Welcome to the UBC Research Excellence Cluster on “Inclusive Linguistic Standards”

Language standards are a defining feature of language use today. Imbued with institutionally-sanctioned values and beliefs, language standards not only shape our speech and writing, but how we conceptualize a particular language and its speakers.

Our goal is to bring linguistic standards in Canada in line with current sociolinguistic and applied linguistic theories in order to develop and maintain a decolonial and dehegemonic approach. In this way, we hope to foster greater acceptance for the characteristic linguistic diversity of Canadian society, rather than continuing the linguistic status quo that privileges certain dominant norms.

The Canadian Word Centre (CWC) is envisaged as an ongoing research, consultation, outreach, and media relations unit that consistently documents usage of the linguistic status quo in Canada to identify new sociolinguistic developments and offer solutions for linguistic problems as they arise.