Speech-Language Pathology in Colombia 1966–2025: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Biopower and Therapy Devices

Background: We investigated speech-language pathology (SLP) discourses in Colombia (1966–2025) to understand how the profession has exerted power over communicative subjects, how it has contributed to the configuration of a healthy national body, and how it has participated in the establishment of normalcy-abnormality standards in communication.

Objective: Drawing on critical and poststructuralist theories, we positioned ourselves to uncover biopower discourses embedded in professional practice.

Method: We used critical discourse analysis to approach biopower configurations in SLP discourses.

Findings: We identified three discourses: the eugenic, the mercantile, and body customization. These discourses function as therapeutic devices that assemble diverse elements for managing communication.

Conclusion: It is shown how SLP discourses have incorporated the search for bodily and communicative perfection through biological means, the construction of SLP therapy as services and technologies for consumers, and body modification at ease. SLP devices aim to bring people closer to the expected normative limits of communication.

Contribution: SLPs might take a critical stance towards social justice.