Abstract
Discrimination, as a globalized yet negative social practice, is quite pervasive phenomenon in the world. This is supported by existing research: for example, Hebl et al. (2002) carry out a field study on formal and interpersonal discrimination among homosexual job seekers who are reported to have met difficulties in finding jobs in local stores. Pérez-Garín et al. (2018) investigate different types of perceived discrimination experienced by people with physical disabilities, hearing impairment and visual impairment. Güler and Yıldırım (2021) examine the relationship between subjective well-being, acculturation and perceived discrimination reported by adolescent Syrian immigrants in Turkey, finding that the latter two help explicate the age and gender influence on the degree of subjective well-being. The Discourse of Perceived Discrimination examines the discursive nature of perceived discrimination among the LGBTIQ (namely Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex and Queer) community and the Spanish-speaking immigrants in contemporary Australian society by grounding its theoretical frameworks in Discursive Psychology and Cognitive Linguistics and offers a view into the relationship between language and discrimination from a discourse analysis perspective.
The book under review consists of seven chapters, with the introduction and conclusion part at both ends. Chapter 1 introduces the definition of discrimination and the different ways that it can be assessed in, usually through an experimental observation of behavior toward targeted people or a quantitative/qualitative approach. The term “perceived” in the title of this book, which specifically points out the research perspectives from the victims, highlights the situated nature of the experiences under investigation (p.3). Chapter 2 briefly reviews perceived discrimination (PD) studies and its analysis in the area of discourse. Chapter 3, as a methodological part, presents the process of data collection, which plays a key role in co-constructed interviews of the targeted respondents involved in the LGBTIQ community and the Spanish-speaking immigrants in Australia. This discourse-based qualitative study favors an integral approach by situating tools from Cognitive Linguistics and Discursive Psychology in Critical Discourse Analysis, which promotes a comprehensive cross-disciplinary to discrimination studies.
Chapter 4 focuses on the analysis of PD experienced by LGBTIQ community. Based on the author’s taxonomy of discrimination into verbal and non-verbal forms, the analysis results show that language is a mark of social inequality and may further have a negative effect on both mental and physical health of targeted people. Chapter 5 investigates PD reported by Spanish-speaking immigrants to Australia in verbal and non-verbal forms. Results show that, unlike the direct forms of discrimination experienced by LGBTIQ community, accent and Latin-like physical appearance trigger PD (such as micro-aggressions) within this Group. Chapter 6 discusses active and passive coping strategies in the PD discourse constructed by the two groups mentioned above. Through the comparative analysis of the discourse, a conclusion can be drawn that emotional responses of the experiencers of these two groups are different in that the forms of discrimination itself and the anticipation of discrimination by the targeted people are different. Chapter 7 summarizes the general patterns and characteristics in the discourse of PD, which "contributes to the study of other PD discourses and provides a more comprehensive understanding of human experiences and actions." (p.133)
Subjectively speaking, what draws me to this volume is the author’s unique discourse-based perspective on discrimination studies. Being discriminated against will have a negative impact on one’s mental and physical state of being. Exploring such a social phenomenon of stigma and inequality from victim’s perspectives can provide insight into creating inclusive environments in education and work places.
Objectively speaking, this thought-provoking volume has a cutting-edge insight into PD studies. First, it unfolds its research from the victim’s perspectives, which is rarely seen in discrimination studies and develops a deeper understanding of such social phenomena. Second, the author uses a co-constructed interviews to collect data, the interviewers being an in-group member, which ensures a reliable and peaceful situation between the interviewers and interviewees and promotes a positive consequence of data collection. Third, the author adopts an integrated approach to situate PD studies into discourse analytic perspective, from which the investigation into PD can “evidence the important role of language in the reproduction of social inequality and reveal the connection between language and reality construction. ”(p.4-5). Fourthly, a very revealing part resides in the contrastive analysis of PD between the two minority groups, the LGBTIQ community and Spanish-speaking immigrants in Australia, about their emotional responses, with the former mainly showing anger and the latter disempowerment, and the reasons for such differences. Last but not least, the analysis of PD discourse has potential relevance to clinical practice of medical specialists.
Despite these assets, there are still two points worth further consideration. In terms of the structure of the book, there is some overlapping content in the introduction chapter and the remaining chapters. In terms of the content, in addition to the metaphor and frame theory, analytic tools drawn from Cognitive Linguistics could be added, such as the mental space theory and conceptual blending theory. As the data collected in this book are dialogues, that is to say they occur when the interviewees are speaking, mental space deals with online processing of events and shifting on perspectives, which can help better understand the cognitive dynamics of PD discourse.