‘There’s Nothing Strange’: Language Policy and Racialisation at Warehouse Workplaces

Abstract

ABSTRACT Sweden is a country where racial/ethnic power relations reflect and reinforce the marginalisation of groups of people. Research has shown that language makes part of such racialised processes through makings of the Swedish language into the norm and a consequent stigmatisation of the ‘non-Swedish’ others. This article explores the role of language in racialisation at the workplace level of online retail warehousing. The empirical material comprises interviews (n = 24) and focus groups (n = 15 groups, tot. of 49 participants) with managers, team leaders, and workers at three online retail warehouses in Sweden, with an emphasis on the perceptions of a Swedish language policy that had been implemented in one of the warehouses. The policy had been implemented to promote inclusion and to create opportunities for workers whose primary language was not Swedish. The article shows that the language policy can be understood as racialising, even though that was not its purpose.