The most comprehensive overview available, this Handbook is an essential guide to sociolinguistics today. Reflecting the breadth of research in the field, it surveys a range of topics and approaches in the study of language variation and use in society. As well as linguistic perspectives, the handbook includes insights from anthropology, social psychology, the study of discourse and power, conversation analysis, theories of style and styling, language contact and applied sociolinguistics. Language practices seem to have reached new levels since the communications revolution of the late twentieth century. At the same time face-to-face communication is still the main force of language identity, even if social and peer networks of the traditional face-to-face nature are facing stiff competition of the Facebook-to-Facebook sort. The most authoritative guide to the state of the field, this handbook shows that sociolinguistics provides us with the best tools for understanding our unfolding evolution as social beings.

'Offers breadth, depth and up-to-date insight.' David Britain, University of Bern
'Mesthrie has succeeded in assembling an impressive list of contributors who are leading scholars in their respective subfields. Many chapters are written by authors who have themselves either edited handbooks or other survey volumes on their topic (Duranti on linguistic anthropology, Singler and Kouwenberg on Pidgins and Creoles, Tollefson on language policy and planning) or who have authored introductory monographs (Bayley and Lucas on sign languages, Blommaert on discourse and pragmatics, Coupland on style, Eades on sociolinguistics and the law, Fought on ethnicity, Muysken on code-switching, Schneider on World Englishes).' Philipp Sebastian Angermeyer, Journal of Sociolinguistics

Rajend Mesthrie is Professor of Linguistics in the Department of English at the University of Cape Town, holding an NRF research chair in the area of language, migration and social change. He served two terms as President of the Linguistics Society of Southern Africa. He has published widely in the fields of sociolinguistics, with special reference to language contact in South Africa. Amongst his publications are Introducing Sociolinguistics, 2nd edition (with Joan Swann, Ana Deumert and William Leap, 2009), Language in South Africa (Cambridge, 2002) and World Englishes (with Rakesh M. Bhatt, Cambridge, 2008).