ABC for cultural linguistics

The article surveys the achievements of cultural linguistics over the last three decades. Cultural linguistics is understood here both in the sense of Farzad Sharifian’s specific model (Cultural Linguistics) and as a general approach to language and culture. In the 1990s, cultural linguistics made a commitment to incorporate insights from cognitive linguistics into cultural considerations of language. The article asks to what extent this commitment has been adhered to. What achievements can be listed, what failures, and what challenges for the future? Specific issues discussed include: language and worldview; language, culture, and mind; cultural cognition; cultural conceptualizations; universalism vs. linguacultural variation; and the challenges that cultural linguistics has to confront today, especially the problem of ‘glocalization’ of English. It is claimed that by meeting those challenges, cultural linguistics at large and Cultural Linguistics specifically stand a chance of becoming important voices in academia and in contemporary socio-cultural discussion.