Caught in the grips of linguistic paranoia

Wed Aug 13 15:27:45 UTC 2008

Well done, Anthea.  Yes, I did mean you with Andrea but you got even,  
no doubt inadvertantly, by misnaming me. :-) Christina
On Aug 13, 2008, at 7:01 AM, Anthea Fraser Gupta wrote:

> Yes, what a title! and I agree we should start quoting this elegantly
> written paper.
>
> The best place to read it for some people might be International J of
> Applied Linguistics 1:1 1991.
> http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/119993754/PDFSTART
>
> Fishman says (more thoroughly and with more sums) much what Stan and I
> said,that "linguistic heterogeneity is not an independent predictor of
> GNP or strife".  He was attacking a (then? still?) entrenched view  
> that
> linguistic heterogeneity was associated with more civil strife and a
> lower GNP. Fishman's criteria (a huge 238) seem more thought through
> than the Economist's -- I still don't understand the climate one! But
> the converse would be equally true -- neither is linguistic
> heterogeneity associated with less civil strive and a higher GNP.
> Fishman concludes by calling for the examination of those linguistic
> policies (based on cultural pluralism) that do lead to positive
> outcomes. I don't know how he would regard the rather special  
> promotion
> of English-Irish bilingualism in Ireland, which isn't based on  
> cultural
> pluralism so much as on expression of national identity.
>
> Reading this paper one realises how the world has changed since 1991.
> Fishman comments that "There has been less politicized ethnolinguistic
> factionalism in the half century since the Second World War,
> notwithstanding the large number of Third World polities that have  
> come
> into existence since then, than in the half century preceding it. ...
> The weak relationship between these criteria [linguistic heterogeneity
> and GNP/civil strife] are both resultants of past circumstances as  
> well
> as indications that those circumstances do not now commonly obtain in
> the world at large, all the more so once the problems of perestroika  
> in
> the former communist countries have been overcome or attenuated." Less
> than 20 years later, it seems clear to me that past circumstances  
> don't
> disappear and that one cannot assume continuing peace. I'm not saying
> that linguistic heterogeneity is a cause, of course. I agree with
> Fishman that any association is weak. And if people want to they will
> create ethnolinguistic groups whether there are significant linguistic
> differences between them or not. And not all conflict is  
> linguistically
> linked either. But ethnolinguistic nationalism is as important in the
> world today as it ever was.
>
> Fishman looked at linguistic heterogeneity and the original article to
> which we are all responding referred to countries that supported
> linguistic heterogeneity in their policies.  We could (if we had  
> decent
> statistics, which we don't) get some figures on linguistic
> heterogeneity.
>
> We would presumably want data on native language patterns [note that  
> we
> would need data on ALL languages spoken in early childhood. Where  
> there
> is widespread familial bilingualism there can be commonality of native
> language as well as diversity. For example, if A is a native speaker  
> of
> Malay and English, and B is a native speaker of Mandarin and  
> English, A
> and B have 3 native languages between them, and one in common, whereas
> if B is a native speaker only of Mandarin, they have 3 languages  
> between
> them and none in common.]
>
> Then we would have to look at governmental support for linguistic
> heterogeneity. Typically (even in South Africa) only some varieties of
> some languages are promoted. We can't divide the world into the bad  
> guy
> ling.het.denying countries and the good guy ling.het.promoting  
> countries
> -- it's more complicated than that. Look at Switzerland -- how do  
> ethnic
> minorities outside the officially sanctioned ones work?
>
>
> (BTW -- did you mean me when you said 'Andrea', Christine? 8-).  
> However,
> I also note that I haven't mastered negative maths -- the Economist
> thinks UK has a worse climate than Ireland. Not that I understand that
> either. )
>
> Anthea
> *     *     *     *     *
> Anthea Fraser Gupta (Dr)
> School of English, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT
> <www.leeds.ac.uk/english/staff/afg>
> NB: Reply to a.f.gupta at leeds.ac.uk
> *     *     *     *     *
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu
>> [mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu] On Behalf Of
>> Christina Paulston
>> Sent: 12 August 2008 21:44
>> To: lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu
>> Subject: Re: Caught in the grips of linguistic paranoia
>>
>> I suggest Stan and Andrea (and anyone else interested)  take
>> a look at Fishman's " Empirical explorations of two popular
>> assumptions: Inter- polity perspective on the relationships
>> between linguistic heterogeneity, civil strife, and per
>> capita gross national product" , easiest found in Dick's and
>> my sociolinguistic reader (Paulston&Tucker, SOCIOLINGUISTICS:
>> THE ESSENTIAL READINGS, Oxford:
>> Blackwell's..  In spite of the impossible title, it is one of
>> Fishmans most interesting articles but rarely cited.  It'll
>> answer your
>> questions. It is statistically complicated so you need to read it.)
>> Christina
>> On Aug 12, 2008, at 12:06 PM, Anthea Fraser Gupta wrote:
>>
>>> Yes -- I agree with Stan -- it would be hard to make any
>> correlation.
>>>
>>> I'm a bit baffled by one of the measures on this list, which is
>>> 'climate and geography', and which is based on 'latitude to
>>> distinguish between warmer and colder climes'.
>>>
>>> Now climate seems to me very much a matter of personal
>> preference --
>>> is warmer better or is colder?  Humid or dry? Do you like a 'real
>>> winter'
>>> or not? People don't seem to agree on this. On this measure
>> US (.177)
>>> does a lot better than UK (-.064) and UK, bizarrely, does
>> better than
>>> Ireland (-.049). Does US do better because there is a lot of choice
>>> about climate (you could be a Florida kind of person or an
>> Alaska kind
>>> of person)? Or just becaus it goes a long way south?  And
>> why should
>>> UK do better than Ireland (no noticeable difference in climate or
>>> latitude).  And why should the Irish climate (cool in
>> summer, warm in
>>> winter, plenty of rain) get such a low score -- seems like
>> a very nice
>>> climate to me.
>>>
>>> 'Community life' is another one I don't understand: "Dummy variable
>>> taking value 1 if country has either high rate of church
>> attendance or
>>> trade-union membership; zero otherwise." Hm.
>>>
>>> All rather dodgy, methinks.
>>>
>>> Anthea
>>> *     *     *     *     *
>>> Anthea Fraser Gupta (Dr)
>>> School of English, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT
>>> <www.leeds.ac.uk/english/staff/afg>
>>> NB: Reply to a.f.gupta at leeds.ac.uk
>>> *     *     *     *     *
>>>
>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: owner-lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu
>>>> [mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu] On Behalf Of
>>>> Stan-sandy Anonby
>>>> Sent: 12 August 2008 15:18
>>>> To: lgpolicy-list at ccat.sas.upenn.edu; Harold Schiffman
>>>> Subject: Re: Caught in the grips of linguistic paranoia
>>>>
>>>> Interesting article. I have a question, though. It says
>> The Quality
>>>> of Life Index, published by The Economist in 2005, showed that the
>>>> five countries with the highest standard of living were Ireland,
>>>> Switzerland, Norway, Luxembourg, and Sweden. Aside from having a
>>>> European address, all of these countries have one key
>> thing in common
>>>> - they promote multilingualism.
>>>>
>>>> That's a really cool list. I looked at it, and noticed
>> that most of
>>>> the countries with the lowest standard of living were also pretty
>>>> mulitlingual.
>>>>
>>>> I'm all in favour of quality of life, and I'm all in favour of
>>>> multilinguilism. I'm just not sure what the Quality of
>> Life Index can
>>>> tell us about the correlation between the two.
>>>>
>>>> Stan Anonby
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 08:05:52 -0600
>>>> "Harold Schiffman" <hfsclpp at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> Caught in the grips of linguistic paranoia
>>>>>
>>>>> By Nataly Kelly
>>>>> August 11, 2008
>>>>>
>>>>> WHAT MAKES the largest military power on earth tremble in
>> its boots?
>>>>> What causes an entire nation of people - the majority of whom
>>>>> descended from non-English speakers - to shudder in fear? What
>>>>> provokes outrage at debates and town hall meetings in the current
>>>>> presidential campaign? Language, that's what.
>>>>>
>>>>> Not every language is seen as Uncle Sam's nemesis - just
>> the 6,911
>>>>> languages that are not English. Americans often view other
>>>> languages
>>>>> as a threat their identity - both as individuals, and as a nation.
>>>>> It's for this reason that a Pennsylvanian recently stood up
>>>> and told
>>>>> John McCain how angry it makes her to see the word entrada at the
>>>>> entrance to her local Lowe's home improvement store. Barack Obama
>>>>> dared to suggest last month that American children should learn a
>>>>> language currently spoken by more people in the world
>> than English:
>>>>> Spanish. Hillary Clinton even stated, albeit jokingly, that
>>>> it's time
>>>>> for the United States to have a multilingual president.
>>>>>
>>>>> Linguistic paranoia seems to have reached unprecedented levels in
>>>>> recent years, a phenomenon that would probably shock our Founding
>>>>> Fathers. After all, they intentionally decided not to declare an
>>>>> official language for America, knowing full well that linguistic
>>>>> dominance in the world is often in flux, and that doing so could
>>>>> restrict the country's ability to both compete
>> internationally and
>>>>> respond to domestic needs.
>>>>>
>>>>> The White House has a time-honored tradition of
>>>> multilingualism. Our
>>>>> second president, John Adams, spoke several languages
>> fluently. He
>>>>> believed in learning other languages and made sure that his
>>>> son, John
>>>>> Quincy Adams, studied four of them.
>>>>>
>>>>> The third president, Thomas Jefferson, spoke between five
>> and seven
>>>>> languages. Herbert Hoover and his wife were fluent in
>> Mandarin, and
>>>>> they translated a book from Latin into English. Jackie
>> Kennedy made
>>>>> campaign speeches in Spanish, Italian, and French to appeal to
>>>>> multilingual voters.
>>>>>
>>>>> Is Obama wrong to point out the obvious, that when future
>>>> generations'
>>>>> knowledge of other languages is restricted, so is the prospective
>>>>> well-being of our nation? The Quality of Life Index,
>>>> published by The
>>>>> Economist in 2005, showed that the five countries with
>> the highest
>>>>> standard of living were Ireland, Switzerland, Norway,
>>>> Luxembourg, and
>>>>> Sweden. Aside from having a European address, all of these
>>>> countries
>>>>> have one key thing in common - they promote
>>>> multilingualism. In spite
>>>>> of being the largest economic power in the world, the
>> United States
>>>>> came in 13th, just behind Spain, Singapore, and Finland.
>>>>>
>>>>> We have the means to be a linguistic superpower. The United
>>>> States is
>>>>> one of the richest countries in the world when it comes
>> to natural
>>>>> language resources, with an estimated 311 languages spoken
>>>> within our
>>>>> borders - 162 of these are indigenous languages, and 149
>> come from
>>>>> other countries. Our internal linguistic diversity has
>>>> proved to be an
>>>>> asset time and time again - Navajo was used for strategic
>> military
>>>>> purposes as a code language in World War II, and current
>> operations
>>>>> abroad would be impossible were it not for the help of
>> the many US
>>>>> linguists who risk life and limb each day.
>>>>>
>>>>> McCain responded to the crowd in Pennsylvania with a plea for
>>>>> appreciating our nation's diversity. Obama went on to say that
>>>>> American children should learn not just Spanish, but other
>>>> languages
>>>>> as well. Across party lines, our presidential candidates are
>>>>> acknowledging the important role of multilingualism both
>> within the
>>>>> United States and abroad. Their campaign managers also know the
>>>>> importance of the multilingual voting demographic - our
>> last census
>>>>> tells us that 20 percent of US residents speak a language
>>>> other than
>>>>> English at home.
>>>>>
>>>>> So why do the bald eagle's feathers get ruffled every time our
>>>>> presidential candidates mention language issues? Fear of
>>>> the unknown.
>>>>> What we are not familiar with makes us uncomfortable.
>>>> Accepting that
>>>>> we are a multilingual nation is a challenge, because it requires
>>>>> looking beyond our borders and outside our comfort zone. The only
>>>>> solution? Know thy enemy.
>>>>>
>>>>> Nataly Kelly is a senior analyst with Common Sense
>>>> Advisory, a market
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/
>>>> 2008
>>>>> /08/11/caught_in_the_grips_of_linguistic_paranoia/?s_campaign=8315
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> **************************************
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>>>> service to
>>>>> its members and implies neither approval, confirmation nor
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>>>>> by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a
>>>> message's
>>>>> contents. Members who disagree with a message are
>>>> encouraged to post a
>>>>> rebuttal. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)
>>>>> *******************************************
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>