Linguistic territoriality under stress (original) (raw)
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The Management of Linguistic Diversity through Territorial and Non-Territorial Autonomy
The principle of nationalism by which the political and the national is to be congruent can have a significant influence on the making of autonomy regimes. Likewise, the devolution of competences over language and education allows for the shaping of identities within such autonomy regimes. The result is an imperfect circular relation in which language, society and political institutions mutually and continuously shape each other: linguistic diversity influences the design of autonomy arrangements and vice-versa. Territorial and non-territorial autonomy have, however, different consequences. In this article the author reviews through a comparative approach how matters of linguistic diversity – including minority language education and language standardisation – are managed differently through the various forms of territorial (legislative and administrative) and non-territorial autonomy (national cultural autonomy and functional autonomy). To do so, the author draws on concrete examples involving minority languages in Spain (territorial legislative autonomy) and in Serbia (national cultural autonomy). Furthermore, the potential consequences of territorial and non-territorial models will be explored by imagining two counterfactual scenarios: a non-territorial arrangement in Catalonia and a territorial one in Serbia.
Territoriality and Minority Language Rights
International Journal on Minority and Group Rights, 2016
Territorial principle emerges not only in domestic legislations on language rights, but also in international documents. The article aims at offering an overview of the interpretations of territoriality in international documents relevant for minority language rights, with a special focus on the European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages and the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. While states often use territorial requirements as a tool of political control over minority language use, the interpretation of their obligations under the two Council of Europe treaties would require a more practical and technical approach to territorial limitations.
Words in Space and Time: A Historical Atlas of Language Politics in Modern Central Europe, 2021
Linguistic Areas (Sprachbünde) in Central Europe, c 1930 pp. 100-102. 2021. Kamusella, Tomasz. Words in Space and Time: A Historical Atlas of Language Politics in Modern Central Europe. 1 ed. Central European University Press, 2021. https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/234/oa\_edited\_volume/chapter/3024969 The “genetic” (Stammbaum-style) classification of languages (Einzelsprachen) has been preferred by scholars and nationalists alike since the mid-nineteenth century because it allows for the allocation of distinctive languages to ethnolinguistically defined nations (groups of people). Einzelsprachen are imagined as self-contained entities, completely separate from one another. This radical discontinuity, at the conceptual level, can be easily translated into territorial discontinuity, or into a state frontier. In a quantum leap of ideologized thinking about the linguistic, the non-territorial character of a language is territorialized into the boundaries of an ethnolinguistic nation-state, in accordance with ethnolinguistic nationalism’s principle of the normative isomorphism of language, nation, and state: Language = Nation = State. The modern-style statehood underpinned with the norm of (Westphalian) sovereignty does not allow for overlapping territories or jurisdictions in the case of nation-states recognized as independent and sovereign (“normal”). Hence, multilingualism and polyglossia are seen as an “aberration” from the perspective of ethnolinguistic nationalism, since these phenomena are a form of social and spatial overlapping of languages, which blurs any sharp divisions among them.
Zeitschrift für Slawistik, 67(4), 501–510, 2022
The essays in this thematic issue explore an important but often overlooked legacy of European multilingualism and the various power asymmetries and ideological values that characterize it, namely the multilingual practices of ethno-linguistic groups on Europe's southeastern periphery. Although the European Union has in the past twenty years adopted legislation that explicitly celebrates and supports multilingualism, linguistic diversity and minority language rights, its language policy has received criticism for tending to rely on and embolden national standardizing language regimes. Indeed, the European focus on the protection of language diversity and language rights appears to reaffirm a static model of language in that it relies upon "the idea of a European polity based on the cooperation of distinct nation states" and upon related codified languages which can be traced back to ideologies of Romantic authenticity and Enlightenment universality. Scholars of the EU's language and multilingualism policy found that the official discourses oscillate between highlighting traditional cultural values like diversity and the right to education in the speakers' first language on the one hand, and promoting economic values and ideologies on the other hand. Accordingly, the "ideal" European citizen is portrayed as a multilingual person whose linguistic repertoire comprises of at least one language intended "for business" (instrumental/universal value) and one language as mother tongue, used "for pleasure" (authenticity). As such, EU language policy does not facilitate newly emerging in-between or translingual modes and directions of communication. Moreover, it does not recognize multilingual individuals whose linguistic repertoire does not match the imagined polarising axis of authenticity and instrumentality. At the same time, scholars have pointed to the relevance of the Habsburg legacy for some of the issues that EU language policy is struggling with, not necessarily as a model to be emulated but in terms of past practices, experiences and legislative efforts with lessons for the present. By placing our emphasis on this imperial legacy in contemporary South-Eastern and Central Europe,1 we argue that it crucially influenced the demographic composition, language policy, ideologies and practices of the region. Moreover, at the time of the Habsburg Monarchy, the basis of a modern institutional and class order, education, public sphere, mass media networks and extensive (written) literary production in vernacular languages was established. In our opinion, the consequent state regimes – composite nation-states, communist states, other nation-states, and so on – need to be examined in terms of the continuities and discontinuities they established with the discursive order, values, and ideologies of the Habsburg imperial legacy, given that their policies were created through a continuous tacit and explicit dialogue with it. Briefly, the change of power relations in these (post-)imperial contact zones throughout history left a material, cultural and psychological legacy that must be taken into account when language use and ideology is discussed.
The article was scheduled for publication in Multilingua. It was, however, rejected by an anonymous reviewer who was not at all happy with it. This is the rejection note: Reviewer(s)' Comments to Author: Reviewer: 1 Comments to the Author "This article argues for the need for a more structured sociolinguistic comparison for regional and minority languages, by proposing that Western European Regional Languages should be treated as a distinct 'Areal Type' to facilitate large scale comparisons. While the article is well written, the content of the article has a number of major shortcomings, as detailed below: - Throughout the article, the author makes sweeping generalisations and oversimplifications of highly divergent contexts and histories across Western and Central Europe in order to justify his central argument, while also failing to include appropriate references to either contemporary or historical research to support these claims. For example, on p. 8 the author vastly oversimplifies over 1000 years of European linguistic, social and cultural history, suggesting a uniformity and homogeneity which does not reflect the hugely divergent role of Latin and the Roman Church across Western and Central Europe. Equally, the author's emphasis on the presence of the Roman Church and Medieval Latin as the predominant literary language in the Middle Ages as the defining event in history to explain the current sociolinguistic situation of all Western European State and Regional Languages, almost entirely neglects the hugely divergent histories and sociolinguistic contexts which developed in more recent centuries. To claim that 'all Regional Languages dealt with here have been exposed to the same political, cultural, religious, economic and technological developments that have surfaced over the past one thousand years' (p. 8, lines 38-40) is patently untrue, as highlighted by the list of languages the author places in this category on p. 9 (lines 19-22). This list illustrates how this categorisation fails to reflect or offer insight into the hugely varied sociolinguistic, cultural and political contexts in which these languages exist. The reference to 'possibly Sardinian', for example, highlights the challenges of applying clear cut boundaries and definitions in contexts where speakers have divergent views on the status of their respective variety. Equally, the official statuses of Catalan and Welsh, and significant linguistic nationalist movements connected to them, are dramatically distinct to the context and discourses surrounding Asturian and Aragonese, where the languages play a more ambiguous role in relation to speakers' sense of having a distinct national identity. Equally, in referring to the cases of what the author describes as 'ethnic languages' (pp. 4-5), the author treats speakers as a unified and homogenous category who all 'happily accept' diglossia and do not consider their varieties to be languages, when research in such contexts highlights significant variation in speakers' views and perspectives on their languages, illustrating how the broad categories the author proposes ignore the nuances and complexities of such cases. - There are a number of contradictory or inaccurate claims throughout the article. For example, on p.5 (line 51) the author describes ethnic languages as existing in 'a stable diglossic situation' which contradicts the claim on the previous page that in these contexts the state language is encroaching on all levels and they are not passed on to the next generation. On p. 12, in describing the 'phase of degeneration' of Regional Languages the author states that State Language took over the formal and written domains of the Regional Language, which is an inaccurate representation of the extent to which these languages were previously used as public written languages and which again diverged significantly across contexts. Equally, fragmentation into dialects is not necessarily a sign of decline but occurs even for established and standardised state languages. Lastly, on p.5 (lines 3-4) the reference to 'Valencian' as 'Catalan spoken by illiterate native speakers' is inappropriate. There are important debates surrounding whether Valencian is a variety of Catalan or a distinct language but this description is inaccurate and does not reflect the nuances and complexities of this debate. - The author's use of appropriate terminology requires further clarification throughout the article. For example, the use of the term 'Ethnic Languages' to refer to those varieties not considered languages by their speakers is confusing since the reference to 'ethnic' suggests speakers have a strong identitarian connection with the language while the author argues the precise opposite. Equally, the author argues that what he terms 'Regional Languages' are generally considered 'national languages' by their speakers, yet fails to fully explain why they believe 'regional language' is the more appropriate term. In this sense, the author should acknowledge the important distinctions between regionalist and nationalist linguistic movements, and address more clearly what they mean by terms such as 'linguistic nation'. Furthermore, on pp. 5-6, the author should clarify what they mean by 'obligatoriness' in relation to state and regional languages. The extent to which the state language is 'obligatory' inevitably varies between states (i.e. the extent to which migrants are 'required' to learn the state language), while in contexts such as Catalonia the so-called 'regional language' is the obligatory language of public education and is also a requirement for employment in many public positions. In this sense, obligatoriness is not as clear cut a category as the author implies and needs further clarification. - The article shows an extremely limited awareness of or reference to contemporary sociolinguistic debates and research on regional and minority languages across Europe. For example, throughout the author assumes 'standardisation' is an unquestioned and natural development for regional languages, neglecting the significant debates and disputes on this subject (see e.g. Gal, S. 2006. Contradictions of standard language in Europe: implications for the study of publics and practices. Social Anthropology. 14(2), 163-81). Equally, the reference to the effects of 'the global tendency of simplifying globalized communication' does not accurately portray the complex effects of globalisation in relation to contemporary language use, as is also reflected by the absence of references to the effects of migration on minority language use. The extent to which the author overlooks the complex multilingual realities (and histories) of contemporary states and regions is highlighted, for example, when the author claims all speakers of Regional Languages are bilingual while the rest of the state's citizens are all 'monolingual speakers of the State Language' (p. 6, line 56), thus entirely ignoring the existence of any other languages within the state with which both regional and state languages coexist and interact. In sum, the oversimplifications and lack of attention paid to the divergent sociolinguistic contexts in which Western European Regional Languages exist highlight precisely the limitations and risks of attempting to impose clearly drawn boundaries and definitions which intentionally overlook or obscure the complex realities in which such languages exist. By exaggerating the similarities between these cases, such categorisations provide no insight into why powerful linguistic nationalist movements developed in some regions and are largely absent in others. While in the Conclusion the author recognises differences in the social vitality and varying degrees of success at revitilisation, they fail to explain how their proposed framework may provide insight into such differences and consequently what the purpose of the identification of this 'Areal Type' may be. Equally, the author's attempts to reinforce ideas of 'Western' European exceptionalism, as well as the need to exclude 'non-autochthonous' varieties, illustrates how such categories serve primarily to exclude those languages and speakers who do not belong. The idea that the 'former Latin cultural province' is a 'natural framework' (p. 10) neglects the huge linguistic, social and cultural diversity within this region. While I agree terms such as 'minority language' and 'regional language' are very broadly applied and often loosely defined, the author's proposed categorisations are founded upon often inaccurate or oversimplified generalisations which offer little insight into contemporary societal multilingualism in Western and Central Europe."
eHumanista/IVITRA 15, 2019
The article contemplates the possibility of a structured sociolinguistic comparison between various language based regionalist movements in Europe. An integrated terminological model for the categorization of various configurations of societal multilingualism is proposed for this purpose. More concretely, we postulate a configurational type of interaction between WESS (Western European State Languages) on the one hand and WERL (Western European Regional Languages) on the other. WERLs have the following characteristics: 1. They are autochthonous, rather than languages of immigrant minorities. 2. They are strictly stateless, rather than out-groups of neighbouring states. 3. They are spoken within the area of influence of the Latin Church during the middle ages, where Latin was the lingua franca of educated people. 4. They have developed a written Standard variety and a certain degree of status planning for this variety.
Regional and immigrant minority languages in Europe
… : Diversity and change. Berlin: Mouton de …, 2007
Moreover, RM and IM languages in one EU nation-state may be official state languages in another nation-state. Examples of the former result from language border crossing in adjacent nation-states, such as Finnish in Sweden or Swedish in Finland. Examples of the latter result from processes of migration and minorization, in particular form Southern to Northern Europe, such as Portuguese, Spanish, Italian or Greek. It should also be kept in mind that many, if not most, IM languages in particular European nation-states originate from countries outside Europe. In particular the context of migration and minorization makes our proposed distinction between RM and IM languages ambiguous. We see, however, no better alternative.
Governing complex linguistic diversity in Barcelona, Luxembourg and Riga
Nations and Nationalism, 2020
Contemporary migration has entailed the emergence of new forms of multilingualism in many European cities. The article uses the concept of complex diversity to analyse this dynamic. The concept points at settings where historical forms of multilingualism and more recent patterns of linguistic heterogeneity interact in ways that lead to particularly rich cultural configurations. The authors assess how local authorities deal with multilingualism in three cities that represent ‘most complex’ cases of diversity politics: Barcelona, Luxembourg and Riga. The focus is on policies related to public communication and on the approaches adopted to promote social and political inclusion in ever more multilingual urban environments. In normative terms, the article concludes that political responses to complex diversity should aim both at overcoming linguistic status inequalities based on historical structures of domination and at creating common spaces of communication for diverse citizens.