Nationalism, Language and Multilingualism

1. Nationalism, Language and Multilingualism • Most of us in the industrialized countries of North America, Western Europe, and Australasia tend to take the concept of the nation-state and its associated national standard language for granted, but, in fact, both of these are the outcome of centuries of struggles among competing political and economic groups to advance their own interests” (Foley 2001: 398).

2. Emergence of Nation-state • French revolution (1789-94) and industrial revolution: (end of 1800’s) • French revolution: Expansion of European ideology • Dismantling of kinship ties and village

3. A shift in the nature of political communication (Tonnes, 1955) • Gemeinschaft “community” to Gesellschaft “association” • Gemeinschaft: likeness, share property of kinship: village • ---Geertz: “primordial attachments” • Gesellschaft: willed, basedon ideology,‘free’ chosen acts of association: Nation-state

4. Imagined Communities (Benedict Anderson, 1983) • Imagining oneself and the rest of the population of a nation as a bounded community • Willed association, rights and duties

5. Basis of association in a Nation-State • Diffusion of national ideologies • --Media • Development of standard language • --exclusion of other languages • Institutionalization of a national language • -- literacy, education of citizens

6. National language and national ideology (Gellner) • A Yimas village (Gemeinschaft community) • produces a competent Yimas • Papua New Guinean nation-state (Gesellschaft community) • produces an effective Papua New Guinean

7. Forces that produce a national language • Political • --political elite’s reflection • --USA Example: AAVE versus SAE • --attitudes towards multilingualism • Economic • --corporations, influence, wealth

8. Multilingualism and nation-state • Problems: Multilingual entities • --fractionalization of interests: Czechoslovakia • Example Indonesia: One nation, one people, one language • --Tribal, ethnic problems: Rwanda and Yugoslavia • --Regional fractionalism: Somalia

9. Geertz’s concept of “primordial attachments” • Failure to go beyond citizens’ • kinship and village ties • National language replaces primordial attachments • The spread of nationalistic messages • --media: written and electronic, educational systems

10. State and nation • State: any region governed under a central administration, with its own legal and political institutions • Nation: any community of people who see themselves as an ethnic and culturally (linguistically) unit, in contrast to other groups of people surrounding them

11. Multilingualism • All modern nations are multilingual • The result of contact • 5000 to 8000 languages worldwide • USA: 27 ethnic groups: 230 languages

12. Bakhtin (1981) • Centripetal forces of language: ---political and institutional forces ---Imposition of one variety code over others • Centrifugal forces of language: ---forces pushing speakers away from a common code or language ---multilingualism ---differentiation

13. Tewa, Arizona (Kroskrity 1993) • Long history of contact (Hopi) • Links between identity and language • Some symbols only available to Tewa • Language medium of identity expression

14. Catalan, Spain (Woodlard 1989) • Political control by central government • Imposition of language code ---Centripetal forces: school system, media • High status in Catalonia

15. Basis of Linguistic Problems • Economic and political • Result in war, genocide ---Yugoslavia, Rwanda ---Hutus and Tootsies

16. Man: Could you tell me where the French test is?Recep: Pardon? (“Pardon?”)Man: Could you tell me where the French test is?Recep: En Français (“In French”)Man: I have the right to be addressed in English by the government of Quebec according to Bill 101.Recept: (To a third person) Qu’est-ce qu’il dit? (“What’s he saying?”)

17. Language Status (Multilingual Nations) • Canada and India • Issues contributing to language status: ---Ethnicity ---Race ---Political and social power of native speakers

18. India • Indo-Aryan (74), Dravidian (24), Austro-Asiatic (1,5) and Tibeto-Burman (0.7) • Hindi official language + 14 state official languages • English elite language and the second language of millions • Mass communication affects minority languages

19. Kamala Das I don’t know politics but I know the names Of those in power, and can repeat them like Days of week, or names of months, beginning with Nehru. I am Indian, very brown, born in Malabar, I speak three languages, write in Two, dream in one. Don’t write in English, they said, English is not your mother tongue. Why not leave Me alone, critics, friends, visiting cousins, Every one of you? Why not let me speak in Any other language I like? The language I speak Becomes mine, its distortions, its queerness All mine, mine alone…. (In Valentine, 2004)

20. Canada • Two different cultural and linguistic identities(linguistic majority French in Quebec) • Economic and politics controlled by Anglo interests until the 1970’s • Calls for independence (Referendum 1995) • Official language act1969 : bilingual education, • Reversal of fortunes in Quebec

21. Situational Use of Language • Quebec situation • Francophones, Anglophones and Allophones, • language according to situation • Reflects attitudes

22. Summary • The rise of the nation-state correlated with the development of standard languages • Replacement of community attachments of kin and village to willed free associations of citizens • Standard and national languages play a role in promulgating a national ideology • In all societies some people speak more than one language • Conflict are based on economic and political conditions but appear as linguistic issues • India and canada good examples of multilingualism:

23. 1. Summarise Clark Blaise’s article a. What is the story about?What are the main themes?