CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Special Issue of the Journal: Language and Intercultural Communication (LAIC)

“The African CAT: Language, Identity, and Communication Accommodation in African Contexts”

Guest Editors: Howard Giles (Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Department of Communication, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA & Honorary Professor, School of Psychology, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia) and Tekena Mark (Senior Lecturer, Department of Theatre and Film Studies, Rivers State University, Nigeria)

Guest Editorial Board:

Taiwo Afolabi, Faculty of Media, Art and Performance, University of Regina, Regina, Canada

Bassey Ekpenyong Bassey, Performing Arts, Akwa Ibom State University, Obio Akpa Campus, Oruk Anam Local Government Area, Nigeria

Sucharita Belavadi, Psychology, Flame University, Puna, India

Lauretta O. Chinyeaka, English Language and Literature, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Nigeria

Chad Edwards, Communication, West Michigan University, Kalamazoo, USA

Craig Fowler, Humanities, Media and Creative Communication, Massey University, Auckland, New Zealand Jessica Gasiorek, Communicology, University of Hawaiʻi, Mānoa, USA

Marko Dragojevic, Communication, University of Kentucky, USA

David Markowitz, Communication, Michigan State University, East Lansing, USA

Antonis Gardikiotis, Social Psychology & Mass Media, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece

Karolina Hansen, Psychology, University of Warsaw, Poland

Jake Harwood, Communication, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA

Olusola John, Centre for Socially Engaged Theatre, University of Regina, Regina, Canada

Samuel Fubara Joshua, Linguistics and Language Arts, University of Port Harcourt, Port Harcourt, Nigeria

Sinfree Makoni, Applied Linguistics, Penn State College of Liberal Arts, University Park, USA

Prisca Makulilo, Linguistics & Communication Skills, College of Business Education (Dar es Salaam Campus), Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Miriam Meyerhoff, Linguistics, All Souls College, University of Oxford, UK

Amadi Gabriel Ndamzi, English and Literary Studies, Rivers State University, Port Harcourt, Nigeria

Nneamaka Obodo. Political Science and International Relations, Nile University, Abuja, Nigeria

Ihuoma Okorie, Department of Theatre and Performing Arts, Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria

Yemi Olawe, English, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria

Margaret J. Pitts, Communication, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA

Zachary Rosen, Communication, University of California, Los Angeles, USA

Peter Ogohi Salifu, Theatre and Performance Studies, University of Warwick, UK

Jordan Soliz, Communication, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, USA

Martha Terna-Abah, General Studies, Nile University, Abuja, Nigeria

Tosin Kooshima Tume, Department of Theatre and Media Arts, Federal University, Oye-Ekiti, Nigeria

Bernadette Watson, English and Communication, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong SAR, and Psychology, The University of Queensland, Australia

Israel Meriomame Wekpe, Theatre Arts, University of Benin, Benin City, Nigeria

Overview

Over the past five decades, Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) has evolved into one of the most empirically rich and theoretically robust frameworks for understanding how individuals adapt to—or distance themselves from—others in interpersonal and intergroup communication. Originally formulated as Speech Accommodation Theory (Giles, Taylor, & Bourhis, 1973), CAT has since expanded to encompass a wide range of verbal and nonverbal behaviors, including accent, dialect, speech rate, gestures, clothing, and even silence as well a wide array of social groups, languages, applied and institutional contexts, new technologies (e.g., human-machine interactions and social media) and even non-human species (e.g., Giles, Markowitz, & Clementson, 2025).

Yet, despite its global applicability, African communicative practices have remained under-researched in CAT scholarship and, indeed, in intercultural scholarship more generally. That said, there has, very recently, been a flurry of CAT activity on a broad range of topics emerging from all around the continent of Africa. This Special Issue is, therefore, very timely and aims to cohere and expand developments in CAT and their possible synergies with intercultural communication research through African perspectives. Toward the latter end, this will be achieved, for instance, by drawing attention to indigenous languages, sociocultural norms, multilingual negotiations, and communicative strategies shaped by colonial legacies, identity politics, and evolving digital cultures.

Key theoretical developments relevant to this Special Issue include entrainment, mimicry, interactive alignment (van de Pol et al., 2023), and the dynamic co-existence of convergence, divergence, and maintenance (Guydish & Fox Tree, 2021). We invite rich, context-sensitive, and culturally-grounded analyses that speak to everyday communicative realities in African communities, institutions, and diasporas. In line with the editorial vision of Language and Intercultural Communication (LAIC), authors are especially encouraged to explore and establish synergies between CAT and the critical approach to intercultural communication, as developed in IALIC (International Association for Languages and Intercultural Communication) and reflected across LAIC’s publications. This may involve questioning power dynamics, ideological positioning, colonial histories, and the ethics of communicative encounters.

For more about LAIC, please visit the journal homepage: Language and Intercultural Communication (Taylor & Francis): https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rmli20/current

LAIC is published by Routledge/Taylor & Francis and does not charge any publication fees.

We welcome contributions that:

1. Re-theorize CAT through African epistemologies and communicative norms
2. Examine communicative accommodations and/or nonaccommodations in political, religious, and/or other intergroup settings
3. Analyze how African media, performance, and digital platforms reflect accommodation or resistance
4. Investigate intersectional dynamics of power, identity, gender, class, and ethnicity in communication
5. Analyze how African media, performance, and digital platforms reflect accommodation or resistance
6. Investigate intersectional dynamics of power, identity, gender, class, and ethnicity in communication
7. Reflect explicitly on the critical intercultural dimensions of CAT in African contexts
8. Accommodative and nonaccommodative behaviors and reactions to them in computer-mediated and human-machine interactions as well as on traditional and social media.

Suggested Topics/Subthemes include (but are not limited to):

1. Language and identity negotiation in postcolonial African states
2. CAT and caregiving, motherhood, or elder discourse in African communities
3. Multilingualism, code-switching, and the politics of language choice
4. Accommodation and conflict resolution in traditional or state governance systems
5. Urban youth language, digital activism, and social media platforms
6. CAT in African theatre, oral storytelling, and performance traditions
7. Gendered dynamics of convergence and divergence
8. Transnational African identities and diaspora communication
9. African language ideologies and resistance to linguistic erasure

Submission Guidelines:

Abstracts (ideally 250–300 words) due: December 1, 2025, or until the issue is full. (Abstract should only be submitted to both Guest Editors personally and NOT online; please check the editors’ emails addresses below). With the abstract, please append a selection of the most recent CAT works you will likely be citing at this stage; if relevant, we can send on recent pdf’s to you. Once the Abstract is approved, authors are fully encouraged not necessarily to wait for the Full Paper draft submission date.

Full papers (6,000–8,000 words) due: March 1, 2026. First drafts should be submitted to both Guest Editors AND on the journal

Submit via journal portal: https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rmli20] and indicating on the drop down menu that it is targeted for this Special Issue. ALSO, submit your first full draft to both Co-Editors via their emails below. Finally, authors are required to contact the Guest Editors about their intent to submit well before they submit their articles on the website so that they may receive specific guidelines for submission.

Review Feedback: Expected as soon as possible after submission (note: timelines may vary) from two members of the Guest Editorial Board and the Guest Editors.

Final revised papers due: August 1, 2026

Anticipated Publication: Language and Intercultural Communication, Volume 26, Issue 6, 2026.

If you have any questions about thematic fit, abstract ideas, or submission process, feel free to contact either guest editor:

1. Howard Giles – howiegiles@cox.net
2. Tekena Mark – tekena.mark@ust.edu.ng

We look forward to your contributions to this landmark Special Issue!