A minoritized language on both sides of the border: legal framework and language policy of Catalan in Andorra and Catalonia

Multilingua ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-168
Author(s):  
Juan Jiménez-Salcedo

Abstract This article analyzes the legislation of the two territories that have the most advanced legal framework regarding language policies towards Catalan: Andorra and Catalonia. The study of the legislation in relation to contexts of social and institutional use shows how this legal framework is not sufficient to change Catalan from being a minoritized language, since the phenomenon of minoritization is innate to the ecosystem in which languages develop. This ecosystem is conditioned by the presence of Castilian as a lingua franca on both sides of the border between Andorra and Catalonia. In the case of Andorra, its status as a cross-border microstate makes it a plurilingual space with Castilian as a socially cross-cutting language; moreover, the fact that until recently there was no network of state schools hindered Catalan language normalisation efforts. Catalonia, on the other hand, is an even more complex example on account of how the implementation of llengua pròpia policy contradicts the constitutional control the Spanish state exercises on this.

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (31) ◽  
pp. 135
Author(s):  
Henning Bergenholtz ◽  
Jonna Bisgaard ◽  
Majken Brunsborg Lauridsen ◽  
Kamilla Kvist Wichmann

To argue that language policies are subject to the vagaries of fashion may be a slight exaggeration. But language policies have indeed attracted growing interest and been increasingly debated over the last three to four years. During this time many companies and organisations have formulated a language policy, or they are currently in the process of doing so. At the national level several politicians have been complaining that no language policy exists for the Danish language. On the other hand, many journalists and several linguists have been criticising the language policy for which the Danish Language Council is responsible as inappropriate. All these statements may appear rather contradictory. The confusion can, however, partly be accounted for by the prevalence of different definitions of what a language policy is and what it involves. In this contribution we will suggest ways of resolving the terminological problems and also discuss some concrete Danish proposals for the part of language policy that we have termed ‘specific language policy’.


Author(s):  
Andrew Linn ◽  
Anastasiya Bezborodova ◽  
Saida Radjabzade

AbstractThis article presents a practical project to develop a language policy for an English-Medium-Instruction university in Uzbekistan. Although the university is de facto English-only, it presents a complex language ecology, which in turn has led to confusion and disagreement about language use on campus. The project team investigated the experience, views and attitudes of over a thousand people, including faculty, students, administrative and maintenance staff, in order to arrive at a proposed policy which would serve the whole community, based on the principle of tolerance and pragmatism. After outlining the relevant language and educational context and setting out the methods and approach of the underpinning research project, the article goes on to present the key findings. One of the striking findings was an appetite for control and regulation of language behaviours. Language policies in Higher Education invariably fall down at the implementation stage because of a lack of will to follow through on their principles and their specific guidelines. Language policy in international business on the other hand is characterised by a control stage invariably lacking in language planning in education. Uzbekistan is a polity used to control measures following from policy implementation. The article concludes by suggesting that Higher Education in Central Asia may stand a better chance of seeing through language policies around English-Medium Instruction than, for example, in northern Europe, based on the tension between tolerance on the one hand and control on the other.


2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (4/2019) ◽  
pp. 193-206
Author(s):  
Darko Simović

The adoption of the Act on Prevention of Domestic Violence was driven by the creation of a more effective legal framework for the protection of victims of domestic violence, and, therefore, also by the alignment of the legal system of the Republic of Serbia with international obligations. The main novelties include multi-sectoral cooperation and primarily preventive nature of the law. However, from its very adoption, it has been pointed to its noticeably repressive character, as well as to provisions with potentially harmful impacts. Hence, this paper represents a contribution to the discussion on the importance and scope of the solutions provided for in the Act on Prevention of Domestic Violence. On the one hand, it points to major novelties intended to contribute to a more effective prevention of domestic violence. On the other hand, it questions the constitutionality and appropriateness of some of the legal solutions, arguing that, in particular respects, the lawmaker had to use a wiser and more subtle approach to conceptualising the provisions of this law.


Author(s):  
Reinhard Bork ◽  
Renato Mangano

This chapter deals with European cross-border issues concerning groups of companies. This chapter, after outlining the difficulties encountered throughout the world in defining and regulating the group, focuses on the specific policy choices endorsed by the EIR, which clearly does not lay down any form of substantive consolidation. Instead, the EIR, on the one hand, seems to permit the ‘one group—one COMI’ rule, even to a limited extent, and, on the other hand, provides for two different regulatory devices of procedural consolidation, one based on the duties of ‘cooperation and communication’ and the other on a system of ‘coordination’ to be set up between the many proceedings affecting companies belonging to the same group.


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Socorro Cláudia Tavares de Sousa ◽  
Cynthia Israelly Barbalho Dionísio

ABSTRACT The aim of this work is to present an overview of the themes discussed in the field of Language Policy and Planning over the last twenty-one years (1990-2010) in Brazil, comparing the alignment of Brazilian research with the international scenario. To that end, expanded notions of language policy were adopted (COOPER, 1989; SHIFFMAN, 1996, 2006; SPOLSKY, 2004, 2009, 2012) and a survey was carried out in order to find the number of articles in the field in a sample of abstracts from Brazilian academic journals of Linguistics and Literature. The main themes identified in this study were: educational language policies, language planning, languages in contact, diffusion of the Portuguese language, and (meta)linguistic knowledge and language policies. On the one hand, these themes show a convergence between Brazilian and international trends; however, on the other, they show a specific thematic trend in the former, that is, the interest in the constitution of (meta)linguistic knowledge in relation to language policy.


Author(s):  
Muñoz-Mosquera Andrés ◽  
Chalanouli Nikoleta

This chapter addresses the civilian components accompanying Visiting Forces. For these components, the privileges and immunities of the UN and those specific of the mission apply. This mission immunity is essential for an impartial and effective performance of the specific UN mandate, which is ‘a prerequisite for the success of the mission’. The legal framework for these privileges and immunities has to be sought in Art. 105 of the UN Charter, which consecrates the principle that the UN officials shall enjoy in the territory of each of its members such privileges and immunities as are necessary for the fulfilment of UN purposes in order to be independent in the exercise of their functions. On the other hand, the 1946 Convention on Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations has not come to bring a common understanding on to whom it applies when peacekeepers are involved.


2011 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 29-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milan Bufon

The article is discussing both challenges and problems that emerge from an intensified cross-border integration, particularly in Europe, which is creating a sort of ‘cross-border regionalism’ that might be sought as a new constituent part of a complex, multi-level system of governance incorporating not only national, but also local/regional agents. Cross-border regionalism is thus not only a system of government, but also a system of ‘grass-rooted’ social and spatial (re)integration of borderlands. This process is closely related to the question of changing territoriality, preserving on the one hand the regional control and on the other hand re-acting societal and territorial co-dependence.


Author(s):  
Henning Bergenholtz ◽  
Mia Johnsen

Surprisingly, no attempts have yet been made to relate language policy and communication policy. This is the case in theoretical contributions on language policy and theoretical contributions on communication policy alike, none of which mentions the other concept. It is also the case in existing language policies where the term communication policy is not referred to at all. Likewise, the term language policy is not found in communication policies, even when a particular company or organisation has a language policy as well as a communication policy. This contribution aims to define both terms and subsequently to establish the relation between them.


2019 ◽  
pp. 39-66
Author(s):  
Yossi Harpaz

This chapter explores the case of Hungarian dual citizenship in Serbia as a representative case of compensatory citizenship that is created on the basis of coethnic ties. Since 2011, Hungary has offered dual citizenship to cross-border Hungarians living in neighboring countries. However, coethnic dual citizenship has complicated and contradictory effects on Serbia's Hungarian minority. On the one hand, they enjoy access to Europe, as well as elevated social status in Serbia. On the other hand, the proliferation of EU passports makes it easier for young Hungarians to emigrate, shrinking this beleaguered population even further. Meanwhile, thousands of ethnic Serbs have also begun to study the Hungarian language. They hope to take advantage of Hungary's generosity toward Hungarian speakers in order to thereby gain access to the EU.


Babel ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizaveta Getta

Abstract The study overviews the role of interpreting services in Tanzania, presenting mainly the experience of practicing freelance interpreters. The two official languages of Tanzania – English and Swahili – have separate roles in the country. Although most Tanzanians accept English as a necessary medium of intercultural communication, Swahili is perceived as an important part of Tanzanian national identity. It is the country’s lingua franca. On the one hand, Tanzania aims to preserve communication in Swahili; on the other hand, there is an inevitable need for intercultural communication with the rest of the world that grows especially in the context of globalization. The paper focuses on the role, status, education, working languages, conditions of Tanzanian interpreters, and the requirements of local and international clients. The study also creates a broader context that mentions crucial historical moments that have influenced the country’s current character of intercultural communication.


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