Article published in:

Languages of the Internet
Edited by Claudio Menezes
[Journal of Language and Politics 5:2] 2006
► pp. 251–275

The European Union in Cyberspace

Multilingual Democratic Participation in a virtual public sphere?

Ruth Wodak | Lancaster University

Scott Wright | De Montfat University

This article analyses the European Union’s Futurum discussion forum. The EU hoped that Futurum would help close the acknowledged gap between institutions and citizens by facilitating a virtual, multilingual, transnational public sphere. Futurum was both an interesting example of how the EU’s language policies shape the structure of deliberative experiments and of a public debate about their relative value. We combine various quantitative measures of the discussions with a critical discourse analysis of a thread which focused on language policies. We found that although the debates were predominantly in English, where a thread started in a language other than English, linguistic diversity was more prominent. The discourse analysis showed that multilingual interaction was fostered, and that the debate about language policies is politically and ideologically charged.

Keywords: electronic democracy, language policies, European Union, public sphere, discourse analysis, multilingualism, multimodality, argumentaion analysis

Published online: 15 September 2006
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.5.2.07wod

Cited by

Cited by 31 other publications

Badouard, Romain & Laurence Monnoyer-Smith

2013. Hyperlinks as Political Resources: The European Commission Confronted with Online Activism. Policy & Internet 5:1 ► pp. 101 ff.

Boc, Anny

2015. The Power of Language: Globalizing “The Chinese Dream”. Fudan Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences 8:4 ► pp. 533 ff.

Boyd, Michael S.

2014. In From Text to Political Positions [Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture, 55], ► pp. 245 ff.

Briggs, Charles L.

2007. Anthropology, Interviewing, and Communicability in Contemporary Society. Current Anthropology 48:4 ► pp. 551 ff.

Cmeciu, Camelia & Doina Cmeciu

2014. ‘Debating Europe’ Platform – A Means of Crafting Online Representations of a European Identity. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 149 ► pp. 195 ff.

Cmeciu, Camelia & Mădălina Manolache

2018. A Narrative Approach to Europe’s Identity Crisis. The European Legacy 23:4 ► pp. 416 ff.

Doerr, Nicole

2012. Translating democracy: how activists in the European Social Forum practice multilingual deliberation. European Political Science Review 4:3 ► pp. 361 ff.

Gerrand, Peter

2007. Estimating Linguistic Diversity on the Internet: A Taxonomy to Avoid Pitfalls and Paradoxes. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12:4 ► pp. 1298 ff.

Karlsson, Martin

2012. In E-Parliament and ICT-Based Legislation, ► pp. 80 ff.

Kelly-Holmes, Helen

2011. Sex, lies and thematising Irish. Journal of Language and Politics 10:4 ► pp. 511 ff.

Kelly-Holmes, Helen & Tommaso M. Milani

2011. Thematising multilingualism in the media. Journal of Language and Politics 10:4 ► pp. 467 ff.

Kelsey, Darren & Lucy Bennett

2014. Discipline and resistance on social media: Discourse, power and context in the Paul Chambers ‘Twitter Joke Trial’. Discourse, Context & Media 3 ► pp. 37 ff.

Kopf, Susanne

2019. In Reference and Identity in Public Discourses [Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 306], ► pp. 159 ff.

Kopf, Susanne

2020. Participation and deliberative discourse on social media – Wikipedia talk pages as transnational public spheres?. Critical Discourse Studies ► pp. 1 ff.

Kopf, Susanne & Elena Nichele

2018. In Doing Politics [Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture, 80], ► pp. 211 ff.

Krzyżanowski, Michat

2009. In Language, Discourse and Identity in Central Europe, ► pp. 23 ff.

Krzyżanowski, Michał

2018. Social media in/and the politics of the European Union. Journal of Language and Politics 17:2 ► pp. 281 ff.

Leppänen, Sipra & Saija Peuronen

2012. In The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics,

Leppänen, Sirpa & Saija Peuronen

2020. In The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics, ► pp. 1 ff.

Mayr, Andrea

2015. Spectacles of military urbanism in online representations of the Elite Squad of the military police of Rio de Janeiro: a multimodal approach. Social Semiotics 25:5 ► pp. 533 ff.

Myers, Greg

2010. Stance-taking and public discussion in blogs. Critical Discourse Studies 7:4 ► pp. 263 ff.

Nguyen, Dennis

2017. In Europe, the Crisis, and the Internet, ► pp. 1 ff.

Nguyen, Dennis

2017. In Europe, the Crisis, and the Internet, ► pp. 27 ff.

Shen, Fei & Hai Liang

2015. Cultural Difference, Social Values, or Political Systems? Predicting Willingness to Engage in Online Political Discussion in 75 Societies. International Journal of Public Opinion Research 27:1 ► pp. 111 ff.

Sierra, Sylvia

2021. A Mexican Autodefensa Facebook Group’s use of binarity, legitimization strategies, and topoi of religion, family and struggle. Discourse, Context & Media 42 ► pp. 100497 ff.

Smith, Graham, Peter John & Patrick Sturgis

2013. Taking Political Engagement Online: An Experimental Analysis of Asynchronous Discussion Forums. Political Studies 61:4 ► pp. 709 ff.

Tolton, Laura Marie

2014. A GROPING VERSUS ‘REAL VIOLENCE’ IN COLOMBIA. Critical Discourse Studies 11:3 ► pp. 322 ff.

Wodak, Ruth

2007. Discourses in European Union organizations: Aspects of access, participation, and exclusion. Text & Talk 27:5-6

Wodak, Ruth

2008. In Qualitative Discourse Analysis in the Social Sciences, ► pp. 1 ff.

Wright, Scott

2007. A virtual European public sphere? The Futurum discussion forum. Journal of European Public Policy 14:8 ► pp. 1167 ff.

Łukasik-Duszyńska, Monika

2021. Tworzenie unijnej strategii komunikowania się a frekwencja obywateli w europejskich wyborach i referendach. Politeja 12:5 (37) ► pp. 123 ff.

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 19 september 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

References

Abdullah, N. A.

2004 Relational Communication in Organizational E-Mail: A Malaysian Case Study. PhD Dissertation. University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur.

Anis, J.

(ed1999 Internet, Communication et Langue Fran�aise. Paris: Hermes Science Publications.

Axelsson, A., Abelin, A. and Schroeder, R.

2003 Anyone speak Spanish?: Language encounters in multi-user virtual environments and the influence of technology. New Media & Society 5(4,) 475—498.

Climent, S., Mor�, J., Oliver, A., Salvatierra, M., S�nchez, M., Taul�, M. and Vallmanya, L.

2003 Bilingual newsgroups in Catalonia: A challenge for machine translation. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 9(1,) http://www.ascusc.org/jcmc/.

Clyne, M.

2003 Towards inter-cultural communication in Europe without linguistic homogenization. In: R. de Cillia, H. J. Krumm and R. R (eds). Die Kosten der Mehrsprachigkeit/ The Cost of Multilingualism. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences, 39—48.

CEC

2001 European Governance: A White Paper. Brussels: European Commission.

Danet, B.

2001 Cyberpl

y: Communicating Online. Oxford: Berg.

de Cillia, R.

2003 Grundlagen und Tendenzen der europ�ischen Sprachenpolitik. In: M. Mokre, G. Weiss and R. Baub�ck (eds). Europas Identit�ten. Mythen, Konflikte, Konstruktionen. Frankfurt/New York: Campus, 231—256.

Durham, M.

2003 Language choice on a Swiss mailing list. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 9(1,) http://www.ascusc.org/jcmc/.

Fairclough, N.

2003 Analyzing Discourse: Text Analysis for Social Research. London: Rout-ledge.

Graddol, D.

1997 The Future of English. London: English Company

Halliday, M.A.K.

1978 Language as a Social Semiotic: The Social Interpretation of Language and Meaning. London: Edward Arnold.

Herring, S. C.

1996 Two variants of an electronic message schema. In: S. C. Herring. Computer-Mediated Communication. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 81—106.

Iedema, R.

1999 Formalizing organizational meaning. Discourse & Society 10(1,) 49—66.

Jewitt, C. and van Leeuwen, T.

. (eds)2001 The Handbook of Visual Analysis. London: Sage.

Kienpointner, M.

1992 Alltagslogik. Struktur und Funktion von Argumentationsmustern. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommann-holzboog.

Kress, G. and van Leeuwen, T.

1996 Reading Images. London: Routledge.

Lemke, J. L.

1999 Discourse and organizational dynamics: Website communication and institutional change. Discourse & Society 10(1,) 21—48.

2000 Multiplying Modalities: Presentational, Orientational and Organizational Meaning. Unpubl. Paper.

2001 Discursive technologies and the social organization of meaning. In: R. Wodak (ed.) Special Issue Folia Linguistica. Critical Discourse Analysis in Post-Modern Societies. Vol. XXXV/1—2, 79—97.

2003 Texts and discourses in the technologies of social organization. In: G. Weiss and R. R (eds). Critical Discourse Analysis. Theory and Interdisciplinarity. London: Palgrave/Macmillan, 130—149.

Maas, U.

1985 Lesen - Schreiben - Schrift. Die Demotisierung eines professionellen Arcanums im Sp�tmittelalter und in der fr�hen Neuzeit. Literatur und Linguistik (LiLi) 59, 55—81.

Neuage, T.

2003 Conversation Analysis of Chatroom Talk. PhD Dissertation, University of South Australia.

Phillipson, R.

2003 English-Only Europe? Challenging Language Policy. London: Routledge.

Pollak and Slobinski

2002 Democratizing the European Union: Representation is nothing; Responsiveness is everything. IWF (EIF) Working Paper 27/2002. Vienna: Institute for European Integration Research, Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Reisigl, M.

2004 Wie man eine Nation herbeiredet. Eine diskursanalytische Untersuchung zur sprachlichen Konstruktion der �sterreichischen Nation und �sterreichischen Identit�t in politischen Fest- und Gedenkreden. Vienna: PhD Dissertation.

Reisigl, M. and Wodak, R.

2001 Discourse and Discrimination. London: Routledge.

Rusch, D.

2004 Von den M�glichkeiten der Web-Inszenierung zum audio-visuellen Gesamtereignis am Beispiel online-journalistischer Kulturberichterstattung in �sterreich und den USA. Vienna: PhD Dissertation.

Schlesinger, P.

2003 The Babel of Europe? An essay on networks and communicative spaces. ARENA Working Paper 22/03.

Schlesinger, P. and Kevin, D.

2000 Can the European Union become a sphere of publics? In: E. O. Eriksen and J. E. Fossum (eds). Democracy in the European Union: Integration through Deliberation?. London: Routledge, 206—229.

Scollon, R. and Scollon, S.

2004 Nexus Analysis: Discourse and the Emerging Internet. London: Routledge.

Seidlhofer, B.

2003 Brave new English? Zum bildungs/sprachenpolitischen Desiderat einer Konzeptualisierung von Englisch als Lingua franca. In: R. de Cillia, H. J. Krumm and R. R (eds). Die Kosten der Mehrsprachigkeit/ The Cost of Multilingualism. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences., 125—134.

Sperber, D. and Wilson, D.

1986 Relevance, Communication and Cognition. Oxford: Blackwell.

Stein, D.

2006 E-mail, internet, chatroom talk: Pragmatics. In: K. Brown (ed.). Elsevier Encylcopaedia of Language and Linguistics. Vol. 4, Second Edition. Oxford: Elsevier (in Press).

Swales, J.

2001 Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Urry, J.

2003 Global Complexity. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Widdowson, H. G.

1994 The ownership of English. TESOL Quarterly 28(2,) 377—389.

Wilhelm, A. G.

2000 Democracy in the Digital Age: Challenges to Political Life in Cyberspace. London: Routledge.

Wodak, R.

2000 Recontextualisation and the transformation of meaning: A critical discourse analysis of decision making in EU-meetings about employment policies. In: S. Sarangi and M. M (eds). Discourse and Social Life. Harlow: Pearson Education, 185—206.

2004 Critical discourse analysis. In: J. Seale, G. Gobo, J. F. Gubrium and D. D (eds). Qualitative Research Practice. London: Sage, 197—213.

Wodak, R. and Wright, S..

forthcoming. The European Union in cyberspace: Democratic participation via online multilingual discussion boards? In: B. Danet and S. C. Herring eds The Multilingual Internet: Language, Culture and Communication in Instant Messaging, Email and Chat Oxford OUP (in press)

Wright, Scott

2004 A Comparative Analysis of Government-run Discussion Boards at the Local, National and European Union levels. PhD Dissertation, University of East Anglia.

Wright, S.

2005 Design matters: The political efficacy of government-run discussion boards. In: R. Gibson, S. Oates and D. D (eds). The Internet and Politics: citizens, voters and activists. London: Routledge, 80—99.

Wright, S. and Street, J.

2005 Democracy, Deliberation and Design: the case of online discussion forums. Paper presented to Political Studies Association Annual Conference, Leeds 2005.

Wright, S.

2006 Government-run Online Discussion Forums: moderation, censorship and the shadow of control. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations.

2007 A Virtual European Public Sphere? The Futurum Discussion Forum. Journal of European Public Policy 14(3) (Special Issue: The European Constitution).

Yates, S. J.

1996 Oral and written linguistic aspects of computer conferencing. In: S. C. Herring. Computer-Mediated Communication: Linguistic, social, and cross-cultural perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 29—47.