5 Decolonising Multilingualism in National Language Policies

2021 ◽  
pp. 75-93
Keyword(s):  
National Language ◽  
Language Policies

Language policies for Hong Kong schools since 1997

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent Kan ◽  
Bob Adamson
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Secondary Schools ◽  
Language Policy ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
International Communication ◽  
National Language ◽  
Medium Of Instruction ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Mother Tongue Education ◽  
Important Means

Francis of Education (print)/1474-8479 (online) Article 2010 Language in education debates in Hong Kong focus on the role and status of English (as the former colonial language and an important means for international communication); Cantonese, the mother tongue of the majority of the population; and Putonghua, the national language of China. This paper examines the language policy formulated in 1997–1998, and finds that it radically departed from previous policies by mandating the use of Cantonese as the medium of instruction in secondary schools. The paper then analyses two subsequent policy revisions and concludes that, while the tonal emphasis on mother-tongue education has remained, the policy revisions have reversed the language policy to previous practices that emphasised the importance of English.

English in the Philippines: A Case of Rootedness and Routedness

2020 ◽  
pp. 133-153
Author(s):  
Bejay Villaflores Bolivar
Keyword(s):  
Communities Of Practice ◽  
Online Communities ◽  
First Language ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
National Language ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Hybrid Form ◽  
Online Communities Of Practice ◽  
Local Languages

The researcher focuses on a hybrid form of English and Cebuano-Bisaya, one of the dominant local languages in the Philippines. Drawing from the Extra and Intra-territorial Model of Buschfeld and Kautzsch, the article argues that the emergence of Bislish is propelled by extra- and intra-territorial forces: first, language policies and a regional resistance against Tagalog as the national language; second, the surge of globalization and the Cebuano speakers’ endeavor for upward and outward mobility. The researcher surmounts that the prominence of Bislish in various domains, particularly in online communities of practice, is tied to the speakers’ attitudes of rootedness and routedness. The study affirms the viability of the EIF Model in explicating cases of language hybridity in postcolonial contexts.

University language policies and language choice among Ph.D. graduates in Estonia: The (unbalanced) interplay between English and Estonian

Multilingua ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 33 (3-4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Josep Soler-Carbonell
Keyword(s):  
Language Policy ◽  
Academic Language ◽  
Language Choice ◽  
National Language ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Discussion Section ◽  
Policy Documents ◽  
Global Language ◽  
A Site

AbstractThe role of English as a global language and its consequences for the internationalization of higher education are matters that have increasingly drawn the attention of researchers from different fields of language and communication. In this paper, an overview of the situation in Estonia is presented. The Estonian context has not previously been analyzed along these lines. The author suggests looking at Ph.D. dissertations as a site of tension between the need to effectively incorporate English as an academic language and the need to maintain Estonian as the national language. The article views this question in the context of some relevant language policy documents and other macro indicators. It then focuses on the number of Ph.D. dissertations defended at four main public universities in the last few years and the languages they have been written in. It appears that, although the language policy documents seem to correctly capture this tension between English and Estonian, the language most commonly used when writing dissertations is overwhelmingly English, with only the humanities providing some counterbalance to that trend. The current situation is different from that of past decades, when English was absent from Estonia’s scientific production and Estonian was significantly employed in that context, alongside Russian. In the discussion section, some lines for further inquiry are presented, together with a proposal for integrating complexity theory in such analyses.

Re-thinking balanced bilingualism

2009 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eva Juarros-Daussà ◽  
Tilman Lanz
Keyword(s):  
Language Revitalization ◽  
Spanish Speakers ◽  
National Language ◽  
Official Language ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
New Immigrants ◽  
The World ◽  
Historical Presence ◽  
Globalized World

Traditionally, Catalonia is seen as a successful example of language revitalization, through the achievement and maintenance of a fairly stable Castilian/Catalan bilingualism for the last thirty years or so. Recently, however, Catalonia has experienced significant immigration in the context of globalization. The autonomous government is now supporting an agenda in which Catalan alone is presented as the national language, the language of convergence, while Castilian, despite its long historical presence in the region, is portrayed as one of three hundred languages spoken there today. We examine how this policy interacts with everyday linguistic realities and with a preservationist agenda. Catalan speakers are divided between those who feel liberated from the imposition of Spanish identity and culture and those who fear an exclusivist nationalism which they feel would be anachronistic in the globalized world of today. Spanish speakers, in turn, feel threatened and targeted. New immigrants, coming from all corners of the world, are caught in a climate in which official language policies hardly reflect their own needs. Linguistic policies have to be re-thought to tend to the needs of immigrants while also ensuring the survival of Catalan.

Language Policy in South Asia

1981 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 60-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Braj B. Kachru
Keyword(s):  
Language Policy ◽  
South Asia ◽  
Liberal Arts ◽  
National Language ◽  
Basic Knowledge ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
The Political ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
The Status ◽  
Regional Languages

In the political divisions within South Asia there has traditionally been no organized effort for language policies.1 Language was essentially related to one's caste, village, district, and state. Beyond this, one identified with languages associated with religion (Sanskrit or Arabic), or learned and literary texts (mainly Sanskrit and Persian). At the time of Indian independence (1947), one task of the new government was to unravel the status and position of almost 560 sovereign states which were ruled by an array of mahārājās, nawābs, and lesser luminaries, depending on the size and the revenue of each state and subdivision. Each state state was a kindgom unto itself, and such political divisions did not foster a national language policy. In India, the largest country in South Asia, four languages were used for wider communication as bazār languages or languages of literature and intranational communication: Hindi (and its varieties, Hindustani and Urdu), Sanskrit, Persian, and later, English (cf., for Sanskrit, Kachru and Sridhar 1978; Sharma 1976; for English, Kachru 1969; 1982a). The Hindus tended to send their children to a pāṭhśālā (traditional Hindu school mainly for scriptural education) for the study of the scriptures and some basic knowledge of the śāastras (Sanskrit instructional texts, treatise), and the Muslims tended to send their children to a maktab (traditional school for Koranic instruction). The denominational schools (vidyāZaya) provided liberal arts instruction in Sanskrit, Persian, Hindi, Arabic, or in the regional languages.

scholarly journals Dimensions of language education policy in Asia

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 7-33
Author(s):  
Anthony J. Liddicoat ◽  
Andy Kirkpatrick
Keyword(s):  
Education Policy ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Education ◽  
Indigenous Languages ◽  
National Language ◽  
Foreign Languages ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Language Education Policy ◽  
National Languages

Abstract This paper will identify the major trends that can be determined from an overall study of recent language policies across Asia. The trends can be seen across three interrelated themes, namely: the promotion and privileging of one language as the national language as part of an attempt to create a nation state, often in polities that are linguistically extremely diverse; a decrease in the promotion of indigenous languages other than the national language and the neglect of these in education in many countries; and the promotion of English as the first foreign language in education systems, often giving other ‘foreign’ languages a minimal role in education. Possible reasons and motivations for these trends will be discussed and countries where exceptions to these trends can be identified will be illustrated. The aim of the paper will be to discuss these trends and to critically evaluate selected language policies. The paper will conclude with predictions for the future linguistic ecology of the region and for the interrelationships of respective national languages, indigenous languages and English

Macro-Level policy and Micro-Level planning

2006 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 3.1-3.18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Barkhuizen ◽  
Ute Knoch
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Language Policy ◽  
South African ◽  
National Language ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Linguistic Context ◽  
Language Practices ◽  
Micro Level

This article reports on a study which investigated the language lives of Afrikaans-speaking South African immigrants in New Zealand. Particularly, it focuses on their awareness of and attitudes to language policy in both South Africa and New Zealand, and how these influence their own and their family’s language practices. Narrative interviews with 28 participants living in towns and cities across New Zealand reveal that while living in South Africa they were generally aware of macro-level language policies in the country, and were able to articulate how these policies influenced language practices at work and within their families. The absence of an explicit national language policy in New Zealand means that these immigrants, on arrival in New Zealand, base their understanding of the linguistic context in the country on the language practices that they observe in their day-to-day lives. It is these observations which guide their decision-making with regard to their own and their family’s language practices.

Language Policies and Politics in South Asia

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vineeta Chand
Keyword(s):  
South Asia ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Language Attitudes ◽  
National Language ◽  
Language Policies ◽  
Language Management ◽  
Linguistic Ideologies ◽  
Language Competencies ◽  
Diachronic Changes

This chapter explores socioeconomic, political, religious ethno-cultural, and national positions toward language management, which underlie diachronic changes in South Asian nations’ language policies and linguistic ideologies. In South Asia, feelings toward linguistic diversity, as realized through national language policies and in actual national language management practices, are highly diverse. The negotiation of and diachronic changes in language policies, together with functional and ideological goals—visible through language attitudes, overt and covert language policies, and diachronic changes in language competencies—offer a lens through which to understand language management and value.

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