Liberal democracies have always accepted the need to go to war, despite the fact that war can undermine liberal values. Wars may be won or lost, not only on the battlefield, but in the perceptions of the publics who pay for them. Presentation is therefore increasingly important. Starting with the First World War, the first major war fought by liberal democracies after the emergence on mass media, Liberal Democracies at War explores the relationship between representations of liberal violence and the ways in which the liberal state understands 'rights' in war. Experts in the field explore crucial questions such as: * How have the violences of war perpetrated in their names been communicated to publics of liberal democracies? * How have representations of conflict changed over time? * How far have the victims of liberal wars been able to insert their stories into the record?

This book offers a new perspective on the British experience of the Second World War in Europe, one in which foreignness and foreign languages are central to the dynamics of war-making. It offers a series of snapshots of the role which foreign languages played in Britain's war - in intelligence gathering (both signals and human intelligence), in psychological warfare, in preparations for liberating and occupying the continent, in denazification, in providing relief for refugees and displaced persons, and in postwar relationships with the USSR. By mapping the linguistic landscape of Britain's war in Europe, key aspects of international communication - translation, language performance, authenticity, language policies - are seen to be vital to military preparations and operations.

This book explores how endangered local interpreters in Afghanistan were seen through Western eyes in the period from 2014, when the West drew down the bulk of its military forces, to the summer of 2021, when NATO forces withdrew completely. The author examines how these interpreters were understood and represented by Western governments, militaries, agencies, press and lobby organisations, how the understandings changed over time, and to what extent the representations reflect distinct rationales for intervention/historic relationships with Afghanistan, specific immigration and anti-terrorism policies, and notions of citizenship. The book will be of interest to students and scholars of translation and interpreting, history, war studies, and migration studies.

This book addresses, for the first time, the question of how development NGOs attempt to 'listen' to communities in linguistically diverse environments. NGOs are under increasing pressure to demonstrate that they 'listen' to the people and communities that they are trying to serve, but this can be an immensely challenging task where there are significant language and cultural differences. However, until now, there has been no systematic study of the role of foreign languages in development work. The authors present findings based on interviews with a wide range of NGO staff and government officials, NGO archives, and observations of NGO-community interaction in country case studies. They suggest ways in which NGOs can reform their language policies to listen to the recipients of aid more effectively.

This book contributes to the debates around the presence and activity of women in politics, as well as the part which language plays in shaping and developing political activity. Footitt argues that, in a world of shifting roots and multiple identities, the stories we tell, the ways in which we understand the relationships between us, and the communities we imagine ourselves belonging to, are of ever-increasing political importance. At the centre of the study are the women from 12 European Union countries who participate in the transnational political site of the European Parliament. Using interviews with female members of the European Parliament from the late 90s and early 00s, and a close textual study of speeches in the European Parliament, Hilary Footitt argues that women have created a language of politics that transcends nationalities and political parties and contributes to engendering democracy, defining citizenship and imagining the community of Europe. Politics, she argues, is multilingual, and an understanding of the varieties of vocabularies and grammars that are potentially available to us may help us to create a more inclusive and dynamic political process.

This Handbook maps the contours of an exciting and burgeoning interdisciplinary field concerned with the role of language and languages in situations of conflict. It explores conceptual approaches, sources of information that are available, and the institutions and actors that mediate language encounters. It examines case studies of the role that languages have played in specific conflicts, from colonial times through to the Middle East and Africa today. The contributors provide vibrant evidence to challenge the monolingual assumptions that have affected traditional views of war and conflict. They show that languages are woven into every aspect of the making of war and peace, and demonstrate how language shapes public policy and military strategy, setting frameworks and expectations. The Handbook's 22 chapters powerfully illustrate how the encounter between languages is integral to almost all conflicts, to every phase of military operations and to the lived experiences of those on the ground, who meet, work and fight with speakers of other languages. This comprehensive work will appeal to scholars from across the disciplines of linguistics, translation studies, history, and international relations; and provide fresh insights for a broad range of practitioners interested in understanding the role and implications of foreign languages in war.

This book addresses, for the first time, the question of how development NGOs attempt to 'listen' to communities in linguistically diverse environments. NGOs are under increasing pressure to demonstrate that they 'listen' to the people and communities that they are trying to serve, but this can be an immensely challenging task where there are significant language and cultural differences. However, until now, there has been no systematic study of the role of foreign languages in development work. The authors present findings based on interviews with a wide range of NGO staff and government officials, NGO archives, and observations of NGO-community interaction in country case studies. They suggest ways in which NGOs can reform their language policies to listen to the recipients of aid more effectively.

Offering a new perspective on the British experience of the Second World War in Europe, this book provides a series of snapshots of the role which languages played in the key processes of British war-making, moving from frameworks of perception and intelligence gathering, through to liberation/occupation, and on to the aftermath of conflict.

Liberal democracies have always accepted the need to go to war, despite the fact that war can undermine liberal values. Wars may be won or lost, not only on the battlefield, but in the perceptions of the publics who pay for them. Presentation is therefore increasingly important. Starting with the First World War, the first major war fought by liberal democracies after the emergence on mass media, Liberal Democracies at War explores the relationship between representations of liberal violence and the ways in which the liberal state understands 'rights' in war. Experts in the field explore crucial questions such as: * How have the violences of war perpetrated in their names been communicated to publics of liberal democracies? * How have representations of conflict changed over time? * How far have the victims of liberal wars been able to insert their stories into the record?