Overview

Current academic discussions and public debates about language frequently focus on the importance of defending languages against various kinds of dangers. Many of these current debates attach great importance to linguistic diversity. The debates focus on defending institutionalized languages against multilingualism, or conversely defending minority languages against the incursion of larger ones, especially the spread of English. In both cases, languages are constructed as autonomous wholes, held to need defending against attack. This book challenges such a view of language, to argue that the discussions in question are not in fact about language itself. The internationally renowned contributors claim that we are witnessing ideological struggles which are taking place on the terrain of language. Discourses of Endangerment addresses such questions as: * What does language represent in discussions of multilingualism? * Why is it constituted as an organic whole?* In whose interest does it lie to construct language in this way?* Who has an interest in taking various positions for or against official languages?* In what way is the linguistic order tied to the social order? The book addresses these issues through a set of case studies which locate the terms of the discussion in broad discourses of language, identity and power. Covering a wide-range of languages including Catalan, Swedish, Corsican, Ukrainian and French, from different sociolinguistic perspectives, this book is essential reading for students and academics interested in language endangerment and sociolinguistics.

Full Product Details

Author:   Alexandre Duchene ,  Monica Heller
Publisher:   Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Imprint:   Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd.
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 1.70cm , Length: 23.40cm
Weight:   0.590kg
ISBN:  

9780826487452

ISBN 10:   0826487459
Pages:   302
Publication Date:   07 January 2007
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.
Language:   English

Table of Contents

1. Discourses of endangerment: Sociolinguistics, globalization and social order, Monica Heller and Alexandre Duchêne 2. Defending diversity: Staking out a common global interest?, Shaylih Muehlmann 3. Indigenous language endangerment and the unfinished business of nation states, Donna Patrick 4. Discourses of endangerment: Contexts and consequences of essentializing discourses, Alexandra Jaffe 5. Who wants to save 'le patois d'Évolène?, Raphaël Maître and Marinette Matthey 6. Français, acadien, acadjonne: Competing discourses on language preservation along the shores of the Baie Sainte-Marie, Annette Boudreau and Lise Dubois 7. The future of Catalan: Language endangerment and nationalist discourses in Catalonia, Joan Pujolar 8. Language endangerment, war and peace in Ireland and Northern Ireland, Tony Crowley 9. Voices of endangerment: A language ideological debate on the Swedish language, Tommaso M.Milani 10. Defending English in an English-dominant world: The Ideology of the 'Official English' movement in the United States, Ronald Schmidt, Sr. 11. Protecting French: The view from France, Claudine Moïse 12. Embracing diversity for the sake of unity: Linguistic hegemony and the pursuit of total Spanish, José del Valle 13. Language endangerment and verbal hygiene: History, morality and politics, Deborah Cameron Index

Reviews

. ..the volume's co-editors argue persuasively...an especially compelling set of questions...authors [are] very skilled in reading ideologies from their data...As a critique of discourses of endangerment, the volume makes significant strides not merely in questioning the rhetorical strategies used to discuss language extinction but also in disclosing conflicts of interest underlying these approaches...this volume takes a major step in offering a language ideological interpretation of how political-economic interests have shaped two very different kinds of threats - one rather real, the other quite imagined...it is a critical complement to such works for scholars interested in language ideological construction of endangerment. Language in Society, 2009

Author Information

Alexandre Duchêne is Professor in Sociology of Language and Multilingualism at the University of Teacher Education, Fribourg, Switzerland. Monica Heller is Professor in the Department of Sociology and Equity Studies in Education of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto, Canada.

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