Polycentricity of Linguistic Landscape and Nation-Building in Post-Soviet Kazakhstan

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 289-312
Author(s):  
Aisulu Kulbayeva
Keyword(s):  
Language Ideology ◽  
Small Town ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Language Choices ◽  
Northern Kazakhstan ◽  
Building Process ◽  
Sign Type

This study illustrates a key existing challenge to realizing trilingualism as a major nation-building language ideology: the ideological polycentricity of multilingual signs—that is, the simultaneous orientation of multilingual signs to several authority centers. Combining diverse linguistic landscape (LL) methodologies such as code preferences (language choices and placement on a sign), indexical orders (patterns that index meta-messages), and polycentricity (a simultaneous orientation toward multiple centers), I examine how three state-approved languages (Kazakh, Russian, and English) are positioned on 346 state and private signs in a small town in northern Kazakhstan. The analysis reveals a range of indexical orders at the level of sign type: monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual sign types of horizontal, vertical, and centralized code combinations. At the level of signage group, bilingual Kazakh-Russian and trilingual Kazakh-Russian-English signs dominate in the top-down group, while monolingual Russian and bilingual Kazakh-Russian signs with centralized Russian dominate in the bottom-up group. The identified indexical orders indicate ideological polycentricity in town public signage, which presents a challenge for the nation-building process.

“Forward to David the Builder!” Georgia's (re)turn to language-centered nationalism

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 522-542 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christofer Berglund
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
The State ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
The Past ◽  
Building Project ◽  
The Rose ◽  
State Language

After the Rose Revolution, President Saakashvili tried to move away from the exclusionary nationalism of the past, which had poisoned relations between Georgians and their Armenian and Azerbaijani compatriots. His government instead sought to foster an inclusionary nationalism, wherein belonging was contingent upon speaking the state language and all Georgian speakers, irrespective of origin, were to be equals. This article examines this nation-building project from a top-down and bottom-up lens. I first argue that state officials took rigorous steps to signal that Georgian-speaking minorities were part of the national fabric, but failed to abolish religious and historical barriers to their inclusion. I next utilize a large-scale, matched-guise experiment (n= 792) to explore if adolescent Georgians ostracize Georgian-speaking minorities or embrace them as their peers. I find that the upcoming generation of Georgians harbor attitudes in line with Saakashvili's language-centered nationalism, and that current Georgian nationalism therefore is more inclusionary than previous research, or Georgia's tumultuous past, would lead us to believe.

scholarly journals Nations and Numbers: Elementary Mathematics Education as a Nationalizing Tool

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lukas Boser
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Education ◽  
Language Ideology ◽  
Elementary Mathematics ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Elementary Mathematics Education ◽  
The People ◽  
Building Process ◽  
Central Elements ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
Standard Language Ideology

One of the central elements of the nation-building process in the 19th century wasthe attempt to homogenize the citizenry, i.e. to fabricate national citizens. Besidesthe military and church, schools were considered to be the main agencies capable ofachieving this national homogenization. In this paper, focusing on the education inSwitzerland and France, I argue that elementary mathematics education was alsoused for this particular purpose. I make the case that throughout the 19th centurymathematics education became a way to familiarize the people with a standardizedlanguage – a language that was supposed to help them master their specific social,cultural and political realities.Key words: mathematics education; nation building; Standard Language Ideology;state formation.

Promising Generations: From Intergenerational Guilt to Ndi Umunyarwanda

2019 ◽  
pp. 189-210
Author(s):  
Richard M. Benda
Keyword(s):  
Identity Politics ◽  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Social Engineering ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Political Narrative ◽  
Almost All ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Current Stage

Ndi Umunyarwanda is a relatively new concept, having surfaced in post-genocide political narrative in July 2013. There is little doubt however that this concept currently dominates Rwandan identity politics and is envisioned as the answer to almost all the historical ills that have befallen and divided Rwanda. In light of the currently predominant discourse on post-genocide Rwanda, Ndi Umunyarwanda could be perceived as a top-down process of social engineering if considered only from the perspective of the current stage of its political dissemination. However, approached from its inception stage as this essay does, It is a bottom-up phenomenon that originates from Youth Connekt Dialogues (YCD); a series of dialogues held between children of perpetrators, children (of) survivors and representatives of local and central governments. The essay offers a narrative analysis of this emergence of Ndi Umunyarwanda out of YCD. The argument proposed here is that change in post-genocide Rwanda happens in different stages and at different levels. A narrative examination of YCD and Ndi Umunyarwanda as sequentially related phenomena shows that individual and group-initiated changes at grassroots levels can and do shape the national metanarrative of post-genocide nation building.

Linguistic landscape in the city of Isfahan in Iran: The representation of languages and identities in Julfa

Multilingua ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 37 (6) ◽  
pp. 701-720 ◽  
Author(s):  
Saeed Rezaei ◽  
Maedeh Tadayyon
Keyword(s):  
Collective Identity ◽  
English Language ◽  
Symbolic Power ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Language Ecology ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Theory Of Language ◽  
The City

AbstractThis paper reports on the diversity of languages displayed in the linguistic landscape of Julfa district, a largely Armenian dominated area, in the city of Isfahan in Iran. The data included a corpus of 323 photographs taken from the top-down and bottom-up signage in this quarter of the city. Ethnographic fieldwork was also conducted to reach a deeper understanding of the linguistic landscape in Julfa. The results of the analyses indicated that Julfa, as home to Armenians in diaspora and also a luxurious neighborhood frequented by more modern strata of the Isfahani society, is occupied more noticeably with Persian and English language and to a lesser extent with Armenian language. The findings further revealed that this neighborhood represents not only Iranian but also Armenian and Christian identities. The results are analyzed based on Bourdieu’s theory of language as a symbolic power. Furthermore, the collective identity and language ecology of Julfa in Isfahan are discussed. At the end, some lines of research for further studies in the LL of Iran are provided.

Belarusian Nationalism in the 2010s: a Case of Anti-Colonialism? Origins, Features and Outcomes of Ongoing ‘Soft Belarusianisation’

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-50
Author(s):  
Anaïs Marin
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
The Past ◽  
New Type ◽  
Challenging Situation ◽  
Red Line

Abstract The past decade has seen the emergence of a new type of nationalism in Belarus, a process labelled as ‘soft Belarusianisation’. This trend differs from earlier, mostly top-down (elite-led) episodes of nation-building – the Belarusisation of the 1920s, the nationalists’ movement that followed perestroika, and the ‘Creole nationalism’ incarnated by A. Lukashenko since the mid-1990s. Instead, soft Belarusianisation seems to be a bottom-up process stemming mostly from civil society. It would be wrong to consider it as a traditional revivalist or genuinely grassroots phenomenon however. Yet it appears as an anti-colonialist process, one meant to avoid further assimilation of Belarusians within the Russian whole. Whereas signs of a timid national awakening appeared back in the early 2010s, two sets of factors contributed to shaping and accelerating soft Belarusianisation in recent years. First were exogenous drivers, notably Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. Among the endogenous drivers is the Belarusian authorities’ benevolence towards soft Belarusianisation. Although they can exploit the rally-around-the-flag potential that the process entails for mobilising society in support of independence, the fact that soft Belarusianisation is perceived as anti-Russian in Russia proper creates a challenging situation for them. Should Belarusian nationalism overstep a red line, the likely consequences would be to put Belarusian sovereignty and national identity under a greater threat than it already is now.

scholarly journals Nomads, warriors and bureaucrats: nation-building and film in post-Soviet Kazakhstan

2015 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 399-416 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rico Isaacs
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Social Critique ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Political Condition ◽  
Building Process ◽  
A Site ◽  
Modern Perspective

Nation-building is a process which is often contested, not just among different ethnicities within a nation-state, but also among the titular ethnic majority. This article explores the contested nature of the nation-building process in post-Soviet Kazakhstan through examining cinematic works. Utilizing a post-modern perspective which views nations and national identity as invented, imagined and ambivalent it identifies four discursive strands within recent post-Soviet Kazakh cinema pertaining to nationhood and national identity (ethno-centric, civic, religious and socioeconomic). Rather than viewing government-sponsored efforts of identity formation in cinema as a top-down process in which the regime transmits its version of nationhood and identity, the discursive strands revealed in this article illustrate there are varying understandings of what constitutes the nation and national identity in Kazakh cinematic works. Furthermore, the strand which focuses on the socioeconomic tensions of modern nation-building in Kazakhstan uncovers how film is used as a site for dissent and social critique of Kazakhstan's modern political condition. What the article illuminates is how discourses related to nation-building can be both competing and complementary and that nation-building is a fluid and transgressive process in which among the titular majority there is no fixed unambiguous understanding of nationhood and national identity.

scholarly journals A Comparative Study of the Gap Between De-Jure and De-Facto Language Policies: The Case of Kyrgyzstan and Hungary

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-69
Author(s):  
Askar Mambetaliev
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Study ◽  
Qualitative Methods ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Document Analysis ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Historical Perspectives ◽  
Main Factors

Summary The purpose of this study was to find the main factors that guide language policies and discover correlations between top-down and bottom-up ideologies in the context of Hungary and Kyrgyzstan. To accomplish this, the study created a database of relevant official documents, photos of linguistic landscapes and qualitative data. The study analyzed the documented top-down decisions from historical perspectives, and then compared them with the data collected from interviews and surveys, and from the collection of photos. The participants included both high-ranking political figures, professors, students and random citizens. Results showed that the official policies often do not comprehensively match with the people’s beliefs, attitudes and desires. Findings also imply that using either document analysis, or the method of linguistic landscape, or qualitative methods alone, might not sufficiently validate the results in the absence of each other, since errors may top up from various discrepancies between top-down and bottom-up arrangements, as well as from overt and covert ideologies.

scholarly journals English and Arabic Inscriptions in the Linguistic Landscape of Yemen: A Multilingual Writing Approach

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anwar A. H. Al-Athwary
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Salient Feature ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
The Public ◽  
Standard Arabic ◽  
Multilingual Writing

The present paper investigates the multilingual written texts of the signboards in the public space of Yemen. It attempts to apply Reh's (2004) typology of multilingual writing. Reh introduces four strategies of multilingualism: duplicating, fragmentary, overlapping, and complementary. They refer to the arrangement of information in the inscriptions of multilingual signs in a given linguistic landscape (LL). To achieve this purpose, a data corpus of 755 multilingual signs in the LL of Yemen has been used, the majority of which are bilingual in Arabic and English. The analysis showed that all four strategies of duplicating, fragmentary, overlapping, and complementary multilingual writings were generally employed in Sana'a's LL. While overlapping and complementary multilingualism were totally absent in the top-down signs, duplicating and fragmentary multilingualism had much higher frequency over overlapping and complementary ones in bottom-up signs. Keeping in mind that speech community in Yemen is monolingual in Arabic, the absence or low frequency of overlapping, and complementary signs in both top-down and bottom-up levels can be explained by the fact that these two types of texts presuppose multilingual readers since knowledge of all the languages involved is necessary to understand the whole message. The model of writing mimicry system proposed by Sutherland (2015) is also examined. Writing mimicry system was found to be a salient feature of the public space of Yemen performing some specific functions; it is only used for advertising and promotional purposes rather than expressing the identity of ethnolinguistic minorities. The study also revealed that Sana'a multilingual LL is characterized by the use of Arabicised English, glocalisation and multifunctional signs, all of which are employed to serve a general purpose of promoting, and advertising commodities and showing modernity and success. Standard Arabic appears on almost all of both top-down and bottom-up signs. The scarce use of Yemeni Arabic is indicative of the notion of Arab nationalism. Linguistic nationalism refers to the communicative and symbolic functions of Standard Arabic in articulating national identity in the LL of Yemen. 

Dilemmas of Estonian nation building in the open media market / Probleme estnischer Nationsbildung im offenen Medienmarkt / L’édification de la nation et le libre marché des médias en Estonie: problèmes et défis

2013 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Triin Vihalemm ◽  
Gabrielle Hogan-Brun
Keyword(s):  
Nation Building ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Media Market

Die Mediennutzung in Estland hat sich als resistent erwiesen gegen die Etablierung des Estnischen als gemeinsamer Sprache im öffentlichen Raum. Bis zum heutigen Tag nutzt die russischsprachige Minderheit Estlands meist Medien in russischer Sprache. Die Sprachgrenze zeigt sich auch in den Praktiken der inhaltlichen Wahl gruppenspezifischer Medien sowie auf staatlicher Ebene (Republik Estland vs. Russische Föderation). Somit ist die Informationssphäre nicht nur in sprachlich, sondern auch inhaltlich in unterschiedliche Subsysteme aufgeteilt.Qualitative Studien zeigen, dass verschiedene Bottom-up- und Top-down- Mechanismen diese zweisprachige und ideologisch heterogene Informationssphäre stets neu reproduzieren. Die sprachlich und politisch gespaltene öffentliche Informationssphäre sieht sich ständig dem Dilemma gegenüber, einerseits Zugang zu praktischen und ideologischen Informationen zu gewährleisten und andererseits die Nationalsprache zu etablieren. Die estnischen Machteliten versuchen beide, oft widersprüchlichen Ziele zu erreichen. Wir diskutieren diesbezügliche Strategien unter dem Gesichtspunkt sowohl sprachzentrierter Nationsbildung als auch der Vielfalt globalisierten Medienkonsums.

Psychology and Culture: Top Down Versus Bottom Up?

PsycCRITIQUES ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 50 (19) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Cole
Keyword(s):  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up
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