WP113 Language and the study of diversity.

Language is one of the most immediate and sensitive indexes of diversity and social change, and it is a key tool for organizing and navigating them.? Attention to the small details of language usage offers a privileged entrance into broader and less immediate social, cultural and political patterns, and this paper outlines elements of the contemporary study of language and society that can contribute to a wider program of diversity studies, focusing on three connected sets of relatively recent significant developments in our field of study.? The first is the move from language and languages to infra-language variation, and its effects on theory and analysis. The second is the shift in the notion of ?speaker?, which has effects on notions of ?competence? and ?groupness? or ?community?. And the third development is the renewed study of societal and institutional responses to diversity.