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This book presents a study of interpreter-mediated interaction in New York City small claims courts, drawing on audio-recorded arbitration hearings and ethnographic fieldwork. Focusing on the language use of speakers of Haitian Creole, Polish, Russian, or Spanish, the study explores how these litigants make use of their limited proficiency in English, in addition to communicating with the help of professional court interpreters. Drawing on research on courtroom interaction, legal interpreting, and conversational codeswitching, the study explores how the ability of immigrant litigants to participate in these hearings is impacted by institutional language practices and underlying language ideologies, as well as by the approaches of individual arbitrators and interpreters who vary in their willingness to accommodate to litigants and share the burden of communication with them. Litigants are shown to codeswitch between the languages in interactionally meaningful ways that facilitate communication, but such bilingual practices are found to be in conflict with court policies that habitually discourage the use of English and require litigants to act as monolinguals, using only one language throughout the entire proceedings. Moreover, the standard distribution of interpreting modes in the courtroom is shown to disadvantage litigants who rely on the interpreter, as consecutive interpreting causes their narrative testimony to be less coherent and more prone to interruptions, while simultaneous interpreting often leads to incomplete translation of legal arguments or of their opponent's testimony. Consequently, the study raises questions about the relationship between linguistic diversity and inequality, arguing that the legal system inherently privileges speakers of English.

Public service interpreting --- Code switching (Linguistics) --- Bilingualism --- Court interpreting and translating --- Law --- Recht --- Gerechtstolken --- Codeswitching --- Codewisseling --- Translating --- tolken --- New York --- New York (State) --- Court interpreting and translating. --- Code switching (Linguistics). --- Bilingualism. --- Public service interpreting. --- Codeswitching. --- Codewisseling. --- Translating. --- New York. --- Language and languages --- Languages in contact --- Multilingualism --- Language shift --- Switching (Linguistics) --- Linguistics --- Diglossia (Linguistics) --- Acts, Legislative --- Enactments, Legislative --- Laws (Statutes) --- Legislative acts --- Legislative enactments --- Jurisprudence --- Legislation --- Bilingual court services --- Courts --- Translating and interpreting --- Translating services --- Community interpreting --- Community translating --- Public service translating --- Tolken --- Script switching (Linguistics) --- Translation science --- English language --- New York City

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Code switching (Linguistics). --- Multilingualism

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Language Contact in Africa and the African Diaspora in the Americas' brings together the original research of nineteen leading scholars on language contact and pidgin/creole genesis. In recent decades, increasing attention has been paid to the role of historical, cultural and demographic factors in language contact situations. John Victor Singler's body of work, a model of what such a research paradigm should look like, strikes a careful balance between sociohistorical and linguistic analysis. The case studies in this volume present investigations into the sociohistorical matrix of language contact and critical insights into the sociolinguistic consequences of language contact within Africa and the African Diaspora. Additionally, they contribute to ongoing debates about pidgin/creole genesis and language contact by examining and comparing analyses and linguistic outcomes of particular sociohistorical and cultural contexts, and considering less-studied factors such as speaker agency and identity in the emergence, nativization, and stabilization of contact varieties.

African Americans --- Americanisms. --- Black English. --- Blacks --- English language --- Languages. --- Languages --- Social aspects --- Social aspects. --- Variation --- Variation. --- United States.