Abstract
This chapter is based on an ethnographic study of how the International Criminal Court addresses the challenges of linguistic diversity across its core activities. The author argues that while the need to communicate in many languages may be obvious to those involved in the ICC’s work, the multiplicity of cultural understandings and attitudes that are a corollary to linguistic diversity may be less so. Using the perceptions and words of the study’s interviewees, along with pertinent scholarship and published commentary, the chapter aims to lay bare a broad spectrum of cultural impacts found at the Court, both those that are explicit and those that are more implicit or may not be considered cultural at all. The conclusion articulates some basic notions about culture(s) that Court staff and others involved in the institution’s work would do well to consider as they carry out their various functions.
