Rethinking Language Policy

Description

The difficulty in the implementation of state language policy has been explained by its complexity and by the competition of language management at various levels and domains, starting with the individual and the family and including the workplace and religion. In recent studies of language policy in Portuguese and French colonies and successor states, I have learned that this earlier model omits the non-linguistic conditions (like wars, ethnic strife and cleansing, corruption and natural disasters) that lead to changes in language demography and repertoire or that interfere with the formation or implementation of language policies. Further, I have found it appropriate both to modify the analysis of language practices to take into account the fuzziness in definition of named languages and the need to deal with diverse multilingual repertoires. The expanded model permits a better understanding of complexity of language policy and management.