WEEK 1 LANGUAGE POLICY AND PLANNING (The Routledge Handbook of Applied Linguistics - James Simpson)

Novita Setiawati
2201411150
201-202
LANGUAGE POLICY AND PLANNING
1.      Definition
There are many definitions about LPP. A frequently cited definition is Cooper’s: “Language planning refers to deliberate efforts to influence the behavior of others with respect to the acquisition, structure, or functional allocation of their language codes” (1989, p. 45). Other definitions include what people do, think and believe about language: “Language policy can be defined as the combination of official decisions and prevailing public practices related to language education and use” (McGroarty, 1997, p. 1). In other definitions there is no place for the non-deliberate realm: “The match of national language capacity to need” (Brecht & Walton, 1993, p. 3). Some definitions do not limit the effects intended by policy intervention and encompass multiple kinds of collective action: “the organized pursuit of solutions to language problems, typically at the national level” (Fishman, 1973, pp. 23–4) and “authoritative allocation of resources to language” (Fishman, 1994, p. 92). Importantly some definitions (Neustupny, 1978, 1983) have also included even mundane practices of individual language use.
2.      The “Activity”
There are six activities that are studied in LPP literature:
a.      Corpus planning
Corpus planning refers to norm selection and codification (characteristics or criteria of a ‘good’ language are established) and is usually undertaken by language experts, resulting in dictionaries, grammars, literacy manuals, and pronunciation and writing style guides. In other words, it is concerned with developing the ‘nuts and bolts’ of language itself (its vocabulary, forms of pronunciation and syntax), so that a language could indeed serve its designated function.
b.      Status planning
Status planning is concerned with official decisions about the appropriate use of a language. The results of status planning are laws, clauses in constitutions prescribing the official standing of languages, and regulations for their use in public administration.
c.       Acquisition planning
Acquisition planning (language-in-education) typically describes the languages teaching policies of states. Foreign or second language instruction can be motivated by humanistic rationales, by economic interest calculations, by assessments about national security or geo-political interest, or by responses to the needs, opportunities, and rights of linguistic minorities.
d.      Usage planning
Usage planning refers to efforts to extend the communicative domains of a given language. This usually occurs in opposition to a replacing language after political reconstitution (administrative devolution, federalism, or national independence) but in more extreme cases usage planning forms part of regeneration efforts on behalf of dying languages.
e.       Prestige planning
Prestige planning involves elevating the esteem of a linguistic code. While this often accompanies status planning, there is an ancient history of poetic, philosophical, and religious involvement in attaching enhanced prestige to given codes that precedes formal planning processes and sometimes contradicts them. The production of canonical literature by poets, prose writers, and other cultural figures has effects that can be usefully discussed as language planning.
f.       Discourse planning
Discourse planning refers to the influence and effect on people’s mental states, behaviors and belief systems through the linguistically mediated ideological workings of institutions, disciplines, and diverse social formations.

3.      Approaches
Tollefson (1991) introduced a distinction to characterize what he saw as two major approaches to LPP: the neoclassical and the historical-structural. The major differences between the neoclassical and the historical-structural approaches are as follows (from Wiley 1996: 115):
1)      The unit of analysis employed: While the neoclassical approach focuses on individual choices, the historical-structural pays attention to relationships between groups.
2)      The role of the historical perspective: The neoclassical is more interested in the current language situation; the historical-structural, in contrast, emphasizes the role of socio-historical factors.
3)       Criteria for evaluating plans and policies: The neoclassical is primarily amoral in its outlook; policies are evaluated in terms of how efficiently they achieve their goals. The historical-structural is more sensitive to issue of domination, exploitation and oppression.
4)       The role of the social scientist: Consistent with its amoral outlook, the neoclassical assumes that the social scientist must and can approach language problems in an apolitical manner. On the other hand, the historical-structural views political stances as inescapable so that ‘those who avoid political questions inadvertently support the status quo’.

4.      History
The emergence of LPP as a coherent field was closely tied to the fact that newly independent states in the postcolonial era (mainly Asian and African) were seen as in need of appropriate modernization and development programs. For these states, the concerns were multiple. The well-intentioned desire to contribute towards programs that could help cultivate national solidarity whilst also improving on standards of education and creating opportunities for economic growth led linguists to position themselves as expert consultants with the state as client.
As a result of this desire to design programs that could contribute to public policy objectives, a series of technical concepts and distinctions were constructed that aimed to provide linguists with the theoretical vocabulary to systematically approach and diagnose LPP-related issues. Examples include:
(i) The idea of a rational model (Jernudd 1973), where alternative ways of tackling a problem were carefully compared before settling on the optimal choice. This approach assumed that LPP issues could be approached in terms of a cost-benefit analysis.
(ii) The distinction between status planning and corpus planning (Kloss 1969): the former was concerned with official decisions about the appropriate use of a language. The latter was concerned with developing the ‘nuts and bolts’ of language itself (its vocabulary, forms of pronunciation and syntax), so that a language could indeed serve its designated function.
(iii) The distinction between processes of language selection, codification of the selected language as standard or correct, elaboration of the language form where necessary, and implementation to ensure that the standards were properly adopted (Haugen 1966). These processes were typically understood to apply sequentially, so that LPP would be pursued in a manner that was organized and systematic.
There is no disputing the fact that these concepts and distinctions, even today, continue to serve as valuable tools when thinking about LPP. This is because, at bottom, LPP involves making decisions about the desirability (or not) of promoting some language practices over others. And all such decisions require some appreciation of the possible relationships between forms of language and their uses, and the ways in which these relationships might be influenced.
What was problematic in this period, however, was the absence of a critical orientation that might have otherwise prevented a number of assumptions from going unquestioned, such as the notion that each nation-state would be ideally served by having just one national language. As a consequence, these assumptions often guided the enthusiastic articulation of solutions designed along technocratic lines.
5.      Challenges for LPP
One significant challenge for LPP is to find ways of addressing multiculturalism. Where LPP is concerned, the most prominent response has been to call for the adoption of language rights (May 2001; Phillipson and Skutnabb-Kangas 1995). The general motivation behind the proposal for language rights is to ensure that an identifiable group – usually a discriminated or stigmatized ethnic minority – is granted specific forms of protection and consideration on the basis of their associated language. The concept of language rights has had enormous appeal, finding a broad swathe of support amongst linguists, sociologists, political philosophers, policy-makers and community activists (Kymlicka 1995; May 2001; Phillipson and Skutnabb-Kangas 1995).However, this actually makes it all the more critical that language rights be subjected to careful scrutiny (Blommaert 2001; Stroud 2001). For example, while language rights may be useful as a short-term measure, it is not clear that they are tenable in the longer term. One reason for this is that there will be parties who have a vested interest in maintaining their (usually hard-won) language rights, and their motivations – such as the desire to cling to political power or to continue enjoying the benefits afforded by such rights – can be quite independent of how effective such rights may actually have been in dealing with discrimination. This means that LPP needs to better understand the pros and cons of language rights, and where necessary, explore alternative ways of responding to multiculturalism.
Another important challenge for LPP is to take better account of the fact that traditional notions of ethnicity and nation do not fit easily with the multilingual dynamics of late modern societies, which are increasingly characterized by a pervasive culture of consumerism (Baudrillard 1988; Bauman 1998), where ‘people define themselves through the messages they transmit to others through the goods and practices that they possess and display’ (Warde 1994: 878). In this regard, Stroud and Wee (2007) have suggested that the concept of sociolinguistic consumption should be given a more foundational status in language policy in late modernity, suggesting that this might offer a more comprehensive account of the dynamics of language choice and change.
Finally, one of the most pressing challenges facing the world today is that of global migration and the related issue of ensuring the wellbeing and dignity of individuals as they move across the globe in search of a better life. As many states work to accommodate the presence of foreign workers, asylum seekers and other aliens within their territories, the need to come up with realistic and sensitive language policies will require the input of LPP specialists. If such input is absent, there is a danger that language policies may unfairly penalize the very people they were intended to help.

6.      Critiques
Academic marginality has not shielded language planning from attack. Perhaps severest has been the allegation that LPP is complicit with social repression in the interests of state and class (Luke, McHoul, & Mey, 1990). Mühlhäusler (1995) holds that when applied by developed-country experts (operating with notions of “one national language”) to intergenerationally stable multilingual nations in post-colonizing contexts, LPP can lead to the creation of hierarchical diglossia among existing languages and varieties, and in turn this can lead to erosion and the ultimate demise of minority languages. Relatedly, the spread of anglophone westernizing modernity can lead to the destruction of distinctive life-worlds and the depletion of the alternative worldviews that reside in diverse linguistic systems (Nettle & Romaine, 2000; Phillipson & Skutnabb-Kangas, 1996; Skutnabb-Kangas, 1995), the result of the absorption of poor and marginalized peoples into global consumerism.
Another allegation has been that LPP has entrenched economic inequalities for immigrants in first world societies by language educational schemes tracking immigrants into low-paid, marginal jobs (Tollefson, 1991).
7.      Problems

8.      The Future of LPP
LPP needs to start being more attentive to the problematic ways in which specific language practices get categorized under particular labels (including that of non-language), and the attendant impact of such categorizations on the social trajectories of different individuals and communities.

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