Panel at the 20th International Pragmatics Conference (IPC20)

Helsinki, Finland | 27 June – 2 July 2027

Convenors: Maria Grazia Rossi (NOVA University Lisbon) & Cristina Ganz (Vita-Salute San Raffaele University)

Submissions are now open for the panel “Discursive Injustice in Healthcare: Microaggressions, Silencing, and the Politics of Clinical Interaction”, to be held at the 20th International Pragmatics Conference (IPC20). A consistent part of studies on communication in medical settings has focused on the interactional challenges deriving from the asymmetry of knowledge and social roles, indicating such asymmetry as one of the primary causes of frequent suboptimal outcomes in professional-patient interactions (Bigi & Rossi, 2023). Scholarship has begun to examine a related but distinct set of phenomena: the ways in which clinical interaction becomes a site where discursive injustice is produced and sustained. Phenomena such as microaggressions (Sue, 2010; Freeman & Weekes Schroer, 2020; Freeman & Stewart, 2024) and epistemic injustices (Fricker, 2007; Carel & Kidd, 2014), are not occasional aberrations but recurrent features of exchanges shaped by race, gender, class, disability, and institutional asymmetry. While existing scholarship on these phenomena has largely relied on retrospective testimony or third-person description, this panel calls for theoretical, empirical, interaction-level investigation of how discursive injustice is produced, sustained, and resisted in real clinical dialogue.

In this panel, the convenors claim that understanding discursive injustice in healthcare requires attention to both the micro-level of clinical dialogue and the broader structural conditions that shape whose voices are heard and whose words count. Drawing on pragmatic and discourse-analytic frameworks, as well as the theory of speech acts (Langton, 1993; Kukla, 2014; McGowan, 2026), contributions are invited that examine how injustice is enacted, recognised, and resisted in interaction. Presentations addressing the following questions are invited:

Theoretical frameworks:

• What conceptual tools best capture the mechanisms through which discursive injustice is enacted in clinical dialogue?
• How can pragmatics-driven accounts address the interplay between microaggressions and epistemic injustices in clinical interaction?
• How do these phenomena reshape the doctor-patient trust relationship and patients’ well-being?

Phenomena and contexts:

• What forms does discursive injustice take in healthcare – dismissal of symptoms, asymmetric repair, failure of uptake, or microaggressive framing?

Data and methods:

• What methodological approaches are appropriate for studying discursive injustice in naturally occurring clinical interaction?
• What are the ethical challenges of collecting and analysing such data, and how can patients’ perspectives be incorporated without reducing them to testimony alone?

Contributions are welcome from researchers working on theoretical dimensions in pragmatics and the philosophy of language, on social epistemology at its intersection with medical discourse, and on empirical approaches to clinical interaction. The convenors particularly encourage submissions that engage with interactional data — whether from primary care, hospital consultations, mental health settings, or other clinical contexts — as well as contributions that examine how structural and institutional conditions shape the micro-level of clinical dialogue. Contributions addressing questions of race, gender, disability, or other axes of marginalisation. Proposals from scholars at all career stages are welcome.

References

Bigi, S., & Rossi, M. G. (Eds.). (2023). A pragmatic agenda for healthcare: Fostering inclusion and active participation through shared understanding. John Benjamins.

Carel H. & Kidd, I.J. (2014). Epistemic injustice in healthcare: A philosophical analysis. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 17: 529–540.

Freeman, L., & Stewart, H. (2024). Microaggressions in medicine. Oxford University Press.

Freeman, L., & Weekes Schroer, J. (Eds.). (2020). Microaggressions and philosophy. Routledge.

Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford University Press.

Kukla, R. (2014). Performative force, convention, and discursive injustice. Hypatia, 29(2), 440–457.

Langton, R. (1993). Speech acts and unspeakable acts. Philosophy & Public Affairs, 22(4), 293–330.

McGowan, M. K. (2026). On silencing: What it is and why it matters. Oxford University Press.

Nielsen, K. M., Nordgaard, J., & Henriksen, M. G. (2025). Fundamental issues in epistemic injustice in healthcare. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 28(2), 291-301.

Sue, D. W. (2010). Microaggressions in everyday life: Race, gender, and sexual orientation. Wiley.

Submission details

Conference: 20th International Pragmatics Conference (IPC20)

Venue: University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland

Conference dates: 27 June – 2 July 2027

Submission deadline: 15 October 2026

Abstract length: 250–500 words

Abstracts should be submitted through the conference website. During the submission process, select “Panel contribution” and, at the “Topics” step, please select the panel “Discursive Injustice in Healthcare: Microaggressions, Silencing, and the Politics of Clinical Interaction” (organised by Maria Grazia Rossi and Cristina Ganz).

For submission guidelines, registration information, and important dates, please refer to the conference call for papers and submission portal.

For further information or any questions, please feel free to contact Maria Grazia Rossi (mgrazia.rossi@fcsh.unl.pt) and Cristina Ganz (c.ganz@studenti.unisr.it).

Event supported by the Foundation for Science and Technology (Fundação para a Ciência e para a Tecnologia) of the Portuguese Ministry of Education and Science under the project UID/00183/2025 https://doi.org/10.54499/UID/00183/2025.