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In:Identity Perspectives from Peripheries
Edited by Yoshiko Matsumoto and Jan-Ola Östman
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 352] 2025
► pp. 18–35

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Chapter 2
Identity glocalization in rural peripheries

 | University of Helsinki
Published online: 13 June 2025
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https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.352.02ost
Abstract
The study argues for the importance of putting identity back as a presupposed perspective on language. The prototypical “periphery” of dialects (as against standard languages) is taken as the starting point from where an argument in favor of the importance of a glocal view on language and identity is advanced. This glocal perspective is illustrated through analyses of examples from the communicative practices in rural communities in Swedish-language Finland. The following set of topics are made salient in this endeavor: the regionalization of dialects, aspects of adaptation and adaptability, and the creation of new forms of language by migrants in rural villages to express their similarity with members of the traditional local population and differences from other migrants. The study focuses on the implicit in language (and how it is (ambivalently) (not) realized) in rural areas with respect to the manifoldness of identities.
Article outline
  • 1.Peripheries and identities
  • 2.The glocal
  • 3.The communities
  • 3.Regionalization and integration
  • 4.On change
  • 5.Migration and integration
  • 6.Implicitness, ambivalence and responsibility
  • 7.Discussion and conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
References (38)
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