Language Planning in the Post-Communist Era: The Struggles for Language Control in the New Order in Eastern Europe, Eurasia and China

Description

This volume provides an in-depth analysis of the attempts of language experts and governments to control language use and development in Eastern Europe, Eurasia and China through planned activities generally known as language planning or language policy. The ten case studies presented here examine language planning in China, Russia, Tatarstan, Central Asia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, and focus in particular on developments and disputes that have occurred since the ‘fall of communism’ and the emergence of a new order in the late 1980s. Its authors highlight the dominant issues with which language planning is invariably intertwined. These include power politics, tensions between ‘official language’ and ‘minority languages’, and the effects of a country’s particular political, social, cultural and psychological environment. Offering a detailed account of the socio-political and ideological developments that underlie language planning in these regions, this book will provide a valuable resource for students and scholars of linguistics, cultural studies, political science, sociology and history. Front Matter ....Pages i-xiii Introduction (Ernest Andrews)....Pages 1-35 Language Planning: Theoretical Background (Ernest Andrews)....Pages 37-65 Language Planning and Policy in China: Unity, Diversity and Social Control (Fengyuan Ji)....Pages 67-92 Language Policy in Russia: Nation, Nationalism, and Language (Joan F. Chevalier)....Pages 93-118 Language Policy and Power Politics in Post-Soviet Tatarstan (Teresa Wigglesworth-Baker)....Pages 119-144 Language Policy and Hegemony in the Turkic Republics (Ayse Dietrich)....Pages 145-167 Language Policy in Independent Ukraine: A Battle for National and Linguistic Empowerment (Vladislava Reznik)....Pages 169-192 Lithuanian Language Planning: A Battle for Language and Power (Loreta Vaicekauskienė, Nerijus Šepetys)....Pages 193-218 Language Planning in Latvia as a Struggle for National Sovereignty (Andrejs Veisbergs)....Pages 219-240 The Polish Language Act: Legislating a Complicated Linguistic-Political Landscape (Magda Stroińska, Ernest Andrews)....Pages 241-260 Language Planning in Slovakia: Nation-Building in the Context of European Integration (Marián Sloboda, Lucia Molnár Satinská, Mira Nábělková)....Pages 261-286 Forms of Language Planning and Policy in the Czech Republic (Hana Srpova)....Pages 287-308 Back Matter ....Pages 309-316