This volume is a collection of 12 articles that examine the place of local knowledge within the context of globalization as it relates to language policy and practice. The introductory chapter begins by problematizing the concept of globalization and illustrating how some fields in the humanities and social sciences are redefining their approaches to it. The chapter then summarizes the main ideas of the 12 articles that follow, which are divided into four sections.

Part 1 consists of four chapters that examine the redefinition of several disciplinary constructs from the perspective of local communities. In chapter 1, Canagarajah provides a historical and theoretical orientation to the idea of local knowledge and demonstrates how linguists in South Asia are redefining familiar constructs such as linguistic identity and speech community. In chapter 2, Bhatt deconstructs the notion of standard language(s) and their accompanying privileged discourses in relation to other world Englishes. He advocates the pluralization of the dominant disciplinary frameworks relating to acquisition, use, and norms to accommodate local linguistic practices. In the third chapter, Ryon examines how sociolinguistic studies conducted from traditional positivistic assumptions may exacerbate the death of local languages, affecting the ecology of linguistic diversity. Using the case of Cajun French, Ryon exposes the ideological slant in language death studies that ignores local resistance and assumes assimilation into the dominant language of the nation-state as norm. The fourth chapter, by de Souza, deconstructs the dominant grapho-centric (word-based) model of literacy that has led to the suppression of alternate literacies. In an effort to recover these local literacies, de Souza details the logic of a multimodal literacy tradition, as practiced by the Kashinawa in Brazil.

Part 2 investigates language policy and planning and the diminishing relevance of the nation-state in these endeavors. In chapter 5, Rajagopalan discusses local resistance to the influence of global English in Brazil, whereas in chapter 6, David and Govindasamy discuss attempts to reaccommodate English in Malaysia, where nationalistic policies have previously excluded it in favor of the indigenous language. Utakis and Pita's study in chapter 7 discusses the need for a transnational education policy for the children of the Dominican community in New York City. The authors advocate a bilingual English-Spanish policy that would provide an educational foundation in both languages for the youth of this transnational community.

The next section of the book, Part 3, examines the challenges facing transnational language teachers. In chapter 8, Block considers how teachers from France in England may make a critical contribution as they express their local values based on more teacher-fronted and form-focused learning in a context where task-based learning is the norm. The next chapter, by Lin, Wang, Akamatsu, and Riazi, discusses the ways in which the language learning experience of four nonnative teachers at home and abroad can serve to reconceptualize English as a pluralized global language informed by local norms, functions, and pedagogies.

Part 4 is devoted to the exploration of classroom contexts of language teaching. In chapters 10 and 11, Martin and Luk show how local identities, knowledge, and discourses need to be utilized to negotiate the learning of unfamiliar codes and content in English language teaching in Brunei and Hong Kong, respectively. These factors complicate dominant teaching practices that favor communicative methodologies and English-only instruction; the authors show the place that needs to be given to local discourses and identities if teaching is to be productive.

In the final chapter, Mermann-Jozwiak and Sullivan show how the local is a microcosm of the global through their students' ethnographic research on the codes and cultures of the Mexican-American community in Corpus Christi, Texas. Their study demonstrates that the students' deep exploration of the local can lead to a better understanding of their own identities in a multilingual world as well as sensitize them to the challenges involved in negotiating global diversity.

This book is a well-written compilation of some current studies examining the reclamation of the local in a globalized world. The theoretical reconstruction of dominant sociolinguistic paradigms is one of its strengths. Although the majority of articles in this volume are case studies from specific contexts and communities with a bias toward language teaching, researchers from anthropology, sociology, ethnic, and area studies will find this volume a valuable resource. If we, as researchers, are to understand the place of local knowledge in language policy and practice from the local perspective, works such as this one will be needed.