Simultaneous multiplicity: new materialist ontologies and the apprehension of language as assemblage and phenomenon

ABSTRACT

This paper explores two prominent strands of inquiry within new materialism – Deleuze and Guattari’s assemblage thinking and Karen Barad’s agential realism – and situates them in relation to language studies. While a singular definition of new materialist scholarship is not feasible, we argue that the selected approaches have potential to come together to reconfigure the trajectory of language studies and critical applied linguistics, as they have begun to do in other fields of inquiry. We draw on new materialism to develop accounts of how language may be ontologically apprehended as assemblage and as phenomenon. However, rather than presenting these accounts as definitive, we invite further consideration of the implications of new materialist ontologies for our capacity to apprehend simultaneous multiplicities, and particularly, for the consequences of these on the conceptions of language that are mobilized through our theoretical and methodological tools.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Parallel discussions are occurring in adjacent fields, such as literacy education (see for example, the contributions in Leander & Ehret, 2019). However, our contribution is distinct from these, particularly in relation to how it responds to recent discussions in our field concerning the nature of language/languaging.

2. Here, we differentiate ontology from ideology and epistemology. Ideology refers to beliefs and understandings about given systems or practices; in relation to language, it is “a rubric for dealing with ideas about language structure and use relative to social contexts” (Errington, 1999, p. 115). In other words, while ontology concerns what there is, ideology concerns what one (person, group, community, organization) thinks and should do about what there is. Epistemology, on the other hand, concerns knowledge, or how one knows about what there is. There is, of course, interplay between these concepts; however, different ideologies and epistemologies can and do exist – as perspectives or worldviews – in relation to the same, or similar, ontology. Ontology, as will be argued, names different worlds or realities, rather than perspectives.

3. This discussion also draws parallels with studies of multimodality (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2001).

4. To be specific, there have been parallel discussions around how new materialisms intersect with both Western and Indigenous scholarship. These discussions have centered on different elements of new materialist philosophy, from its interpretations of quantum physics (Faye & Jaksland, 2021) to its use of theories of non-human agency (Rosiek et al., 2020).

5. It is noteworthy that not all theorists see Deleuze as a self-identified materialist (see, Gamble et al., 2019). Nonetheless, given the clear influence of Deleuze (and Guattari)’s work in new materialist scholarship, particularly in relation to the assemblage, it is rather uncontroversial to identify them as key figures in this area.

6. As Phillips (2006) defines, “[a]gencement designates the priority of neither the state of affairs nor the statement but of their connection, which implies the production of a sense that exceeds them and of which, transformed, they now form parts” (p. 108).

7. However, in discussing the radical inseparability of phenomena and apparatuses, Barad (2014) is careful to establish that “[e]ntanglements are not unities. They do not erase differences; on the contrary, entanglings entail differentiatings, differentiatings entail entanglings. One move – cutting together-apart” (p. 176).

8. Diffraction is a transdisciplinary exploration of the creation and configuration of phenomena, responsive to the relational ontology at the heart of agential realism: avoiding hierarchisation, diffraction places “the understandings that are generated from different (inter)disciplinary practices in conversation with one another” (p. 93). Discussing her work across the natural and social sciences, Barad (2007) emphasizes that “respectful engagements with different disciplinary practices” are necessary in order to remain attentive to “important details of specialized arguments within a given field without uncritically endorsing or unconditionally prioritizing one (inter)disciplinary approach over another” (p. 93).

9. Barad (2007) emphasizes the importance of methodological rigor in agential realism, grounded within quantum mechanics, but also puts forward the usefulness of this methodological approach for scholars working in such diverse fields as feminism, poststructuralism, and science studies. Examples of application of a diffractive methodological approach include Barad (2010, 2019); beyond Barad’s work, see, Lenz Taguchi and Palmer (2013), Warfield (2016), and Mazzei (2014).