The discourse of some of the most powerful public figures in today’s world is often incoherent and nonsensical. Incoherent yet authoritative discourse shows that authority does not rest in language but results from non‐linguistic and pre‐textual conditions. The non‐linguistic and pre‐textual conditions are exemplified in an Australian case‐study of a media debate between the Immigration Minister and a refugee, drawing on research by Smith‐Khan (2019a, 2019b). Two such conditions are then examined with reference to academic publics. First, I ask which languages do or do not carry authority, before moving on to speaker identity as a condition of authority. The close association between English and academic excellence has resulted in diminishing the authority of academic publications in languages other than English. The same is true of publications by women and people of colour. I close by reflecting on referencing practices as forms of extending authoritativeness to voices in excluded languages and from excluded scholars in academic publics.

中文翻译：

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论学术界的权威条件

当今世界上一些最有影响力的公众人物的话语通常是不连贯和荒谬的。不连贯但权威的话语表明，权威并不在于语言，而在于非语言和前文本条件。在澳大利亚移民部长与难民之间媒体辩论的案例研究中，以非语言和文本前条件为例，该研究借鉴了Smith-Khan（2019a，2019b）的研究。然后，参考学术界对两个这样的条件进行了研究。首先，在继续讲说话者身份作为授权条件之前，我先询问哪些语言具有或不具有授权。英语与学术成就之间的紧密联系导致以英语以外的其他语言发表的学术出版物的权威性下降。妇女和有色人种的出版物也是如此。在结束时，我将反思实践作为将权威性扩展到排除语言中的声音以及学术界排除学者的形式。