How do they construe the question of language, of medium (or not)? Much work on youth language shows how youth’s linguistic practices are frequently more complicated than the institutional projects devoted to inculcating standard language use would like; and more to the point, that students’ linguistic practices often explicitly align in distinction, if not in opposition to such projects, thereby requiring institutional efforts to double down on linguistic standard- ization, purification, and discipline. Hindi Is Our Ground, English Is Our Sky is an important addition to the sociology of education, as well as to linguistic anthropologists’ understanding of language politics and institutionality in postcolonial settings. It importantly bridges the gap between our under- standings of language ideology and institutional organization as they come to register in and as the changing political economy of north India. It will be of interest to scholars of multilin- gualism, education, language ideology, and youth culture. Critical Thinking in Slovakia after Socialism. Jonathan L. Larson. Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2013. xx + 240 pp. NETTIE BOIVIN Nazarbayev University nettie.boivin@nu.edu.kz This book investigates the nature of critical thinking not only through linguistic and socio- cultural discourse; rather, the author expands the scope of the argument to include anthropo- logical, political, and sociological perspectives of how one assesses critical thinking and communication. This produces a more nuanced analysis of how fluid language is for differing interlocutors across ethnic communities. Larson provides a good historical overview of the Slovak context including colonialization by various regimes (feudal, totalitarian, socialist), process of protest during Prague Spring (1968), the Velvet Revolution (1989), and the final reconstruction phase (1989–93). The author’s knowledge of the Slovak language and culture provides the reader with a clearer understanding of how language is socioculturally embedded into the thinking process of a culture. More importantly, he is able to highlight ethnic differ- ences between the Slovak and Czech Soviet experience due to variations in pragmatic linguistic interpretations of particular words. The author leads the reader, not just assess language as a static structural component, but a feature of the overall context within a performance act of social discourse. Moreover, there is a strong use of ethnographic stories and meta-narratives relevant to both the context and the argument. The weaving of the ethnography, linguistic, and sociopolitical facets create an interesting and layered argument throughout the book. First in the introduction, the author provides historical, sociopolitical, and sociocultural overview of critical thinking in East Central Europe. He lays out the book’s argument through ethnographic postscripts of life in the region. During this journey, the reader is shown how the author is differentiating critical thought as analysis rather than judgment.After that, he high- lights how his argument is anchored not just in the literal analysis of text-based discourse but also the meaning held within the act of communication. Next, he describes the ethnographic methods used to analyze discourse as pertaining to critical thought. Finally, he outlines each chapter of the book. In Chapter One, Larson examines civil and public debate. After the fall of the Soviet regime, the Slovak people attempted to maintain a civil objective criticism in their critical discourse. However, highlighted in the chapters is how easy the critiques shift from evaluation to judgment as highlighted using the examples of two journals; the journal Kritika & Kontext used evaluation whereas the journal Domino aimed criticism at government agencies and institutions. Larson refers to these changes in discourse from evaluation to judgment as “frame slippage” (63). Moreover, he argues that civil public discourse is rooted in a socio- cultural manner of Slovakian thinking rather than a politically motivated one. Then in Chapter Two, he investigates how intellectuals and activists utilized critical discourse that contained hidden objectives such as institutional criticism, variation in discourse under prevat (92), and emotional display in public speech. For example, the use of the pronoun “them,” during Communism, was for those in the government.After prevat or the change in government, the pronoun “us” referred to those in the government. This linguistic change highlighted emo- tionality in public speech. Moreover, he outlines how the civility of the discourse during the Velvet Revolution turned into deep resentment of past transgressions from the Soviet regime. 360 Journal of Linguistic Anthropology