Epistemology of language and space: an introduction

Abstract

intersections of three spatial phenomena: a) stratified multilingual spaces with their centers and scales; b) internal mobility of inhabitants of touristified places in terms of both horizontal mobility (internal displacements) and vertical mobility (of a socio-economic nature); and c) tourism as short-term mobility. The most important epistemological issue that emerges from the paper is the question of how to approach the effect of tourism on the linguistic ecology of touristified spaces. The descriptive-contrastive analysis of two spaces is proposed as a necessary step to study this effect. From a methodological point of view, the paper mobilizes a series of data and observations constructed from a combination of methods ranging from (digital) ethnography to demolinguistics and discourse analysis. In this sense, the paper reveals that the ontological plurality of spatiality can/should/has to result in methodological plurality.