Introduction: a Context-Sensitive Approach to Stance and Voice

Abstract

Stance and voice are two of the most significant concepts in applied linguistics today, but at the same time, and perhaps because of this, they are also among the most contested and ambiguous. Stance, for example, has been shrunk to a focus on self-mention and expanded to include all expressions of personal opinion, whereas voice has been regarded as a key marker of individuality and as an ideological expression of Western cultural hegemony. Research has followed stylistic, critical and applied strands and definitions have changed over the past quarter-century, but the terms essentially refer to the expression of point of view in speech and writing and to the ways we engage with others. They are central to ways of looking at written texts as social interactions, where readers and writers negotiate meanings, and to how students can be taught to convey their personal attitudes and assessments and appropriately con-nect with their readers.