language of women's rights while also promoting gender-discriminatory harmful practices with the intent of establishing what they consider to be a more devout Islamic state. Gender analysis of online extremism has implications for strategies to counter and prevent radicalization to violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the work of organizations in the area of digitization has intensified significantly. This trend is also evident in the field of recruitment where job application tracking systems (ATS) have been developed to allow job advertisements to be published online. However, recent studies have shown that recruiting in most organizations is not inclusive, being subject to human biases and prejudices. Most discrimination activities appear early but subtly in the hiring process, for instance, exclusive phrasing in job advertisement discourages qualified applicants from minority groups from applying. The existing works are limited to analyzing, categorizing and highlighting the occurrence of bias in the recruitment process. In this paper, we go beyond this and develop machine learning models for identifying and classifying biased and discriminatory language in job descriptions. We develop and evaluate a machine learning system for identifying five major categories of biased and discriminatory language in job advertisements, i.e., masculine-coded, feminine-coded, exclusive, LGBTQ-coded, demographic and racial language. We utilized the combination of linguistic features with recent state-of-the-art word embeddings representations as input features for various machine learning classifiers. Our results show that the machine learning classifiers were able to identify all the five categories of biased and discriminatory language with a decent accuracy. The Random Forest classifier with FastText word embeddings achieved the best performance with tenfolds cross-validation. Our system directly addresses the bias in the attraction phase of hiring by identifying and classifying biased and discriminatory language and thus encouraging recruiters to write more inclusive job advertisements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we use grounded practical theory to develop a practical theory for using "difficult data" in Language and Social Interaction university classes. "Difficult data" are transcribed, audio/video-recorded data that contain language and ideologies that could be offensive, bigoted, or otherwise disturbing. We provide contextual literature for understanding the pedagogical tensions around using these data from communication pedagogy research as well as social theory for handling the language within the data. We base our analysis on various types of data from academia: an international/intercultural pedagogical speech event, student surveys, field notes, interview, and recordings of classroom instruction using difficult data. We provide a practical theory focused on techniques for managing the central problem that instructors want students to analyze the social consequences of interaction without replicating the problematic impacts of discourse that make difficult data difficult. Our theory reveals four techniques including framing the data as difficult, surveying students before the class, using already-published research data, and metacommunicating about these dilemmas. These techniques do not promise inviolability, but instructors can foster deliberative reflection/co-orientation about classroom interaction that considers whether the use of difficult data can help students develop analysis-informed praxis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning to communicate in one's native language(s) is one of the most impressive accomplishments of the first few years of life. A Review of "How You Say it": How you say it: Why you talk the way you do - and what it says about you, Katherine D. Kinzler, Boston, MA, Mariner Books, 2020, 256 pp., ISBN: 0544986555 By early childhood, these biases are explicit - children prefer to learn (even non-linguistic information) from people who speak their native language with their native accent (Kinzler, Corriveau, & Harris, [2]), explicitly say they would rather be friends with someone who speaks with their native accent (Kinzler, Shutts, DeJesus, & Spelke, [5]), and begin to endorse language-based stereotypes (e.g., about who is nicer or smarter; Kinzler & DeJesus, [3]). [Extracted from the article]

Background: Language barriers play significant roles in quality of healthcare. Limited studies have examined the relationships between Spanish language and quality of intrapartum care. The objective was to determine the association between primary Spanish language and quality of intrapartum care so as to further inform best practices for non-English speaking patients in the labor and delivery setting. Methods: We used the 2016 Listening to Mothers in California survey data, which included a statewide representative sample of women who gave birth in hospitals. Our analytical sample included 1202 Latina women. Multivariable logistic regression was used to examine the association between primary language (monolingual English vs. monolingual Spanish vs. bilingual Spanish/English) and perceived discrimination due to language, perceived pressure for medical interventions, and mistreatment during labor, adjusting for maternal sociodemographics and other maternal and neonatal factors. Results: Over one-third of the study population spoke English (35.6%), less than one-third spoke Spanish (29.1%), and greater than one-third spoke bilingual Spanish/English (35.3%). Overall, 5.4% of Latina women perceived discrimination due to language spoken, 23.1% perceived pressure for any medical intervention, and 10.1% experienced either form of mistreatment. Compared to English-speakers, Spanish-speakers were significantly more likely to report discrimination due to language (aOR 4.36; 95% CI 1.15–16.59), but were significantly less likely to experience pressure for certain medical interventions (labor induction or cesarean delivery) during labor (aOR 0.34; 95% CI 0.15–0.79 for induction; aOR 0.44; 95% CI 0.18–0.97 for cesarean delivery). Bilingual Spanish/English-speakers also significantly reported discrimination due to language to a lesser extent than monolingual Spanish-speakers (aOR 3.37; 95% CI 1.12–10.13). Any form of Spanish language (monolingual or bilingual) was not significantly associated with mistreatment. Conclusions: Spanish language may contribute to experiences of discrimination during intrapartum care among Latina women. Future research is needed to explore perceptions of pressure, discrimination and mistreatment, among patients with limited English proficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widespread ubiquity of hate speech affects people's attitudes and behavior. Exposure to hate speech can lead to prejudice, dehumanization, and lack of empathy towards members of outgroups. However, the impact of exposure to hate speech on empathy and propensity to attribute mental states to others has never been directly tested empirically. In this fMRI study, we examine the effects of exposure to hate speech on neural mechanisms of empathy towards ingroup (Poles) versus outgroup members (Arabs). Thirty healthy young adults were randomly assigned to 2 groups: hateful and neutral. During the fMRI study, they were initially exposed to hateful or neutral comments and subsequently to narratives depicting Poles and Arabs in pain. Using whole-brain and region of interest analysis, we showed that exposure to derogatory language about migrants attenuates the brain response to someone else's pain in the right temporal parietal junction (rTPJ), irrespective of group membership (Poles or Arabs). Given that rTPJ is associated with processes relevant to perspective-taking, its reduced activity might be related to a decreased propensity to take the psychological perspective of others. This finding suggests that hate speech affects human functioning beyond intergroup relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies have shown that both cotton-top tamarins as well as rats can discriminate between two languages based on rhythmic cues. This is similar to the capabilities of young infants, who also rely on rhythmic cues to differentiate between languages. However, the animals in these studies did not have long-term language exposure, so these studies did not specifically assess the role of language experience. In this study, we used companion dogs, who have prolonged exposure to human language in their home environment. These dogs came from homes where either English or Spanish was primarily spoken. The dogs were then presented with speech in English and in Spanish in a Headturn Preference Procedure paradigm to examine their language discrimination abilities as well as their language preferences. Dogs successfully discriminated between the two languages. In addition, dogs showed a novelty effect with their language preference such that Spanish-hearing dogs listened longer to English, and English-hearing dogs listened longer to Spanish. It is unclear what particular cue dogs are utilizing to discriminate between the two languages; future studies should explore dogs' utilization of phonological and rhythmic cues for language discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have established social media as intrinsic to fourth wave feminism. However, even as social media has created a platform for many feminist theorists to share their work, it has also created trolls who perpetuate gender discrimination and gender-biased language. Feminist Twitter users have attempted to push back on discriminatory language, but are often attacked. The Twitter user @manwhohasitall addresses gendered language by using satire, Tweeting from a fictional world where gender stereotypes are reversed. This approach, discussed through a discourse analysis of a corpus of 528 Tweets from the calendar year 2017, illustrates how @manwhohasitall engages with satire, invention, and illustration to address and critique gendered language. This study reveals five major themes that illuminate the media's gender biases—and identifies a model to humorously address gendered language: Reparative Tweeting. This paper suggests that other forms of Reparative Tweeting or advocacy that relies on satire and community discourse may allow feminists to discuss gender bias without immediate pushback, and offer a model for showing, rather than telling, the story of gender discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID pandemic cast a harsh light on the structural and systemic health inequalities that exist in American society and in U.S. medical education. Black and Brown communities were disproportionately affected, and the pandemic highlighted the need for a diverse physician and healthcare workforce. Both the lack of equitable, high-quality healthcare in underrepresented communities and the obstacles that students who are underrepresented in medicine (URiM) experience in medical school are direct consequences of the structural racism that flourishes in U.S. medical schools and healthcare institutions. In this article, we explain structural racism and how it has manifested itself in medical education, including the lack of diversity among faculty and leadership, implicit biases and stereotypes about people of color, and discriminatory language used in evaluations of URiM students. We conclude with potential solutions for addressing structural racism in medical education. These include increasing diversity among faculty and leadership, implementing antiracist curricula, and providing mentorship and support for URiM students. Ultimately, we aim to promote discussion and action to eliminate structural racism in medical education in America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This study analyzes the treatment of obesity in the Spanish press during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the aim of finding out how the information on this topic was framed. Methodology: Using the methodology of content analysis and the framing theory as a reference, 350 content units on obesity and COVID-19 published in the digital editions of the four most widely read Spanish general-information newspapers in 2020 were analyzed: El País, El Mundo, La Vanguardia and ABC. Results: In the contents that focus on obesity the individual responsibility frame predominates, attributing the cause of obesity to individual responsibility and disseminating the idea that being overweight is a personal choice. On the other hand, in those centred on COVID-19, the collective responsibility frame predominates. Offensive language and images that reflect negatively on people with obesity are also used, albeit in a minority of cases. Discussion: The media can influence the beliefs and attitudes of its audience, as well as health care decision-making. Thus, the way in which the media portrays obesity is important in increasing or reducing stigmatization toward people who suffer from it. Conclusions: Narrative attributing the cause of obesity to individual responsibility fosters increased social stigma and reinforces weight-based stereotypes and should be avoided in the media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the urban space of Łódź, this paper studies some anti–Semitic aspects of discriminatory discourse of football fans. Its main goal is to present how anti-Semitic discriminatory meanings are formulated and spread in the urban space and how particular social groups (football fans) organize the urban discourse. In the multimodal material from the urban discourse, we scrutinize verbal and visual forms of discrimination captured on the walls of buildings, parks, or shopping centres in various stickers, posters, and flags. This paper implies that the language of particular social groups goes beyond closed internet communication or stadium discourse to a more open social sphere. A consequence of the social polarization found in the analysed data may be the radicalization and vulgarization of language in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper focuses on the description of language used as a tool of discrimination. We understand discrimination as a relationship between two subjects when ontological and axiological certainty is violated. In this sense discriminatory instrumentalisation of language is released at the level of harmful discrimination, unequal treatment and disadvantage. Language use plays a major role in creating a discourse which establishes certain ways of thinking and speaking. The research material is based on conversation about the advertisement for Absolut vodka. The conversation was held on Facebook. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]