Language policy and political philosophy
On the emerging linguistic justice debate
Helder De Schutter | University of Leuven
This paper provides an overview of the emerging debates over language policy and linguistic diversity within political philosophy. It outlines the larger context of this debate and identifies its protagonists and the main issues at stake in it. In addition, it presents an interpretive scheme for the analysis of the variety of approaches that have so far been developed within this field. This scheme relates these approaches back to two clashes of different language ideologies. The first clash is between instrumentalism and constitutivism. The second clash is between transparency and hybridity. Finally, the paper explains why the sociolinguistic literature on language policy should interest political philosophers, and vice versa: why sociolinguists should engage with political philosophy.
Keywords: hybridity, nationalism, linguistic justice, language policy, language rights, language ideologies
Published online: 27 February 2007
https://doi.org/10.1075/lplp.31.1.02des
https://doi.org/10.1075/lplp.31.1.02des
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