Language Discordant Social Work in a Multilingual World

Based on ethnographic observations of encounters between social workers and people with whom they do not have a shared language, this book analyzes the impact of language discordance on the quality of professional service provision.

Exploring how street-level bureaucrats navigate the landscape of these discretionary assessments of language discordance, language proficiency, and the need for interpreting, the book focuses on four main themes:

• the complexity of social work talk
• the issue of participation in language discordant meetings
• communicative interaction
• the issue of how clarification is requested when needed, and whether professionals and service users are able to reach clarity when something is unclear

Based on the findings presented on these different aspects of language discordant talk, the consequences of language discordance for social work are presented and discussed, focusing primarily on issues at the intersection of language, communication, power, dominance and subordination, representation, linguicism, and ultimately, human rights and human dignity.

It will be of interest to all social work students, academics and professionals as well as those working in public services and allied health more broadly.

Hilde Fiva Buzungu is Associate Professor at the department of social work, child welfare and social policy at Oslo Metropolitan University in Norway. Her research focuses on communicative interaction between professional practitioners and linguistic minorities, with particular attention given to issues of power and domination, communicative oppression and linguicist structures in society.