Abstract

This essay outlines the potential of artistic research for engaging audiences in cultural literacy and linguistic hospitality, which according to Paul Ricoeur occurs “where the pleasure of dwelling in the other’s language is balanced by the pleasure of receiving the foreign word at home” (10). It builds upon Emile Benveniste’s (1969) and Jacques Derrida’s (1997, 2000) transcultural etymological investigation of hospitality which is central to Alison Phipps’ ethical, socially oriented ethnographic praxis. Focusing on the use of a sensory and reflexive methodology in Translation Zone(s): A Stuttering, a participatory arts research project-developed during an Arts and Humanities Research Council Cultural Engagement Fellowship-this essay aims to extol the value of adopting an experimental approach to language, to embrace “not knowing” as a constructive methodological strategy and to extend the scope of research within this area to encompass other epistemological fields. The project is recontexualised in the aftermath of the United Kingdom’s EU referendum (2016) and looks towards the possibilities that the affective nature of art affords, considering how it could be used to encourage a critical debate about language and counteract the increasingly nationalist rhetoric and identity politics associated with being a native English speaker.