In
sociolinguistics, language planning (also known as language engineering) is a deliberate effort to influence the function, structure or
acquisition of
languages or
language varieties within a
speech community.
[Kaplan B., Robert, and Richard B. Baldauf Jr. ''Language Planning from Practice to Theory.'' Clevedon: Multilingual Matters ltd., 1997] Robert L. Cooper (1989) defines language planning as "the activity of preparing a normative
orthography
An orthography is a set of convention (norm), conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, punctuation, Word#Word boundaries, word boundaries, capitalization, hyphenation, and Emphasis (typography), emphasis.
Most national ...
,
grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...
, and
dictionary
A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged Alphabetical order, alphabetically (or by Semitic root, consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical-and-stroke sorting, radical an ...
for the guidance of writers and speakers in a non-homogeneous speech community" (p. 8). Along with
language ideology and language practices, language planning is part of
language policya typology drawn from Bernard Spolsky's theory of language policy. According to Spolsky, language management is a more precise term than language planning. Language management is defined as "the explicit and observable effort by someone or some group that has or claims authority over the participants in the domain to modify their practices or beliefs" (p. 4) Language planning is often associated with government planning, but is also used by a variety of
non-governmental organization
A non-governmental organization (NGO) is an independent, typically nonprofit organization that operates outside government control, though it may get a significant percentage of its funding from government or corporate sources. NGOs often focus ...
s such as
grass-roots organizations as well as individuals. Goals of such planning vary. Better communication through
assimilation of a single dominant language can bring economic benefits to minorities but is also perceived to facilitate their political domination.
[Cobarrubias, Juan. "Ethical Issues in Status Planning." ''Progress in Language Planning: International Perspectives''. Eds. Juan Cobarrubias and Joshua Fishman. New York: Mouton Publishers, 1983.] It involves the establishment of
language regulators, such as formal or informal agencies, committees, societies or academies to design or develop new structures to meet contemporary needs.
Language ideology
Four overarching language ideologies are proposed to explain motivations and decisions.
;Internationalization
:the adoption of a non-indigenous language as a means of wider communication, as an official language or in a particular domain, such as the use of English in
India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
, Singapore, the
Philippines
The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
,
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...
, and
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...
.
;Linguistic assimilation
:the belief that every member of a society, irrespective of their
native language
A first language (L1), native language, native tongue, or mother tongue is the first language a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period hypothesis, critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' ...
, should learn and use the dominant language of the society in which they live. An example is the
English-only movement of some residents of the
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
.
;Linguistic pluralism
:the recognition and support of many languages within one society. Examples include the coexistence of
French,
German,
Italian, and
Romansh in
Switzerland
Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
; and the shared official status of
English,
Malay,
Tamil, and
Mandarin Chinese
Mandarin ( ; zh, s=, t=, p=Guānhuà, l=Mandarin (bureaucrat), officials' speech) is the largest branch of the Sinitic languages. Mandarin varieties are spoken by 70 percent of all Chinese speakers over a large geographical area that stretch ...
in
Singapore
Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
. The coexistence of many languages may not necessarily arise from a conscious language ideology but rather the relative efficiency of communicating in a shared language.
;Vernacularization
:the
restoration and development of an indigenous language, along with its adoption by the state as an
official language
An official language is defined by the Cambridge English Dictionary as, "the language or one of the languages that is accepted by a country's government, is taught in schools, used in the courts of law, etc." Depending on the decree, establishmen ...
. Examples include
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...
in the state of
Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
,
Quechua in
Peru
Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...
and
Māori in
New Zealand
New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...
.
Goals
Eleven language planning goals have been recognized (Nahir 2003):
[Nahir, Moshe. "Language Planning Goals: A Classification." ''Sociolinguistics: The Essential Readings.'' Eds. Paulston, Christina Bratt and G. Richard Tucker. Oxford: Blackwell, 2003]
# Language purification –
prescription of usage norms in order to preserve the "
linguistic purity" of language, protect language from foreign influences, and guard against perceived language deviation from within
#
Language revival – the attempt to restore to common use a language which has few or no surviving native speakers
#
Language reform – deliberate change in specific aspects of language or extralinguistic elements, such as
grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...
and
orthography
An orthography is a set of convention (norm), conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, punctuation, Word#Word boundaries, word boundaries, capitalization, hyphenation, and Emphasis (typography), emphasis.
Most national ...
, in order to facilitate use
# Language standardization – the attempt to garner
prestige for a regional language or dialect, developing it as the chosen
standard language
A standard language (or standard variety, standard dialect, standardized dialect or simply standard) is any language variety that has undergone substantial codification in its grammar, lexicon, writing system, or other features and that stands ...
of a
region
In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as areas, zones, lands or territories, are portions of the Earth's surface that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and ...
# Language spread – the attempt to increase the number of speakers of a language
# Lexical modernization – word coining or adaptation
# Terminology unification – development of unified
terminologies, mainly in technical domains
# Stylistic simplification – simplification of language usage in
lexicon
A lexicon (plural: lexicons, rarely lexica) is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Greek word () ...
, grammar, and style. That includes changing the use of language in social and formal contexts.
# Interlingual communication – facilitation of linguistic communication between members of distinct speech communities
# Language maintenance – preservation of a group's native language as a first or
second language where pressures threaten or cause a decline in the status of the language
# Auxiliary-code standardization – standardization of marginal, auxiliary aspects of language, such as signs for the deaf, place names, or rules of
transliteration and
transcription
Types
Language planning has been divided into three types:
Status planning
Status planning is the allocation or reallocation of a language or dialect to functional domains within a society, thus affecting the status, or standing, of a language.
Language status
Language status is distinct from, though intertwined with, language prestige and language function. Language status is the given position (or standing) of a language against other languages.
[Edwards, John. "Language, Prestige, and Stigma," in ''Contact Linguistics''. Ed. Hans Goebel. New York: de Gruyter, 1996.] A language garners status according to the fulfillment of four attributes, described in 1968 by two different authors,
Heinz Kloss and
William Stewart. Both Kloss and Stewart stipulated four qualities of a language that determine its status. Their respective frameworks differ slightly, but they emphasize four common attributes:
# Language origin – whether a given language is indigenous or imported to the speech community
# Degree of standardization – the extent of development of a formal set of norms that define 'correct' usage
# Juridical status
## Sole official language (e.g. French in France and Turkish in Turkey)
## Joint official language (e.g. English and
Afrikaans
Afrikaans is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and also Argentina where there is a group in Sarmiento, Chubut, Sarmiento that speaks the Pat ...
in
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...
; French, German, Italian and Romansh in Switzerland)
## Regional official language (e.g.
Igbo in
Nigeria
Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean to the south. It covers an area of . With Demographics of Nigeria, ...
;
Marathi in
Maharashtra
Maharashtra () is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. It is bordered by the Arabian Sea to the west, the Indian states of Karnataka and Goa to the south, Telangana to th ...
, India)
## Promoted language – lacks official status on a national or regional level but is promoted and sometimes used by public authorities for specific functions (e.g.
Spanish in
New Mexico
New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...
;
West African Pidgin English in
Cameroon
Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...
)
## Tolerated language – neither promoted nor proscribed; acknowledged but ignored (e.g.
Native American languages in the
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
in the present day)
## Proscribed language – discouraged by official sanction or restriction (e.g.
Welsh in the UK in the past,
Breton,
Alsatian and others in France;
Elfdalian and
Gutnish in Sweden;
Galician,
Basque
Basque may refer to:
* Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France
* Basque language, their language
Places
* Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France
* Basque Country (autonomous co ...
and
Catalan during
Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco Bahamonde (born Francisco Paulino Hermenegildo Teódulo Franco Bahamonde; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975) was a Spanish general and dictator who led the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalist forces i ...
's regime in Spain;
Macedonian in
Greece
Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...
;
[Wardhaugh, Ronald. "Planning," in ''An Introduction to Sociolinguistics''. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2008] indigenous American languages during the
boarding school era[cit]
Jennifer Jones, Dee Ann Bosworth, Amy Lonetree, "American Indian Boarding Schools: An Exploration of Global Ethnic & Cultural Cleansing"
Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture & Lifeways, 2011, accessed 25 January 2014)
# Vitality – the ratio, or percent, of users of a language to another variable, such as the total population.
[ Kloss and Stewart both distinguish six classes of statistical distribution. However, they draw the line between classes at different percentages. According to Kloss, the highest level of vitality is demarcated by 90% or more speakers, followed by 70%, 40%, 20%, 3%, and less than 3%. According to Stewart, the six classes are determined by the following percentages of speakers: 75%, 50%, 25%, 10%, 5%, and less than 5%.
William Stewart outlines ten functional domains in language planning:][Stewart, William A. "Sociolinguistic Typology of Multilingualism," in ''Readings in the Sociology of Language''. Ed. Joshua Fishman. The Hague: Mouton Publishers, 1968.]
# Official – An official language "function as a legally appropriate language for all politically and culturally representative purposes on a nationwide basis." The official function of a language is often specified in a constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
.
# Provincial – A provincial language functions as an official language for a geographic area smaller than a nation, typically a province
A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...
or region
In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as areas, zones, lands or territories, are portions of the Earth's surface that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and ...
(e.g. French in Quebec
Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...
)[Cooper, Robert L. ''Language Planning and Social Change''. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989.]
# Wider communication – A language of wider communication (LWC) may be official or provincial, but more importantly, it functions as a medium of communication across language boundaries within a nation (e.g. Hindi
Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...
in India; Swahili language
Swahili, also known as as it is referred to endonym and exonym, in the Swahili language, is a Bantu languages, Bantu language originally spoken by the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya, and Mozambique (along the East Af ...
in East Africa
East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the Africa, African continent, distinguished by its unique geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the regi ...
)
# International – An international language functions as a medium of communication across national boundaries (e.g. English, formerly French as a diplomatic and international language)
# Capital – A capital language functions as a prominent language in and around a national capital (e.g. Dutch and French in Brussels
Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
)
# Group – A group language functions as a conventional language among the members of a single cultural or ethnic group
# Educational – An educational language functions as a medium of instruction in primary and secondary schools on a regional or national basis (Urdu
Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...
in West Pakistan and Bengali in East Pakistan)
# School subject – A school subject language is taught as a subject in secondary school or higher education
Tertiary education (higher education, or post-secondary education) is the educational level following the completion of secondary education.
The World Bank defines tertiary education as including universities, colleges, and vocational schools ...
(e.g. Classical languages)
# Literary – A literary language
Literary language is the Register (sociolinguistics), register of a language used when writing in a formal, academic writing, academic, or particularly polite tone; when speaking or writing in such a tone, it can also be known as formal language. ...
functions as a language for literary or scholarly purposes ( Academese)
# Religious – A religious language functions as a language for the ritual purposes of a particular religion (e.g. Liturgical Latin for the Latin Church
The Latin Church () is the largest autonomous () particular church within the Catholic Church, whose members constitute the vast majority of the 1.3 billion Catholics. The Latin Church is one of 24 Catholic particular churches and liturgical ...
within the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
; Arabic
Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
for the reading of the Qur'an
The Quran, also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation directly from God ('' Allāh''). It is organized in 114 chapters (, ) which consist of individual verses ('). Besides ...
)
Robert Cooper outlines two additional functional domains (mass media and work) and distinguishes three sub-types of official functions:
# A statutory language is a "de jure" official language
# A working language is used by a government for daily activities
# A symbolic language is used as a state symbol
A symbol is a mark, Sign (semiotics), sign, or word that indicates, signifies, or is understood as representing an idea, physical object, object, or wikt:relationship, relationship. Symbols allow people to go beyond what is known or seen by cr ...
Corpus planning
Corpus planning refers to the prescriptive intervention in the forms of a language, whereby planning decisions are made to engineer changes in the structure of the language.[Ferguson, Gibson. (2006). ''Language Planning and Education.'' Edinburgh University Press.] Corpus planning activities often arise as the result of beliefs about the adequacy of the form of a language to serve desired functions.[Hornberger, Nancy H. (2006). "Frameworks and Models in Language Policy and Planning", in Thomas Ricento, ''An Introduction to Language Policy'', Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 24–41.] Unlike status planning, which is mostly undertaken by administrators and politicians, corpus planning is generally the work of individuals with greater linguistic expertise. There are three traditionally recognized types of corpus planning: graphization, standardization, and modernization.
Graphization
Graphization refers to development, selection and modification of scripts and orthographic conventions for a language.[Liddicoat, Anthony J. (2005). "Corpus Planning: Syllabus and Materials Development," in Eli Hinkel, ''Handbook of Research in Second Language Teaching and Learning'', Routledge, pp. 993–1012.] The use of writing in a speech community can have lasting sociocultural effects, which include easier transmission of material through generations, communication with greater numbers of people, and a standard against which varieties of spoken language are often compared.[Ferguson, Charles A. (1968). "Language Development", in Charles A. Ferguson, Thom Huebner (1996), ''Sociolinguistic Perspectives: papers on language in society, 1959-1994'', Oxford University Press US, pp. 40–47.] Linguist Charles A. Ferguson
Charles Albert Ferguson (July 6, 1921 – September 2, 1998) was an American linguist who taught at Stanford University. He was one of the founders of sociolinguistics and is best known for his work on diglossia. The TOEFL test was created under ...
made two key observations about the results of adopting a writing system. First, the use of writing adds another form of the language to the community's repertory. Although written language is often viewed as secondary to spoken language, the vocabulary
A vocabulary (also known as a lexicon) is a set of words, typically the set in a language or the set known to an individual. The word ''vocabulary'' originated from the Latin , meaning "a word, name". It forms an essential component of languag ...
, grammatical structures and phonological structures of a language often adopt characteristics in the written form that are distinct from the spoken form. Second, the use of writing often leads to a folk belief that the written language is the 'real' language, and speech is a corruption of it. Written language is viewed as more conservative, while the spoken form is more susceptible to language change. Isolated relic areas of the spoken language may be less innovative than the written form, or the written language may have been based on a divergent variety of the spoken language.
In establishing a writing system for a language, corpus planners have the option of using an existing system or designing a new one. The Ainu of Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
chose to adopt the Japanese language
is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...
's katakana
is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji).
The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...
syllabary as the writing system for the Ainu language. Katakana is designed for a language with a basic CV syllable structure, but Ainu contains many CVC syllables which cannot easily be adapted to this syllabary. Therefore, Ainu uses a modified katakana system, in which syllable-final codas are consonants
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract, except for the h sound, which is pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Examples are and pronou ...
by a subscript version of a katakana symbol that begins with the desired consonant.
An example of an original script includes the development of the Armenian script
The Armenian alphabet (, or , ) or, more broadly, the Armenian script, is an alphabetic writing system developed for Armenian and occasionally used to write other languages. It is one of the three historical alphabets of the South Caucasu ...
in 405 AD by St. Mesrop Mashtots. Though the script was modeled after the Greek alphabet
The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and is the earliest known alphabetic script to systematically write vowels as wel ...
, it distinguished Armenian from the Greek and Syriac alphabet
The Syriac alphabet ( ) is a writing system primarily used to write the Syriac language since the 1st century. It is one of the Semitic languages, Semitic abjads descending from the Aramaic alphabet through the Palmyrene alphabet, and shares sim ...
s of the neighboring peoples. Likewise, in the early 19th century, Sequoyah (Cherokee) designed an orthography for Cherokee
The Cherokee (; , or ) people are one of the Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, they were concentrated in their homelands, in towns along river valleys of what is now southwestern ...
in the Southeast of the present-day United States. It uses some Latin characters but also introduces new ones.
Standardization
The process of standardization
Standardization (American English) or standardisation (British English) is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organiza ...
often involves one variety of a language taking precedence over other social and regional dialect
A dialect is a Variety (linguistics), variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standard language, standardized varieties as well as Vernacular language, vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardize ...
s of a language.[Christian, Donna (1988). "Language Planning: the view from linguistics", in Frederick J. Newmeyer, ''Language: the socio-cultural context'', Cambridge University Press, pp. 193–211.] Another approach, where dialects are mutually intelligible, is to introduce a poly-phonemic written form that is intended to represent all dialects of a language adequately but with no standard spoken form. If one dialect is chosen, it comes to be perceived as supra-dialectal and the 'best' form of the language.
Choosing the standard language has important social consequences, as it benefits the speakers whose spoken and written dialect conforms closest to the chosen standard.[Wiley, Terrance G. (2003). "Language Planning and Policy," in Sandra McKay, Nancy H. Horberger, ''Sociolinguistics and Language Teaching'', Cambridge University Press, pp. 103–147.] The chosen standard is generally spoken by the most powerful social group within society, and it is imposed upon other groups as the form to emulate, making the standard norm necessary for socioeconomic mobility. In practice, standardization generally entails increasing the uniformity of the norm, as well as the codification of the norm.
By contrast, English has become standardized without any planning. The process began when William Caxton introduced the printing press
A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a printing, print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in whi ...
in England
England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
in 1476. This was followed by the adoption of the south-east Midlands dialect, spoken in London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
, as the print language. Because of the dialect's use for administrative, government, business, and literary purposes, it became entrenched as the prestigious variety of English. After the development of grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...
s and dictionaries
A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged Alphabetical order, alphabetically (or by Semitic root, consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical-and-stroke sorting, radical an ...
in the 18th century, the rise of print capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit. This socioeconomic system has developed historically through several stages and is defined by ...
, industrialization
Industrialisation (British English, UK) American and British English spelling differences, or industrialization (American English, US) is the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an i ...
, urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
, and mass education led to the dissemination of this dialect as the cultural norm for the English language.
Modernization
Modernization occurs when a language needs to expand its resources to meet functions. Modernization often occurs when a language undergoes a shift in status, such as when a country
A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, state with limited recognition, constituent country, ...
gains independence
Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...
from a colonial power or when there is a change in the language education policy
Education policy consists of the principles and policy decisions that influence the field of education, as well as the collection of laws and rules that govern the operation of education systems. Education governance may be shared between the local ...
. The main force in modernization is the expansion of the lexicon
A lexicon (plural: lexicons, rarely lexica) is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Greek word () ...
, which allows the language to discuss topics in modern semantic domains. Language planners generally develop new lists and glossaries to describe new technical terms, but it is also necessary to ensure that the new terms are consistently used by the appropriate sectors within society. While some languages, such as Japanese and Hungarian, have experienced rapid lexical expansion to meet the demands of modernization, other languages, such as Hindi
Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...
and Arabic
Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
, have failed to do so. Such expansion is aided by the use of new terms in textbooks and professional publications. Issues of linguistic purism
Linguistic purism or linguistic protectionism is a concept with two common meanings: one with respect to foreign languages and the other with respect to the internal variants of a language (dialects).
The first meaning is the historical trend ...
often play a significant role in lexical expansion, but technical vocabulary can be effective within a language, regardless of whether it comes from the language's own process of word formation or from extensive borrowing from another language.[ While Hungarian has almost exclusively used language-internal processes to coin new words, Japanese has borrowed extensively from English to derive new words as part of its modernization.
]
Acquisition planning
Acquisition planning is a type of language planning in which a national, state or local government system aims to influence aspects of language, such as language status, distribution and literacy through education. Acquisition planning can also be used by non-governmental organizations, but it is more commonly associated with government planning.
Acquisition planning is often integrated into a broader language planning process in which the statuses of languages are evaluated, corpuses are revised and the changes are finally introduced to society on a national, state or local level through education systems, ranging from primary schools to universities. This process of change can entail an alteration in student textbook formatting, a change in methods of teaching an official language, or the development of a bilingual language program, only to name a few. For example, if a government chooses to raise the status level of a certain language or change its level of prestige, it can establish a law which requires teachers to teach only in this language or that textbooks are written using only this language's script. This, in turn, would support the elevation of the language's status or could increase its prestige. In this way, acquisition planning is often used to promote language revitalization, which can change a language's status or reverse a language shift, or to promote linguistic purism. In a case where a government revises a corpus, new dictionaries and educational materials will need to be revised in schools in order to maintain effective language acquisition.
The education sector
The education ministry or education sector of government is typically in charge of making national language acquisition
Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive and comprehend language. In other words, it is how human beings gain the ability to be aware of language, to understand it, and to produce and use words and s ...
choices based on state and local evaluation reports. The duties of education sectors vary by country; Robert B. Kaplan and Richard B. Baldauf describe the sectors' six principal goals:
# To choose the languages which should be taught within the curriculum
In education, a curriculum (; : curriculums or curricula ) is the totality of student experiences that occur in an educational process. The term often refers specifically to a planned sequence of instruction, or to a view of the student's experi ...
.
# To determine the amount and quality of teacher training
Teacher education or teacher training refers to programs, policies, procedures, and provision designed to equip (prospective) teachers with the knowledge, attitude (psychology), attitudes, behaviors, approaches, methodologies and skills they requir ...
.
# To involve local communities
A community is a Level of analysis, social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place (geography), place, set of Norm (social), norms, culture, religion, values, Convention (norm), customs, or Ide ...
.
# To determine what materials will be used and how they will be incorporated into syllabi.
# To establish a local and state assessment system to monitor progress.
# To determine financial cost
Cost is the value of money that has been used up to produce something or deliver a service, and hence is not available for use anymore. In business, the cost may be one of acquisition, in which case the amount of money expended to acquire it i ...
s.
Problems
Although acquisition planning can be useful to governments, there are problems which must be considered.[Thorburn, Thomas. "Cost-Benefit Analysis in Language Planning." ''Can Language Be Planned?'' Ed. Rubin, Joan, and Björn H. Jernudd. Hawaii: The University Press of Hawaii, 1971] Even with a solid evaluation and assessment system, the effects of planning methods can never be certain; governments must consider the effects on other aspects of state planning, such as economic and political planning. Some proposed acquisition changes could also be too drastic or instituted too suddenly without proper planning and organization. Acquisition planning can also be financially draining, so adequate planning and awareness of financial resources is essential. Therefore, it is important that government goals be organized and planned carefully.
Multilingualism
There is also growing concern over the treatment of multilingualism in education, especially in many countries which were once colonized. Choosing the language of instruction which would be most beneficial to effective communication on the local and state level requires thoughtful planning, and it is surrounded by debate. Some states prefer to teach only in the official language, but some aim to foster linguistic and thus social diversity by encouraging teaching in several (native) languages. The use of a single language of instruction supports national unity and homogeneity[Fishman, Joshua A. "The Impact of Nationalism on Language Planning," ''Can Language Be Planned?'' Ed. Rubin, Joan, and Björn H. Jernudd. Hawaii: The University Press of Hawaii, 1971] whereas the incorporation of different languages may help students to learn better by offering alternative perspectives.
Non-governmental organizations
In addition to the education sector, there are non-governmental sectors or organizations that have a significant effect on language acquisition, such as the of France or the Real Academia Española of Spain. These organizations often write their own dictionaries and grammar books, thus affecting the materials which students are exposed to in schools. Although these organizations do not hold official power, they influence government planning decisions, such as with educational materials, affecting acquisition.
Ireland
Before the partition of Ireland
Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...
, a movement began which aimed at the restoration of Irish, as the nation's primary language, based on a widespread sentiment for Irish nationalism and cultural identity.[Macnamara, John. "Successes and Failures in the Movement for the Restoration of Irish," ''Can Language Be Planned?'' Ed. Rubin, Joan, and Björn H. Jernudd. Hawaii: The University Press of Hawaii, 1971] During and after colonisation, Irish had competed with English and Scots; the movement to restore the language gained momentum after the Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence (), also known as the Anglo-Irish War, was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (1919–1922), Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and Unite ...
. The Gaelic League was founded to promote the acquisition of Irish in schools, thus "de-Anglicizing" Ireland. Immediately after The Irish Free State gained independence in 1922, the League declared that Irish must be the language of instruction for at least one hour in primary schools in the state. Irish-speaking teachers were recruited, and preparatory colleges were established to train new teachers.
The program implementation was mostly left to the individual schools, which did not consistently carry it out. Additionally, educating a generation is a long process, for which the League was not prepared. There was no consensus as to how the Irish language should be reinstituted; the League and schools did not develop a system assessment plan to monitor progress. Thus the movement lost strength, and the number of native Irish speakers has been in steady decline.[Mac Giolla Chriost, Diarmait. "Micro-level Language Planning in Ireland." ''Language Planning in Local Contexts'' Ed. Anthony J. Liddicoat and Richard B. Baldauf, Jr. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters Ltd., 2008]
Case study: Quechua in Peru
Status planning
Peru
Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...
's history of language planning begins in the 16th century with Spanish colonization
475px, Map of the year each country achieved List of sovereign states by date of formation, independence.
Colonization (British English: colonisation) is a process of establishing occupation of or control over foreign territories or peoples f ...
. When the Spanish first arrived in Peru, Quechua served as a language of wider communication, a lingua franca, between Spaniards and Peruvian natives. As the years passed, Spaniards asserted the superiority of the Spanish language; as a result, Spanish gained prestige, taking over as a language of wider communication and the dominant language of Peru.[Coronel-Molina, Serafin M. "Functional Domains of the Quechua Language in Peru: Issues of Status Planning." University of Pennsylvania] In 1975, under the leadership of President Juan Velasco Alvarado, the revolutionary government of Peru declared Quechua an official language of the Peruvian state, "coequal with Spanish."[Hornberger, Nancy and Kendell A. King. "Authenticity and Unification in Quechua Language Planning." University of Pennsylvania: 1998.] Four years later, the law was reversed. Peru's 1979 constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
declares Spanish the only official language of the state; Quechua and Aymara are relegated to "official use zones," equivalent to Stewart's provincial function described above. Quechua has officially remained a provincial language since 1979. Today, Quechua also serves a limited international function throughout South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...
in Argentina
Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...
, Bolivia
Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...
, Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
, Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...
, Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...
, and Ecuador
Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. It also includes the Galápagos Province which contain ...
; communities of Quechua speakers outside Peru enable communication in Quechua across borders. Still, because of Quechua's low status, Spanish is almost always used as the lingua franca instead. Recently, Quechua has also gained ground in the academic world, both as a school subject and a topic of literary interest.
Corpus planning
The three main types of corpus planning are all evident in the development of Quechua languages in Peru since the colonial era. Graphization has been in process since the arrival of the Spanish in the region, when the Spanish imperialists attempted to describe the exotic sounds of the language to Europeans.[Coronel-Molina, Serafin M. (1996). "Corpus Planning for the Southern Peruvian Quechua Language." ''Working Papers in Educational Linguistics,'' 12 (2), pp. 1–27.]
When Quechua was made an official language in Peru in 1975, the introduction of the language into the education and government domains made it essential to have a standard written language. The task of adopting a writing system proved to be a point of contention among Quechua linguists. Although most agreed to use the Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...
, linguists disagreed about how to represent the phonological system of Quechua, particularly in regards to the vowel system. Representatives from the Peruvian Academy of the Quechua language and the Summer Institute of Linguistics wanted to represent allophones of the vowel
A vowel is a speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract, forming the nucleus of a syllable. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness a ...
s /i/ and /u/ with separate letters and , which creates an apparent five-vowel system. They argued that this makes the language easier to learn for people who are already familiar with written Spanish. However, other Quechua linguists argued that a three-vowel system was more faithful to the phonology
Phonology (formerly also phonemics or phonematics: "phonemics ''n.'' 'obsolescent''1. Any procedure for identifying the phonemes of a language from a corpus of data. 2. (formerly also phonematics) A former synonym for phonology, often pre ...
of Quechua. After years of debate and disagreement, in 1985 Quechua linguists proposed the Pan-Quechua alphabet as an accurate representation of the language, and this was adopted in intercultural bilingual education programs and textbooks. However, the Peruvian Academy and the SIL both refused to adopt it and continued to propose new alphabets, leaving the issue unsettled. For more information, see Quechua writing system and Quechuan and Aymaran spelling shift. Another disagreement was about how to reflect the phonological differences apparent in different dialects of Quechua. For example, some distinct dialects utilize aspirated and glottalized versions of the voiceless uvular stop /q/, while others do not and some language planners found it important to reflect these dialectal differences.
The search for a unified alphabet reflects the process of standardization. Unlike other cases of standardization, in Quechua this has been applied only to the written language, not to the spoken language, and no attempt was made to change the spoken language of native speakers, which varied by regions. Rather, standardization was needed to produce a uniform writing system to provide education to Quechua speakers in their native language.
Language planners in Peru have proposed several varieties to serve as the supradialectal spoken norm. Some saw Qusqu-Qullaw as the natural choice for a standard since it is recognized as the form which is most similar to that spoken by the Incas. Others favor Ayacucho Quechua since it is more conservative, whereas Qusqu-Qullaw has been influenced by contact with the Aymara language.
Rodolfo Cerrón Palomino proposed a literary standard, Southern Quechua that combines features of both dialects. This norm has been accepted by many institutions in Peru.
Lexical modernization has also been critical to the development of Quechua. Language planners have attempted to coin new Quechua words by combining Quechua morphemes to give new meanings. Generally, loanwords are considered only when the words cannot be developed through existing Quechua structures. If loanwords are adopted, linguists may adjust them to match typical Quechua phonology.
Acquisition planning
Since Quechua is no longer an official language of Peru, Quechua literacy is not consistently encouraged in schools.[Hornberger, Nancy "Quechua Literacy and Empowerment." ''Indigenous Literacies in the Americas'' Ed. Hornberger, Nancy. New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 1996] Peru's education system is instead based on Spanish, the nation's official language. Despite its low prestige, Quechua is still spoken by millions of indigenous Peruvians, a great deal of whom are bilingual in Quechua and Spanish. There is a desire to preserve the uniqueness of Quechua as a language with its own attributes and representations of culture. Some argue that promoting a diverse literacy program gives students diverse perspectives on life, which could only enhance their educational experience. Before 1975, Peru had bilingual education programs, but Quechua was not taught as a subject in primary and secondary schools. After the 1975 education reform, Quechua and Spanish both had standing in bilingual programs, but only in restricted speech communities. These experimental programs were then canceled due to a change in government planning, but again reinstated in 1996. Even with national intercultural bilingual education programs, teachers at local schools and members of the community often prefer using Spanish, destabilizing support for bilingual education. This underscores the importance of community support as a goal for the education sector as mentioned earlier. Some believe that due to Spanish's higher national prestige, it is more socially and economically beneficial to learn and speak Spanish. It is debatable whether these education programs will benefit education or raise the status of Quechua.
See also
* Abstand and ausbau languages
* Directorate of Language Planning and Implementation
* Language death
* Language policy
** Inclusive language
** Gender-neutral language
Gender-neutral language or gender-inclusive language is language that avoids reference towards a particular sex or gender. In English, this includes use of nouns that are not gender-specific to refer to roles or professions, formation of phrases i ...
** Political correctness
* Linguistic relativity
* Language shift
* Linguistic imperialism
* Linguistic purism
Linguistic purism or linguistic protectionism is a concept with two common meanings: one with respect to foreign languages and the other with respect to the internal variants of a language (dialects).
The first meaning is the historical trend ...
* Linguistic rights
* Interlinguistics
* Languages in censuses
References
Further reading
* Bastardas-Boada, Albert
"Language planning and language ecology: Towards a theoretical integration."
2000.
* Cobarrubius, Juan & Joshua Fishman, eds. ''Progress in Language Planning: International Perspective''. The Hague: Mouton, 1983.
* Cooper, R. L. ''Language Planning and Social Change''. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
* Hult, F.M., & Johnson, D.C. (eds.) (2015). ''Research Methods in Language Policy and Planning: A Practical Guide.'' Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell .
* Kadochnikov, Denis (2016). Languages, Regional Conflicts and Economic Development: Russia. In: Ginsburgh, V., Weber, S. (Eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Economics and Language. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 538–580.
* Rubin, Joan, Björn H. Jernudd, Jyotirindra Das Gupta, Joshua A. Fishman and Charles A. Ferguson, eds. ''Language Planning Processes''. The Hague: Mouton Publishers, 1977.
*
* Silva, Diego B. (2019)
Language policy in Oceania
''Alfa, Rev. Linguíst.'' 63 (2).
Relevant journals
* ''Current Issues in Language Planning'' (Routledge
Home page
* ''Language Policy'' (Springer
Home page
* ''Language Problems and Language Planning.'
Home page
External links
Articles on language planning in West Africa
(Journal of West African Languages)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Language Planning
Applied linguistics
Concepts in language policy
Linguistic rights
Language varieties and styles
Sociolinguistics
Interlinguistics