- Title
- Language and value: towards accepting a richer linguistic ecology for South Africa
- Creator
- Wright, Laurence
- Date
- 2004
- Type
- text
- Type
- article
- Identifier
- vital:7042
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007383
- Identifier
- https://doi.org/10.1075/lplp.28.2.05wri
- Description
- preprint
- Description
- Language policy debate is often obscured by two factors: failure to acknowledge different time-frames attending contrasting positions, and failure to recognise that ordinary people are motivated by their perceived best interests in the present. This article argues that the key to more general public acceptance of linguistic ecological diversity in South Africa is to shift the emphasis from policy development to practical language cultivation issues. Provide the requisite cultivation support, and acceptance of a revitalised future for African languages becomes more assured. It should also be understood that the modernisation of African languages in South Africa has a political dimension concerning which South African language commentators are strangely silent. This political thrust may not be entirely congruent with the concerns of those whose brief for African languages is primarily cultural or ecological – if, indeed, they are even aware of it. Finally, it needs to be recognised that language development under conditions of controlled influence, as in the civil service or schooling, is potentially achievable (with whatever difficulty), but that this must be complemented by authentic contemporary intellectual work published in African languages if the linguistic dimension of the African Renaissance is to take off.
- Format
- 36 pages, pdf
- Language
- English
- Relation
- Language Problems and Language Planning, Wright, L.S. (2004) Language and value: towards accepting a richer linguistic ecology for South Africa. Language Problems and Language Planning, 28 (2). pp. 175-197, Language Problems and Language Planning volume 28 number 2 175 197 2004 type="issn">1569-9889
- Rights
- Wright, Laurence
- Rights
- Use of this resource is governed by the terms and conditions of the Language Problems and Language Planning Self-archiving Policy
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Wright, Laurence (Prof)
RU Institute for the Study of English in Africa (ISEA)
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