Domestic Workers Talk

Anne Ambler Schluter, Kellie Gonçalves

Description

A timely exploration of issues of power in language use and mobility

Set in a multilingual cleaning company that serves Anglophone customers in the upper-(middle) class suburbs of New York City, this book presents an ethnographic study into power, language policy and communication from the perspectives of the Brazilian–American employer as well as the company’s Hispanophone and Lusophone employees. Power asymmetries in internal communication demonstrate the employer’s legitimated domination over her employees and her L1 Portuguese as a form of linguistic capital. Employees’ resourcefulness and multicompetence – rather than quantifiable levels of English-language proficiency – determine the extent to which they rely on language brokering to facilitate communication with their customers, directly impacting their agency. The book contributes to current debates on extra-linguistic modes of communication in multilingual settings and thematic analyses of care work, migration, communication and the role of English.

Figures and Tables

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1. Introduction

Chapter 2. Advancing Methodology: Using a Mixed Methodological Approach within a Multilingual Cleaning Company

Chapter 3. Magda: The Personal and Professional Trajectory of Shine’s Owner

Chapter 4. The Interplay between Identity, Ideology and Capital that Strengthens Cultural Attachments: The Pull of Portuguese and the Portuguese-Centric Ironbound Community for Shine's Hispanophone Employees

Chapter 5. Multicompetence as Essential and English-Language Proficiency as Secondary: Examining the Shape of Customer–Employee Interactions between Speakers who do not Share a Common Language

Chapter 6. Conclusion

References

Index

Sujets

• Social Psychology
• Communication Studies
• Disciplines
• Language Arts
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Nueva York
• Linguistics
• Multilingualism
• Professional
• Anglophone
• Postgraduate education
• General officer
• Sociolinguistics
• Informal sector
• Portuguese
• General
• Research
• Monde anglo-saxon
• Postgraduate
• Social
• Migration
• New York

Informations

• Publié par: Channel View Publications
• Date de parution: 02 novembre 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781800416772
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 10 Mo

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