Despite decades of often ambitious policies in Australia, languages education is still characterized by
intermittent commitment to the teaching of languages, with inequitable access particularly entrenched in rural and regional
contexts. While research has focused on the practical and material constraints impacting on policy implementation, little research
has investigated the role of the discursive terrain in shaping expectations and limitations around what seems achievable in
schools, particularly, from the school principal perspective. Beginning with an overview of policy interventions and an analysis
of contemporary challenges, we use Q methodology to identify and analyze viewpoints at work in similarly-positioned rural and
regional schools. In doing so, we seek to determine what seems possible or impossible across settings; the role of principals in
enabling and constraining pathways for the provision of school language programs, and the need for macro-level language policy to
be informed by constraints specific to rural and regional contexts.
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