The politics of translingualism: After Englishes presents a radical perspective that questions the current tradition of epistemology in research on translingualism. The monograph assembles data from cutting-edge scholarship in sociolinguistics, critical theory, film theory, and composition studies to argue that extant paradigms for evaluating Englishes in the metadiscourse on translingualism are deficient and reify a positivist tradition of epistemology. As a way of destabilizing underlying attitudes inherent in mainstream translingual epistemologies, the author advocates a paradigm shift in translingual research, a move from confronting the metadiscourse of plurality and differences in Englishes, to a reevaluation of the frameworks used in evaluating Englishes.

The author begins by deepening the reader's understanding of trends in translingualism research against the backdrop of the reality that Englishes rather than English is a cultural fact. Scholars are further tasked to reimagine the metadiscourse of standardized English in a manner that provides opportunities to reconsider the means by which standardized English gets evaluated. This review highlights the main controversies that the author observes in the metadiscourse on translingualism and the practical solutions the author proffers. In addition, I note two thematic strands: (i) a theoretical-sociolinguistics perspective, which deals with the criteria for evaluating ‘peripheralized’ Englishes, and (ii) an applied linguistics perspective, which describes pathways to the theoretical issues observed.

From a theoretical standpoint, the author poses new sets of questions that challenge the practice of using a ‘single normative standard’ to evaluate other varieties of English, assess the writing of nonnative speakers of English, and determine the basis for employability. Drawing from the theories of illiteracy (Abraham Acosta, Thresholds of illiteracy, New York: Fordham University Press, 2014), intelligibility (Judith Butler, Gender trouble, New York: Routledge, 1990), and disidentification (José Esteban Muñoz, Disidentifications, Minneapolis: Univeristy of Minnesota Press, 1999), the author develops the theory of inscrutability as ‘acknowledgement of our inability to read translingual practices through the evaluative purview of normative Englishes' (19). On the use of Standard English to evaluate the writing of nonnative speakers of English, by contrast, the author posits that because contemporary classrooms are heterogeneous, the use of only Standard English to evaluate college writing alienates other students whose language practice does not fit in. With respect to the issue of language in the workplace, the author argues that in today's emerging global economy ‘it is becoming increasingly untenable to come to a definitive or even reliable determination of whether normative Englishes are a precondition to employability’ (109). As to the applied linguistics perspective, the author applies the notion of inscrutability to translingual practice to illustrate how people can make sense of different Englishes and proposes a prolegomenon to a pedagogy of translingualism.

To conclude, the author has succeeded in reinventing the native and nonnative varieties dialectics in an innovative manner by confronting a central dogma in discourse on ‘Proper English’ that there is a given, settled, and inflexible cultural identity in which language has a crucial determining role and to which ‘aliens’ simply do not belong. Readers will find this book useful for gaining a nuanced understanding of the scholarly discourse on translingualism and global Englishes.