Globalisation and African Languages: Risks and Benefits

Couverture
Katrin Bromber, Birgit Smieja
Walter de Gruyter, 2004 - 326 pages
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Globalisation and African Languages links African language studies to the concept of 'globalisation' which increasingly undergoes critical review. Hence, African linguists of various provenience can make valuable contributions to this debate.

In cultural matters, which by definition include language, there is often a sense that globalisation leads to a major trend of homogenisation, which results in a reduction of diversity on the one hand and, on the other, in new themes being incorporated into global (cultural) patterns. However, often conflicting and overlapping particularistic interests exist which have a constructive as well as destructive potential.

This aspect leads directly to the first of three sections of this volume, LANGUAGE USE AND ATTITUDES, which addresses some of the burning issues in sociolinguistic research. Since this research area is tightly linked to the educational domain these important issues are addressed in articles that comprise the second section of this volume: LANGUAGE POLICY AND EDUCATION. The third section of the volume presents articles dealing with LANGUAGE DESCRIPTION AND CLASSIFICATION demonstrating which parts of different language systems are affected through contact under historical and modern conditions.

The contributions of all the well-known scholars in this volume show that globalisation is a two-way street, and to ensure that all sides benefit in a reciprocal manner means the impacts have to be monitored globally, regionally, nationally and locally. By disseminating and emphasising these linguistic findings as part of the global cultural heritage, African language studies may offer urgently needed new perspectives towards a rapidly changing world.

 

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Table des matières

CrossBorder Languages Reports and Studies Regional Workshop
178
The impact of Kiswahili on Kiluguru
181
Loan words in Swahili
199
The noun phrase in the Kerebe language
219
The infinitive as a part of speech in Swahili
243
How many languages are there in Africa really?
279
Languages and language names in Mozambique
297
Observations on Swahili and Midzichenda plant names
313

Using Northern Sotho as medium of instruction in
119
Attitudes among
163
Subject index
323
Droits d'auteur

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Page 66 - English linguistic imperialism is that the dominance of English is asserted and maintained by the establishment and continuous reconstitution of structural and cultural inequalities between English and other languages.
Page 66 - English linguistic imperialism is one example of linguicism, which is defined as 'ideologies, structures, and practices which are used to legitimate, effectuate, and reproduce an unequal division of power and resources (both material and immaterial) between groups which are defined on the basis of language'...
Page 12 - ... are still largely confined to home and neighborhood, since their elders (both adult and school age) carry into the domains of intimacy a language learned outside its confines. Formal institutions tend to render individuals increasingly monolingual in a language other than that of hearth and home. Ultimately, the language of school and government replaces the language of home and neighborhood, precisely because it comes to provide status in the latter domains as well as in the former, due to the...
Page 77 - In order to reverse the pattern of widespread minority group educational failure, educators and policy-makers are faced with both a personal and a political challenge. Personally, they must redefine their roles within the classroom, the community, and the broader society so that these role definitions result in interactions that empower rather than disable students.
Page 22 - The dominance of English in the schools parallels its dominance within the higher socioeconomic strata that every Kenyan pupil is striving to enter. The whole educational system in Kenya clearly continues to be focused on the minority who succed.
Page 79 - Cuyckens for a very helpful and constructive critique of an earlier version of this paper. Needless to say, I alone am responsible for the arguments presented here.
Page 301 - QI and 0-2 are not similar tout court, but, upon proper analysis, they are more similar to each other than either of them is to...
Page 92 - DISLOCATION (read from the bottom up) 1. Education, work sphere, mass media and governmental operations at higher and nationwide levels 2.
Page 273 - This research was sponsored by the German Research Society (DFG), to which we wish to express our gratitude for this support. Most of all, we wish to thank the following !Xun people who assisted us during our field research in northern Namibia: Jimmy Haushona, Timotheus Erastus, Selma Hampolo, and Simon Hampolo. 2.
Page 111 - Adequately and objectively without a good grounding in the study of language use. language, ie, the communicative strength, determined by the number of functions a given language performs and the quality of such functions relative to the social structure of the speech community.

À propos de l'auteur (2004)

Katrin Bromber researches at the Centre for Modern Oriental Studies, Berlin, Germany.

Birgit Smieja is Assistant Professor at the University Koblenz-Landau, Germany.

Informations bibliographiques