Structural Inequalities and Realization of the ‘Language As Pure Potential’ Ideal

The ‘language as pure potential’ ideology views language as a tool that will unlock speakers’ potential, allowing them to achieve their goals. Through unquestioning acceptance of this ideology as a commonsensical notion, neoliberal subjects feel compelled to constantly upgrade their language skills as part of the continuous self-improvement project necessary for success (or even survival) amid the precarious lack of stability that characterizes today’s neoliberal workplaces. This idealized view of language as a neutral key that will open doors for unproblematic communication across cultural borders obscures structural inequalities and other language ideologies that, in reality, serve to constrain realization of the ‘language as pure potential’ ideal. In 2009, I conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with six female Taiwanese research participants – interviews in which they provided me with recollections of their original language learning motivations, as well as predictions of their personal and professional lives in ten years’ time. Over the course of the subsequent ten years, I conducted periodic interviews with these participants, allowing me to address the question of how their early aspirations and visions of the future aligned with the realities they ended up experiencing. In this talk, I will focus on the trajectories of two of these participants – Rachel and Gigi. Rachel subscribed vehemently to the ‘language as pure potential’ ideology – Gigi less so. While both Rachel and Gigi experienced periodic frustrations in their trajectories, largely attributed to their gender, Gigi ultimately achieved a great deal of success, and her linguistic abilities did play a key role in that success. Rachel, in contrast, faced obstacles that she attributed to structural socioeconomic advantages of others (such as the means to study overseas). Interlocutors did not always regard her words (however fluent) as legitimate, and her belief in the ‘language as pure potential’ ideology was shaken.