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Daniel N. Silva and Jerry Won Lee receive the AAAL Book Award 2026 for Language as Hope, a groundbreaking work in applied linguistics and social justice research.
The winners of the 2026 Book Award of American Association of Applied Linguistics (AAAL), which recognizes excellent contributions in the field of applied linguistics, have been announced. Some of the beneficiaries include Daniel N. Silva who together with Jerry WonLee has been credited with the influential work of book Language as Hope.
The award celebrates academic achievement and acknowledges publications that make considerable contributions to theoretical and practical knowledge in the study of languages. The 2026 acknowledgment puts the work of Silva at the center of the modern linguistic studies.
Published by Cambridge University Press, Language as Hope is an insightful and groundbreaking book that looks into the importance of language beyond its communicative function as the basis for life, power and change.
In particular, the author focuses on the disadvantaged communities of Brazil and shows how those who inhabit the world characterized by violence and discrimination construct meanings and form a community through language. It questions the conventional theories of language by placing language as a force in the construction of social realities, and not just their reflection.
Daniel N. Silva is an associate professor of applied linguistics, who researches the areas of language, social justice, and digital communication in peripheral communities, all based in Brazil. His research has examined such issues as the relationship between language and matters of violence, activism, and hope.
Also writing the book with the other author Jerry Won Lee, is a Professor at University of California, Irvine who specializes in globalization and translinguality. This book gives us an insight into Sociolinguistics, Anthropology and Critical Theory from a multidisciplinary approach.
One of the highest honors in applied linguistics is the AAAL Book Award that is awarded to publications characterized by their originality, methodological rigor, and practical significance. Each year the award is given at the AAAL conference at which the most prominent scholars convene to address the new trends in language studies.
The choice of Language as Hope highlights a changing tendency in the discipline towards socially engaged research, i.e. a research that not only contributes to the development of academic theory, but also seeks solutions to urgent problems in the global arena, i.e. the problem of inequality, marginalization and communication under crisis conditions.
The fact that Silva is so recognized is an indicator of the growing significance of interdisciplinary studies in the comprehension of language as a social phenomenon that is dynamic. The focus of the book on the linguistic and social construct of hope is particularly close to the current international environment where the matters of identity, inequality, and resilience are the key topics of scholarly and policy debates.
The work helps to achieve a more inclusive and ethically responsible research by preempting the voices and experiences of marginalized communities. It also creates new avenues to scholars, educators and policymakers who want to use language as a weapon of empowerment and transformation.
The work helps to achieve a more inclusive and ethically responsible research by preempting the voices and experiences of marginalized communities. It also creates new avenues to scholars, educators and policymakers who want to use language as a weapon of empowerment and transformation.
With the ongoing evolution of academia, works such as Language as Hope have created a new standard of reference- showing that the study of a subject could be both scholarly and socially changing.
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