Jan Blommaert is Professor of African Linguistics and Sociolinguistics and head of the Department of African Languages and Cultures at Ghent University.

• Preface; Acknowledgments; 1. Introduction; 2. Critical discourse analysis; 3. Text and context; 4. Language and inequality; 5. Choice and determination; 6. History and process; 7. Ideology; 8. Identity; 9. Conclusion: discourse and the social sciences; Notes; Appendix: English translations of the documents in chapter 5; Glossary; References; Index.

'This is a book I wish I read in graduate school. It is exciting, interesting, and highly readable. In an advanced undergraduate, or a graduate seminar, it would provide wide opportunities for discussion. It covers far more intellectual territory than most sociolinguistic or discourse analysis texts and it ties micro and macro topics together in an intellectually satisfying fashion. … I believe this is an excellent, fascinating, wide-ranging and highly readable book. I recommend it for graduate seminars and for broadening the perspectives of long established professionals. Blommaert successfully draws a broad array of intellectual contributions into the study of meaningful symbolic behavior.' Journal of Sociolinguistics