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I am wondering why no one has quite mentioned that language is just a
single part of the ethnic/racial stratification scene in the United
States (and elsewhere). There is only so much that educating people
about language can accomplish when race relations have a lot to do also
with clean water supplies, prison, health care disparities (Christina
mentioned this!), sociogeographical isolation of the poor, the impetus
towards empire, enduring and changing commercialization of black bodies
and sounds, etc. etc. etc. The efficacy of language
consciousness education depends of course on historical and cultural
contexts of other forms of consciousness raising and the ethnic/class
struggle (i.e. timing is everything). Someone mentioned Kendall
King's book earlier on Quechua, standardization and the classroom where,
for example, in the introduction King points out that her ethnography
takes place in a setting where indigenous people in Ecuador had just won
a political place in the wording of the constitution and that the wide
ranging effects of this will have mattered at a more pervasive level than
the efforts of a single educational consortium. Nonetheless, this
educational consortium arose at the time of political change and was
probably more effective because of its correlation with the zeitgeist.
(that last part is me talking, not necessarily King whose book I do not
presently have by my side). That's related to why King concludes
that language revitalization may not necessarily fully reinstate
languages within all domains, but that it has a positive
social-psychological effect on minority children and within their
communities. (again, I hope I've summarized that accurately).<br><br>
Wasn't it Marvin Harris who points out that changing superstructural
concerns from the top, like language and its ideologies, have less
likelihood of affecting the infrastructure or the structure of a social
group? While changes form the base, in the infrastructure and the
structure will have wider-ranging on the superstructure? When and
how are minority language planning efforts likely to change the
structure, I guess, is what I'm asking...<br><br>
Rachel Reynolds<br><br>
At 05:51 AM 1/12/2004 +0200, you wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite><font face="arial" size=2 color="#0000FF">Christina's
comment reminds me of a remark made by a Navajo graduate student of mine
many years ago: by moving to the city, she knew it was unlikely that her
son would grow up speaking Navajo, but at least she wouldn't have to
carry water a mile or two every day. </font><br>
<font face="arial" size=2 color="#0000FF">Of course, those who stayed on
the Reservation are speaking Navajo less and less.</font><br>
<font face="arial" size=2 color="#0000FF">Bernard</font>
<dl><font face="tahoma" size=2>
<dd>-----Original Message-----
<dd>From:</b> owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu
[<a href="mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu" eudora="autourl">mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu</a>]
On Behalf Of </b>Christina Paulston
<dd>Sent:</b> Sunday, January 11, 2004 9:54 PM
<dd>To:</b> lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu
<dd>Subject:</b> Re: printability and standardization<br><br>
</font>
<dd>I must express myself extremely badly to be so misunderstood. Of
course a person can be literate in more than one language or dialect - I
read some seven languages, eight, myself. We are not, that is, I am
not talking about a linguistic problem but a social. Of course the LSA
comment "from this perspective" they noted, was perfectly
sound. It was the Black community across the country who rose up in
protest at having AAVE imposed on them and you can give them all the
linguistic information you want and it is not going to help.
<dd> What about South Africa, now with 11 official
languages? Many Afrikaners for "pedagogically sound" reasons
now urge the African population to send their children to mother tongue
schools - exactly the same policy enforced under apartheid for reasons of
segregation. Parents prefer education in English for their children
- are you going to tell them they suffer from false consciousness ( a
singularly brilliant concept, that)? There are as always other
circumstances, quality of teachers, texts, etc but parents still want
English. And I think it should be their choice.
<dd> The problem of course becomes worse when the
children and the parents disagree over that choice - which is not
uncommon with immigrant groups. I just object to linguists playing
omniscient gods and recommending options for life decisions on the
basis of linguistic criteria. Most people want a decent life, at
least for their children, a good job, good health care (Bush should take
note), a secure old age, etc, and if that necessitates another language,
they don't care. Of course they can remain bilingual but the children
usually don't think it is worth it.
<dd> Etc. My very last comment,
Christina<br><br>
<dd>----------
<dd>From: Ronald Kephart <rkephart@unf.edu>
<dd>To: lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu
<dd>Subject: RE: printability and standardization
<dd>Date: Sun, Jan 11, 2004, 11:15 AM<br><br>
<br><br>
<dd>At 11:02 AM -0600 1/10/04, Felicia Briscoe wrote:<br><br>
<dd>...There also seems to be an underlying assumption in much of the
recent writing that
<dd>bilingualism is either very difficult to attain or that it is someway
is detrimental to the person who is bilingual. I find this a very
strange assumption. Why can't a person be fully literate in AAVE and
fully literate in standard English. Why is it so often posed as an
either/or option?<br><br>
</dl><br>
I think part of the answer lies in what anthropological linguist MJ
Hardman calls our linguistic postulates: specifically, the importance of
singularity. This manifests itself in all sorts of ways not only within
our language but also how we think about language, as well as more
widely: one "right" answer, one god, preference for individual
over collective work, "most valuable players," the totalitarian
nature of our corporations, even the prescriptive insistence on
"he" rather than "they" as a generic pronoun. And of
course, "one language."<br><br>
See: Hardman, 1978, Linguistic postulates and applied anthropological
linguistics, in Papers on linguistics and child language</i>, edited by
V. Honsa and M.J. Hardman-de-Bautista, 117-36. The Hague:
Mouton.<br><br>
-- <br>
Ronald Kephart<br>
Sociology, Anthropology, & Criminal Justice<br>
University of North Florida<br>
<font color="#0000FF"><a href="http://www.unf.edu/~rkephart" eudora="autourl">http://www.unf.edu/~rkephart</a><br>
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