Language Policy and Education || Educational Language Planning and Linguistic Identity

Educational Language Planning and Linguistic IdentityAuthor(s): Peter SuttonSource: International Review of Education / Internationale Zeitschrift fürErziehungswissenschaft / Revue Internationale de l'Education, Vol. 37, No. 1, Language Policyand Education (1991), pp. 133-147Published by: SpringerStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3444410 .

Accessed: 04/04/2014 02:27

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Springer is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to International Review ofEducation / Internationale Zeitschrift für Erziehungswissenschaft / Revue Internationale de l'Education.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 108.28.104.5 on Fri, 4 Apr 2014 02:27:47 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springer

http://www.jstor.org/stable/3444410?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


EDUCATIONAL LANGUAGE PLANNING AND

LINGUISTIC IDENTITYI

PETER SUTTON

Abstract - There are cases in which a "high" form of a language is taught and used in formal situations, but linguistic variation is also caused by geography, ethnicity and socioeconomic class. Certain variants are regarded as inferior and restricted in expressive capacity, and are disadvantageous. The paper suggests that it is possible to map each person's linguistic identity in two dimensions: the number of languages spoken, and the situation-specific variants of each language. Further, it is argued that the distance between a "low" variant and a "high" standard form of a language may present to the "low" learner of a standardized mother tongue a barrier just as great as that posed by the learning of a related foreign language to a speaker of the high variant. It is proposed that greater tolerance be exercised in acceptance of variation and in recognition of linguistic identity, so that this can be built on in the necessary and desirable expansion of linguistic competence, rather than being devalued. The relevance of the communicative approach to language teaching is touched on.

Zusammenfassung - Es gibt Fille, in denen eine "hohe" Form einer Sprache gelehrt und in formellen Situationen gebraucht wird, aber linguistische Verande- rungen werden auch durchGeographie, ethnische Identitat und sozialkonomische Klassen hervorgerufen. Gewisse Varianten gelten hinsichtlich ihres Ausdrucksver- mogens als unterlegen und restriktiv und sind unvorteilhaft. In dem Artikel wird vorgeschlagen, die linguistische Identitdt jedes Einzelnen in zwei Dimensionen darzustellen: die Anzahl der gesprochenen Sprachen und die situationsspezifische Variante jeder Sprache. Weiterhin wird argumentiert, daB die Distanz zwischen einer "niedrigen" Variante und einer "hohen" Standardform einer Sprache fir den "niedrigen" Lernenden einer standardisierten Muttersprache ebenso schwierig ist wie das Erlernen einer verwandten auslindischen Sprache fur denjenigen, der die "hohe" Form spricht. Es wird vorgeschlagen, gr6Bere Toleranz durch Akzeptieren der Variation und Anerkennung der linguistischen Identitat zu uiben, so daB man darauf die notwendige und wiinschenswerte Erweiterung der linguistischen F'hig- keit aufbauen kann anstatt sie zu entwerten. Die Relevanz des kommunikativen Ansatzes zum Unterrichten einer Sprache wird kurz behandelt.

Resume - II existe des cas ou une "haute" forme d'une langue est enseignee et utilisee dans des situations formelles, mais la differentiation est causee egalement par la geographie, l'ethnicite et la classe socioeconomique. Certaines variantes sont considerees inferieures, d'une capacite expressive limitee, et sont desavan- tageuses. L'article suggere qu'il est possible de tracer l'identite linguistique de chacun dans deux dimensions: le nombre de langues parlees, et les variantes de chaque langue reliees a des situations specifiques. En plus, on raisonne que la distance entre une variante "basse" d'une langue et la "haute" forme standard peut

International Review of Education - Internationale Zeitschrift fiir Erziehungswissenschaft - Revue Internationale de Pedagogie 37(1): 133-147, 1991. 0 1991 Unesco Institute for Education and KluwerAcademic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.



134

presenter a l'apprenant, ayant la forme "basse" d'une langue maternelle standardi- s6e, une barriere aussi grande que celle qui se dresse devant celui qui parle la variante haute et qui apprend une langue 6trangere apparentee. On propose donc qu'une tolerance plus large soit exercee en acceptant la variation et en reconnais- sant l'identite linguistique, afin que cette derniere serve de fondation pour l'l6ar- gissement necessaire et souhaitable des competences linguistiques, plutot que d'etre devalorisee. La relevance de l'approche communicative a I'enseignement des langues est mentionnee.

Learners in all educational institutions have previous language experience: as soon as a baby hears its first words, it is unconsciously making its own

language map, and no two maps are entirely identical. Speakers of what is known as the same language grow up using different variants of it, but while the existence of geographical and some ethnic variants may be

generally recognized, awareness of the crucial importance of sociolects, and certainly tolerance of them, is not as widespread in educational establishments. In extreme cases, a "high" version of the language, quite unlike the vernacular of even higher socio-economic classes, is taught for formal, written educational use. Where this is not the case, the school sociolect may appear to children of lower SECs to be equally "high" and unrelated to their reality.

Variants of Language

It is customary to think of a language as having various dialects. Works such as the Dictionary of American Regional English (Cassidy 1985) or the Atlas Linguistique de l'Afrique Centrale (Dieu 1983) record dialect words peculiar to certain districts, and chart the lines (isoglosses) between

languages and dialects. However, there are other "lects" which may be overlooked in language planning. There are well-documented cases of diglossia, where a prestigious (high) form of a language used for formal purposes co-exists with a situationally inferior (low) form used for mun- dane interchange, for example where "the difference between the collo- quial vernacular which the child will hear and speak before entering school and the classical Arabic which is there taught to him ... extends to phonology, vocabulary and grammar" (Malhas 1972: 191; compare, for example, the situation of Tamil: Sugathapala de Silva 1975: 18).

Even where there is no diglossia, there will be dialectal and sociolectal variation. A recent study in Germany (Kallmeyer 1989) shows that speakers of German are themselves very conscious of the linguistic differences within the one language between their own "sociolect" and



135

those of people they regard as superior or inferior: the distinctions were made plain when lower-class speakers were quoting and thereby imitating the speech of persons they held to be of higher or lower social status.

Differentiation is also caused by geographical location and ethnicity. For example,

the uniformity of the structural base of the Philadelphia dialect... is used only by the white population. The 38% of the Philadelphia population that is black does not share in the underlying system of categories and does not participate in the ongoing changes. (Labov 1987:140)

To sociolect and dialect we can thus add "ethnolect". In the American context, distinctions can be drawn not only between black and white speech, but also within the white English-speaking population:

a very common type of English used in Buffalo are varieties of ethnic dialects, which we call "ethnolects" (cf. Wolck 1983). They are used by third or later generation descendants of the three major continental European immigrant groups, i.e., by German, Polish and Italian Americans who have "lost" their ancestral language but retain in their (monolingual) English traces that are diagnostic of their family's linguistic heritage. (Wolck 1989: 23)

It is therefore possible to view oneself as ethnically or culturally Polish or Italian, etc., while speaking English.

Disadvantaged Variants

Academic disadvantage frequently attaches to socioeconomic variants, and in particular to lower class speech which deviates from received pronunciation and grammatical rules. Goffinet and Van Damme (1990), for instance, report in a study of functional illiteracy in Belgium that adults who had dropped out from school claim they did so because the teachers made fun of their lower-class accents.

Speakers of geographically distinct dialects may also be at a disadvantage in the educational context. Gadler (1989) refers to research by Maierhofer in which interviews conducted in a regional non-standard variant of German elicited lively responses from adolescent pupils, while those conducted in standard "high" German produced monosyllabic replies or silence. In the same volume Harris (1989) gives examples of school pupils speaking Irish English giving "wrong" answers to questions posed in standard English because of a difference in the conventional use of tenses. In Irish usage, the influence of the structure of the Gaelic language is strongly felt in English, even though Gaelic itself may be unknown to the speaker.



136

The perceived social status of geographical dialects and socially deter- mined sociolects varies. In urban societies a rural variant is often regarded by speakers of the received standard with an amused tolerance which they do not accord to an urban variant. Despite such bucolic romanticism, the gap in communication may be just as great.

Mapping Linguistic Identity

It can thus be seen that a person's mother tongue or preferred language of customary use (and the two concepts are not interchangeable) does not embrace all variants of a given language, and may be limited to a sociolect, dialect or ethnolect which is considered inferior to the standard of "educated" speech. It is also apparent, from the frequency of the use of a language other than the learners' mother tongue as the medium of instruction in education, that some form of bilingualism is common. As migration increases and monocultural nation-states become obsolete, cultural identity becomes more complex, less tied to a geographical location, more individlalized, and less static.

That bilingualism is not an absolute term has long been recognized (Mackey 1970; Paulston 1978). Nor is it possible to determine a point at which a dialect should be considered a separate language, but it is expedient to distinguish between whole languages on the one hand, and subsystems on the other, notably sociolects and the various registers of language used in particular situations, identified by the degree of formality and the presence of transaction-specific cant or jargon. Fluency in the range of sociolects and registers varies greatly between speakers and writers of the same language, according to familiarity with the relevant situations, level of education, breadth of reading, etc.

We can therefore suggest that each person, teacher and pupil, road mender and high court judge, inhabits a linguistic space which has two dimensions. This is indicated in Fig. 1, where the horizontal plane represents fluency in sociolects, ergolects (professional jargon) and registers of language appropriate to and derived from a range of situations, while the vertical represents the simpler measure of number of languages known in oral and/or written forms. The "home base" of each speaker is situated at the point of intersection, and competence extends in both dimensions in a fluid manner throughout life. If one were to shade the horizontal squares on the "linguistic map" of the figure, the resulting pattern would be different for each language on the vertical scale. In certain circumstances a speaker is able to communicate satisfactorily and with confidence in one language, while in other situations he or she may be obliged to use



137

I I I I I

A

Languages

Situation-specific codes and registers

4-^ ~ -^-< faml]

Fig. 1. Proposed model for a linguistic map.

another, may indeed be able to choose between two or more, or may fail in all.

Sociocultural and political conditions limit the number of situations in which a language - even a language used elsewhere in all possible contexts - can in fact be used. A study of German-speaking minorities in 27 countries, for example, shows the importance of churches, local newspapers and social gatherings for the maintenance of the language among emigrant communities living in countries which demand quite different languages for communication with public authorities and for schooling (Born and Dickgiesser 1989).

Codes

There is a view that any language or variant of a language, whether dialect, sociolect, ethnolect, ergolect, chthonolect (mother tongue), demolect



138

(community language), politolect (official language), or indeed any other sublect or register, should be termed a "code". It is convenient to use this neutral term to indicate that the use of two and more variants of language is not restricted to bilinguals and even occurs within one language. The derived term code-switching makes plain that we do switch from one register to another in everyday life (high, low, working jargon, etc.) according to the social context. If we are literate, we also switch between written and spoken codes. In terms of Fig. 1, each square for each language is therefore arguably its own code; some will be primarily or exclusively oral, others exclusively written. Written standard languages do not orthographically accommodate all geographical, ethnic or social variants. Transcription can be used for the texts of theatrical performances, for example, using approximate spellings to represent non-standard pronunciation, but it is not just considered inappropriate to write academic texts in every dialect of a language: it is also practically impossible.

Bernstein (1971) distinguishes between restricted and elaborated codes. Whether this perception can be accepted depends on how the language is divided up. If, say, a "high" standard language is held to include many situation-related registers and subject-specific jargons, then it is clearly further elaborated than a "lower" variant which uses simple rather than compound sentences and a lexis limited to informal everyday contacts within a narrow socio-economic band. All living codes are in a state of continual change and elaboration, and even those which are restricted in their actual use can potentially be elaborated very swiftly by the incorporation of related variants or vocabulary borrowed from languages conventionally used in other situations. One can nonetheless agree that at any given time and place, some codes are used in a wider range of contexts than others, and that they differ in their lexical and grammatical range of expression. This applies both between languages, and between variants within a language.

The Distance between Languages and Language Variants

The distance between any two distinct languages generally renders them mutually incomprehensible, but within branches of language families this may not be the case, and speakers of different languages may well be able to communicate without formally learning the other tongue, say between Xhosa and Zulu, or between Spanish and Portuguese. In the written form, related languages are even more accessible. There is no set of rules for determining when a dialect should be considered a separate language, and this is in effect a political decision generally associated with the



139

autonomy of the speakers. Consequently, in some places adjacent languages are as mutually intelligible as adjacent dialects in others. Pattanayak (1973: vii) suggests that it is possible to draw a line across India, and to discover that each dialect spoken along the line is intelligible to its neighbours, while intelligibility between one end of the line and the other is nil. Although one may not subscribe to the view that there can be no language contact without conflict, a proposition treated in the Plurilingua series edited by Nelde (1983-date), it is clear that the propinquity of speakers of languages and variants other than one's own affects every person's linguistic map without any intervention by formal or non-formal educational institutions.

It is therefore possible to suggest that the distance between a variant of a language and the standard, received form of that language, can be as great a barrier to communication and to educational advance as is the distance between one language and another. We may argue that a child speaking a rural or lower-class urban "restricted" sociolect faces a greater difficulty by being expected to function on entry into school in a version of his language which uses unfamiliar grammar, vocabulary and syntax, than does the child from a background where the "high" form is spoken and read, when he learns the familiar grammar and syntax, but unfamiliar vocabulary of a related foreign language. Strength is lent to the hypothesis by the findings of a Canadian study that:

the cultural or national origin of the parents was far less important than their social class in explaining their differences in values. Thus, the rules governing the education of children of middle-class Portuguese parents were more similar to those for parents of the same social background from Greece, France, the United States, etc., than they were for Portuguese parents of the working class. (Lambert 1985: 93 - original French)

Figure 2 sets out the question schematically. As already indicated, the precise delimitation of sublects is usually unclear. Their number, and their distance both from each other, from variants of other standards, and from their own notional standard language, will vary. Nonetheless, it may reasonably be speculated that the child is worst off who speaks a "low" variant but is expected to learn a "high" second or foreign language. Corson points to research which indicates that:

the ability that most children have to pick up everyday uses of a language quickly and easily can be misleading when making judgments about their language proficiency.... Bilingual minority children ... may still have serious problems when they have to carry out the more academic classroom tasks. (Corson 1990:172)



140

h ___ Hi .gh - - -- I - - / tandard

(ethnolso I irlcf ( ( I) \ elan??g?)

language languag s 1 2

Fig. 2. Example of distances between languages and language variants.

The Implications of Code Variation

If we accept that a language is not an indivisible entity, that bilingualism and multilingualism are becoming increasingly common, and that linguistic diversity should be recognized in planning educational activities, then there are implications for decisions on the role to be accorded to each language and sublect (status planning), for attempts to change the vocabulary and structures of languages (corpus planning), and for the teaching of mother tongues, second and foreign languages.

Status Planning

Political decisions are taken in all countries on the use of languages for governmental purposes, and on the recognition or toleration of other

languages at national, regional or local level for other purposes, including education. Well-known models have been adopted to meet situations of multilingualism within a state. A trilingual policy may be adopted: mother tongue, regional language, and national/official language, which may be a residual colonial language (now sometimes replaced by English). In countries with no immediate colonial background, the use of English, in particular, may be necessary in scientific and commercial fields, and it may arguably be taught as a second rather than as a foreign language. That is to say, the classroom may not be the only source of the language, with consequent effects on the methodology that can be used. Where the decision is taken to permit instruction through a medium other than the national or official language, the mother tongue may be used for economi- cally viable or vociferous groups up to a certain grade, or throughout the

system, while the amount of coverage given to a second language will vary. What is of equal importance to these high-level decisions, and is

perhaps even more important for those affected, is the status accorded to



141

the variants discussed above. However, whatever decisions on the acceptability of variants are taken at a high level, they are also taken in the classroom and the surrounding society, where teachers, examiners and employers cannot help expressing preference, knowingly or not, for certain forms of a given language, usually closest to their own usage.

Certain squares of language use in the horizontal plane of Fig. 1 have often been blocked off for some members of a society by their perceived or real lack of access to the respective social or employment positions on account of racial prejudice, in which the lack of acceptability of a particular ethnolect plays a major role, as well as on grounds of socioeconomic class. The levels of social and linguistic status, and of literacy and educational achievement form a vicious circle:

the problems experienced by the minorities in acquiring literacy and in academic performance generally are a function of their adaptation to the limited opportunity historically open to them for jobs and other positions in adult life requiring literacy, and where literacy pays off. (Ogbu 1987:151)

There is no easy pedagogical way out of this deadlock, as the answer is also sociopolitical. A helpful approach may be to extend toleration, and a status of acceptability, to a wider range of sublects than has been the case to date. This is not to say that educators should rest content with forms of expression limited in their precision and range by a restricted code, but that each code should be recognized as one of a set of variants which cannot be abolished, ignored or wished away. It has therefore to serve as the starting point for the acquisition of related variants and other languages, and is not "abnormal" or "wrong" in its home context.

Corpus Planning

Decisions on the use of languages for specific purposes, including government administration, legal proceedings, political debate, journalism or the teaching of natural science, are inextricably related to the ability to express the relevant content in the languages under consideration, both orally and in writing. Major investment may therefore be needed to provide a language hitherto used for other cultural purposes with the vocabulary, and the writing system, of planned new roles. In questions of standardiza- tion, the width of the tolerated band of variation is of crucial importance. It is no coincidence that "tolerance" is an engineering term highly relevant to what we may call "language engineering".

Whether efforts at linguistic recovery, reconstruction and expansion will succeed depends not only on their being written down and acquiring new lexis, but also on the usefulness which their speakers perceive them to have. New studies of language loss are being made, which indicate that



142

preservation cannot be guaranteed (Dorian 1987; Weltens et al. 1987). It may also be that alien vocabulary and morphology will be imported into the vernacular, while government lexicographers prefer locally invented terms drawn from the roots of the local language, resulting in another form of diglossia and the widening of the gap between the language of official documents and that of the majority of their readers.

A wider tolerance with regard to the acceptance of alien loan words and dialectal variance may shorten the process, reduce investment needs, expand the vocabulary and accommodate the inevitable. (It should not be forgotten in this context that users of English plundered Latin, Greek and other, non-European languages in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to meet the needs for new scientific and trading concepts.)

Language Teaching

In language policy-making, individuals' competence is seldom regarded: what is thought of is the group identified by language, culture or ethnicity, and the needs of the group or the state for acquisition of second and foreign languages.

Teachers are not provided with linguistic maps of students' knowledge, or of their own, but nonetheless have to function with a class of individual students, and should therefore ideally start from where the learners are, rather than from somewhere different in the hope that their students will catch up before they have gone too far. This applies both to the teaching of a language, and to teaching of other subject matter through the medium of a given language.

Mother Tongue: the Learners'Home Base We may imagine learners, individually or in groups, to be familiar with certain streets of a city (their linguistic home base). In order to introduce them to the remainder of the city, the teacher has to go into those streets to guide them, rather than standing in the main square and shouting. Some learners will hear the voice and be curious, while some will ignore it because it is undecipherable. Of the former, some will find the way to the starting point in the square, while others will become confused, discouraged and lost.

To pursue the image further, it is difficult for a teacher to be in two places at once, as when learners start from streets wide apart: this is the case in multilingual, multicultural, and indeed "multisocial" classes. The best that can then be achieved is the sympathetic use of a standardized language by the teacher, the broadcasting of educational messages in the languages and sociolects of the streets by the media and "street workers", and the toleration of variants in educational environments, in order to



143

allow all learners to express themselves until they have enlarged their linguistic maps to include the ability to use the agreed standard language in the appropriate contexts. Even if the generally advocated policy of teaching at least initial literacy and basic education through the medium of the mother tongue is followed, this cannot be successful unless the learner's variant of the mother tongue is accepted as a means of inter- nalizing and recalling what has been learnt.

Although we have been likening the landscape of a language to that of a city in a figurative sense, it is clear that there is frequently some literal truth in the image. Teachers do travel across cities, from middle-class housing to working-class neighbourhoods, and do teach speakers of quite different languages and dialects. Somehow they need to communicate, in other words to develop their own language policy which takes account of the linguistic identity of the learners, and recognizes their own identity too.

If we accept that the distance between "high" and "low" variants can be as great as that between two distinct languages, it begins to appear necessary to teach the standard form of a language almost as a second or foreign language. This is to acknowledge, and even to stress, the distinctions between the variants rather than to pretend that they are essentially the same.

Second and Foreign Language Teaching The model of a linguistic map proposed in Fig. 1 is not only derived from a simplified view of sociolinguistics, but also owes much to the concept of communicative foreign language teaching adumbrated in the publications arising out of Council of Europe research. It used to be thought that a language should be taught by reference to its grammar, through a series of encoding and decoding exercises. The revolutionary work of Van Ek (1978), Wilkins (1976, 1985) and their associates divides language into quite different categories. It no longer prescribes what is correct, but examines the application of language for functional purposes. Typically, a syllabus is no longer expressed only in parts of speech, tenses, etc., but in functions, and topics or situations:

Simple More advanced

Greeting someone Telephoning Taking leave Making compliments Expressing thanks Giving evasive answers Apologising Employment interview Asking for something Conversation: politics etc. etc.



144

There are problems in this approach. Not only has the teacher to take into account the likely situations in which varied learners will apply the language being taught, but also to present the grammatical structures in some kind of order which allows for reinforcement, internalization and transferability of a coherent body of competences. On the other hand, a communicative approach recognizes that grammar is not immutable, that a language is what its users make it, and that it is a tool for the expression of its content rather than an abstract set of rules learnt for their own sake.

Even though the new linguistics of foreign language teaching has been acclaimed in Europe, achievement lags behind what might be expected. This may be on account of inadequate training (Freudenstein 1987), but it is also attributable to the conservatism of language teachers (Byram 1989) and the pull of examination syllabuses.

There is arguably also a sociocultural factor, as indicated above under "Disadvantaged Variants". Whereas languages were taught, and in many places still are taught, by the grammatical method using situational exemplars from middle-class life which were familiar to the teacher but a barrier to many learners, what has supplanted this is the teaching and testing of a selection of simple exchanges thought to represent the realistic use of language by a larger number of the population. However, this can result in another untypical and restricted set of items:

All our efforts to create classroom conditions conducive to foreign or inter- cultural communication seem to be doomed from the start: there is simply no plausible reason for anybody to take part in such fabricated and make-believe language interactions. Foreign language teaching can thus be seen to prevent any true access to life and the world around. Pupils may even be hindered in their personal involvement and expression, in their fantasy and creativity. (Buttjes 1990: 54)

It may be that the problem of relevance is particular to the learning of

foreign languages and "high" formal dialects, as there are many linguistic stimuli other than the school classroom for those learning to expand their

competence in their mother tongue, and usually for those learning a second language.

In addition to the communicative approach, there has also been a move to meet the needs of learners, particularly in multilingual environments, by teaching about language as a phenomenon, rather than plunging straight into the acquisition of any one language. (cf. Pomphrey 1986; Sutton

1989). This teaching of "language awareness" holds some hope of using the multiple home bases of learners as starting points, and may be

particularly valuable when it is impossible to use the teaching of a mother



145

tongue for the same purpose of language exploration in a homogeneous, monolingual, monosocial class.

Conclusion: The Enlarging of Linguistic Identity

The foregoing summary of aspects of linguistic identity indicate that the adoption of a policy on mother tongues, second and foreign languages leads to many other contingent decisions. A main consideration is what variants of a language should be taught, used, tolerated or encouraged. This depends in part on the roles allocated to the language: is it to be used for administration in the interests of national unity, as a regional or local vernacular, as a co-equal with an official language in certain public domains, for scientific research, in cultural performances, or as a purely foreign language with no application within the state? If the last, what uses will realistically be made of it by learners, and is it being taught as a way. of conveying cultural information about the speakers of the language, or as a method of giving insight into the phenomenon of language?

It is not possible to teach all of a language, either as mother tongue, second or foreign language. No native speaker can truly claim to be totally fluent, as there will always be professional jargons, slangs, and references which call, if one is honest, for the use of a dictionary. The most that can be hoped for in any language policy is therefore that learners, and incidentally teachers, will be helped to move about the chess board of their linguistic map (see Fig. 1) to the most necessary squares in each relevant language.

The methods chosen for the expansion of learners' linguistic maps must therefore vary, using communicative approaches as well as explication of grammar and language awareness, but the implementation of language policy needs to recognize the existence of individual linguistic identity as well as that of the group. The enlarging of linguistic identity is a part of general education and is very closely related to success in basic and continuing education. Despite all the research in sociolinguistics and language teaching methodology, it is still true, as Paulston said in the last Special Issue of the International Review of Education devoted to language policy in 1978, that "elitist education has never been a problem, and upper and middle class children do perfectly well whether they are schooled in the mother tongue or in the L2 [second language] although we don't really know why" (p. 311). Perhaps it is because they do not have to overcome the double obstacle of climbing from a low to a high linguistic code, as well as crossing the bridge to a different language.



146

References

Bernstein, B. 1971. Class, Codes and Control: Theoretical Studies towards a Sociology of Language. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Born, J. and Dickgiesser, S. 1989. Deutschsprachige Minderheiten. Ein Oberblick iiber den Stand der Forschung fiir 27 Lander. Mannheim: Institut fiir deutsche Sprache.

Buttjes, D. 1990. Teaching Foreign Language and Culture: Social Impact and Political Significance. Language Learning Journal (September 1990): 53-57.

Byram, M. 1989. Politics and Language Teaching. Curriculum 10: 45-50.

Cassidy, F. G., ed. 1985. Dictionary of American Regional English. Vol. 1 (A-C.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Corson, D.: 1990. Language Policy across the Curriculum. Clevedon (UK): Multilingual Matters.

Dieu, M., Renaud, P., Tadadjen, M. and Breton, R 1983. Altas Linguistique de lAfrique Centrale (ALA C): Structures et Methodes. Paris: ACCT/CERDOTOLA.

Dorian, N. C. 1987. Investigating Obsolescence: Studies in Language Contraction and Death. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Freudenstein, R. 1987. General Survey of Aspects of Foreign Language Teacher Training. Paris: Unesco, ref. ED-87/WS/13.

Gadler, H. 1989. Osterreich. Soziolinguistica 3: 85-95.

Goffinet, S. and Van Damme, D. 1990. Functional Illiteracy in Belgium. Hamburg: Unesco Institute for Education.

Harris, J. 1989. Ireland. Soziolinguistica 3: 54-60.

Kallmeyer, W. 1989. Wir und die anderen. Sprachliche Symbolisierung sozialer Identitit und soziale Segmentierung. In: Nelde, P. H. ed., Plurilingua VII: Urban Language Conflict (31-46). Bonn: Diimmler.

Labov, W. 1987. The Community as Educator. In: Langer, J. ed., Language, Literacy and Culture: Issues of Society and Schooling (128-146). Norwood NJ: Ablex.

Lambert, W. E. 1985. Le role du langage dans la formation de l'identite et les relations intergroupes. In: APLV, Colloque de Cerisy: Le citoyen de demain et les langues (92-101). Paris: APLV.

Mackey, W. F. 1970. The Description of Bilingualism. In: Fishman, J. ed., Readings in the Sociology of Language (554-571). The Hague: Mouton.

Malhas, A. F. 1972. Jordan. In: Opitz. K. ed., Mother Tongue Practice in the Schools (181-198). Hamburg: Unesco Institute for Education.

Nelde, P. H., ed. 1983-1989. Plurilingua. Bonn: Diimmler and Brussels: Research Centre on Multilingualism.

Ogbu, J. 0. 1987. Opportunity Structure, Cultural Boundaries, and Literacy. In: Langer, J., ed., Language Literacy and Culture: Issues of Society and Schooling (149-177). Norwood NJ: Ablex.



147

Pattanayak, D. P. 1973. Distribution of Languages in India in States and Union Territories. Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages. Paulston, C. B. 1978. Education in a Bi/Multicultural Setting. International Review of Education 24(3): 309-328.

Pomphrey, C. 1986. Language Awareness at Hampstead. ILEA Languages Centre Bulletin (London). Autumn 1986: 17-21.

Sugathapala de Silva, M. W. 1976. Diglossia and Literacy. Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages. Sutton, P. 1989. Language Awareness for Adults. Adult Education (UK) 61(4): 319-322.

Van Ek, J. 1978. The Threshold Level for Modern Language Learning in Schools. London: Longman.

Weltens, B., de Bot, K. and van Els, T. eds., Language Attrition in Progress. Dordrecht: Foris.

Wikins, D. A. 1976. Notional Syllabuses. Oxford: Oxford University Press. -- . 1985. Linguistics in Language Teaching. London: Edward Arnold.

Wolck, W. 1989. The Linguistic Resolution of Urban Ethnic Conflict. In: Nelde, P. H., ed., Plurilingua VII: Urban Language Conflict (21-29). Bonn: Diimmler.

- . 1983. The Role of Language in Defining Ethnic Minorities. In: Nelde, P. H., ed., Plurilingua I: Current Trends in Contact Linguistics (189-202). Bonn: Diimmler.



Language Policy and Education || Educational Language Planning and Linguistic Identity

Documents

Transcript of Language Policy and Education || Educational Language Planning and Linguistic Identity