A B S T R A C T The article proposes a framework for the analysis of identity as produced in linguistic interaction, based on the following principles: (1) identity is the product rather than the source of linguistic and other semiotic practices and therefore is a social and cultural rather than primarily internal psychological phenomenon; (2) identities encompass macro-level demographic categories, temporary and interactionally specific stances and participant roles, and local, ethnographically emergent cultural positions; (3) identities may be linguistically indexed through labels, implicatures, stances, styles, or linguistic structures and systems; (4) identities are relationally constructed through several, often overlapping, aspects of the relationship between self and other, including similarity/difference, genuineness/artifice and authority/ delegitimacy; and (5) identity may be in part intentional, in part habitual and less than fully conscious, in part an outcome of interactional negotiation, in part a construct of others' perceptions and representations, and in part an outcome of larger ideological processes and structures. The principles are illustrated through examination of a variety of linguistic interactions.

This special issue of Noves-sl makes a further contribution to the well stoked tradition of studies and reflections on youth and language in Catalan Sociolinguistics. This has been partially motivated by the fact that one of the priority objectives of the 2005-2006 Action Plan of the Secretariat of Linguistic Policy was the promotion of the use of Catalan among young people and included, among other measures, conducting and publishing studies on this subject. In any case, this issue does not intend to make an exhaustive study of the "state of the art" of research on language and youth. In this introduction, I would like to analyse the progress of this research work in the Catalan sociolinguistic context from a point of view that links political and theoretic questions. Following that, the contributions made by various authors are divided into two sections: in the first, three articles show new approaches to the study of the linguistic practices of youths; and in the second there is a collection of the most recent studies carried out (and which we have been able to publish here) on language and youths in Catalonia. On the basis of these articles, I would also like to discuss the theoretical and epistemological changes taking place in sociolinguistics both on a Catalan and international level, and which directly affect the approach to research on youths and language.. Summary 1. The large number of studies on youths and language 2. Theoretical displacements in research on youths and languages 3. About the contributions to this issue 4. Bibliography

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Sociolinguistic research on the linguistic construction of identity has begun to attend to the construction of culturally normative, unmarked social categories such as whiteness and masculinity. The study of these categories involves the investigation of ideology as well as identity, because ideology produces hegemonic forms of white masculinity. Such ideologies of race and gender shape narratives of interracial con¯ict told by middle-class European American boys at a California high school. The article focuses on one such narrative, told by a white boy who aligns with black youth culture and uses elements of African American Vernacular English in his speech. Via language crossing and other discursive strategies such as constructed dialogue, the narrative positions black masculinity, in contrast to white masculinity, as physically powerful and locally dominant. At the same time, the narrative preserves the racial hierarchy that enables white cultural appropriation of African American culture through language crossing.

s Abstract The study of youth played a central role in anthropology in the first half of the twentieth century, giving rise to a still-thriving cross-cultural approach to adolescence as a life stage. Yet the emphasis on adolescence as a staging ground for integration into the adult community often obscures young people's own cultural agency or frames it solely in relation to adult concerns. By contrast, sociology has long considered youth cultures as central objects of study, whether as deviant subcultures or as class-based sites of resistance. More recently, a third approach-an anthropology of youth-has begun to take shape, sparked by the stimuli of modernity and globalization and the ambivalent engagement of youth in local contexts. This broad and interdisciplinary approach revisits questions first raised in earlier sociological and anthropological frameworks, while introducing new issues that arise under current economic, political, and cultural conditions. The anthropology of youth is characterized by its attention to the agency of young people, its concern to document not just highly visible youth cultures but the entirety of youth cultural practice, and its interest in how identities emerge in new cultural formations that creatively combine elements of global capitalism, transnationalism, and local culture.