Abstract
This paper critically examines the role of language in research on postmigrant societies by foregrounding how terminological choices and categorisations are not neutral but actively reinforce existing ideologies, including language ideologies. Building on Janine Dahinden’s (2016, 2025) insights into the power of categorisation in migration studies, the paper reflects on how scholarly language can shape both academic and public discourse by constructing and positioning subjects within hierarchies of belonging and difference.
The term “migratismo” will be a case in point. Coined within Italian linguistics to describe words and expressions entering Italian from languages of recent immigration, the term is often used with the intention of describing the plasticity and dynamism of contemporary Italian—particularly in literary contexts (Ricci 2015; Ferrari 2023). Such usage is frequently motivated by a desire to recognise the transformative impact of transnational, plurilingual writers on the Italian literary landscape. However, as this paper will show, this categorisation is double-edged: it risks reducing authors and speakers to their (real or presumed) migrant status, thus contributing to their migrantisation. It also reveals an attachment to dominant language norms and hierarchies, grouping non-dominant, hybrid linguistic practices under a label that evokes discrimination and exclusion. Overall, the term stigmatises identities, practices, and creative outputs by marking them as perpetually other, something which echoes Dahinden’s critique of how migration-related categories can reinforce boundaries and sustain dominant ideologies.
The paper concludes by advocating for de-migrantising perspectives that, drawing on current research on translanguaging (García & Wei 2014) and plurilingual repertoires, recognise hybrid (literary) language practices as manifestations of the lived realities of a postmigrant society. Finally, it calls for more platforms that facilitate exchange and integration between literary authors and researchers in ways that can illuminate the role of language, also in migration studies.
References
Dahinden, J. (2016). A plea for the ‘de-migranticization’ of research on migration and integration. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 39(13), 2207–2225.
Dahinden, J. (2025). …when the category ‘migration’ lost its innocence for migration scholars. And what now? A plea for dialogue. Comparative Migration Studies, 13, 37.
Ferrari, J. (2023). Parole migranti in italiano. Milano, Milano University Press.
García, O., & Wei, L. (2014). Translanguaging: Language, bilingualism and education. Palgrave Macmillan.
Ricci, L. (2015). Neoislamismi e altri “migratismi” nei romanzi di Amara Lakhous, in «Carte di viaggio» VIII, 115-42.