Tues. & Thurs. 10:00-11:20 PM, rm. 297 Paccar Hall
Language Politics and Cultural Identity
Instructor: Prof. Laada Bilaniuk (she)
Office: Denny Hall M244
Office Hours: by appointment
e-mail: bilaniuk@uw.edu
“There is no linguistic exchange, however insignificant or personal it may seem, which does not bear the traces of the social structure that it helps to reproduce”
—John Thompson, summing up Pierre Bourdieu
Course description
How do ways of speaking come to stand for social identities and values? Why does speaking a certain way give some people more power? How does the way we speak shape our sense of self? These are some of the questions we will address in this course, as we examine the nature of linguistic diversity around the world from a linguistic anthropological perspective, that is, based on ethnographic field research. This approach tries to get at how people experience, understand, and practice language in their everyday lives, in order to illuminate the complex dynamics of language politics and its implications.
The course begins with an inquiry into the emergence and nature of the “language unit,” a language that gets a name (like “English”). Key to unpacking the language unit is a focus on language ideology (the mediating link between linguistic and social forms) and symbolic power. We examine various case studies, delving into the complexities that lie beyond the simple labels and blur their boundaries, including in the United States, Israel, the Arabic-speaking world, Ukraine, and other contexts. We will consider the institutional and interpersonal struggles that shape language statuses, and how identity is enacted and symbolized through language. We will also learn about various field research methods that can be used to investigate language politics.
Students will choose an individual linguistic/geographic focus to investigate on their own. The final product of this research will be a paper, due in Week 10. In this paper you should outline the parameters of your chosen language situation and explore a facet of that situation in more depth. Students will consult with the instructor to determine their topic and sources. This is a 3-credit course, but students who would like to conduct a more extensive research project can enroll for an additional 2 credits of independent study (ANTH 499 for undergraduates, ANTH 600 for graduate students) with Prof. Bilaniuk. Ask for an independent study add code to enroll.
The goal of this course is to give you a deeper understanding of language ideology and language politics. You should come away with a basis for cross-cultural comparison in considering the import of historical, political, geographic, linguistic, and psychological factors, and how they intertwine in shaping language politics. You will also learn about ethnographic research methods focusing on language and identity.
Course requirements and grading
- Class Participation (50% of grade). A large portion of this class will consist of discussion activities, in-class assignments, and close analysis of the readings in small-group and whole-seminar discussions. Readings will be available as pdfs on the course website. You are expected to come to every class having done the reading assignments carefully and fully, prepared to discuss your questions and criticisms. The class participation grade also includes Homework, as will be announced in class & on the website.
If you absolutely must miss a class, for an excusable reason, check for the make-up assignment in the module. That assignment (and your reason and any applicable documentation) is due in the next class session you attend.
- Quizzes (30% of grade—15% each quiz). There will be two quizzes covering main points from the readings. These are intended to help you push yourself to complete the readings, think about them, and be able to articulate key concepts.
- Research Project paper. (20% of grade). Students choose a linguistic/geographic focus to investigate, in consultation with Prof. Bilaniuk. In the paper, the student should outline the basic parameters of their chosen language situation, and explore a facet of that situation in more depth. (For undergrads the length should be 7 pages, for graduate students it should be 10-12 pages. Students doing the additional 2 credits of independent study write a longer paper and also do a Powerpoint presentation on their project).
(Some past topics included: the stigma of Japanese in Korea; Japanese dialects; Cantonese language endangerment; language diversity in Taiwan ; Vietnamese language aesthetics in South Vietnam; gender-neutral language in Romanian)
COURSE OUTLINE
Go to Modules for week-by week topics, links to readings, and assignments.
WEEK 1: Introduction
Tuesday January 7: What is “language politics”? Defining the field.
In-class writing: “We are all to a greater or lesser degree multilingual.”
What is your linguistic repertoire?
Thursday January 9: TBD
Homework to turn in by Sunday Jan.12: online response paper to the reading. Consider the “linguistic facts of life” that Lippi-Green lays out. Where do you stand in relation to these facts? Are any of them challenging to accept, and if so, why? If you accept them, explain how you came to accept them. Which of these is most challenging for mainstream society, and why?
Also, please post on the "introduce yourself" discussion board.
WEEK 2: Language, nation, & the ideological construction of language units
Tuesday January 14:
Reading: • Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined communities. Pp. 1-46.
Refer to questions list as you read to prepare for class discussion (just a reading guide--no need to formally write up or turn these in).
Methods discussion: Designing questions and conducting interviews for language politics research.
In-class research methods practice: interviewing (language life history interviews.)
Thursday January 16: The myth of standard language
Read the two selections below by Lippi-Green and Thompson. Come to class prepared to explain what is the “Standard Language Myth.” What are commonalities between Lippi-Green’s argument and that of Bourdieu (as explained by Thompson)?
Readings:
• Lippi-Green, Rosina. 2012. Chapter 4: The standard language myth. English with an Accent: Language, ideology, and discrimination in the United States, 2nd ed. Pp. 55-64.
• Thompson, John B. 1991. Editor’s Introduction to Bourdieu’s Language & Symbolic Power. Pp.1-25 (top).
Today we will also discuss research project planning.
WEEK 3: Language and identity in Israel: The revival of Hebrew & Hebrew/Arabic dynamics
Tuesday January 21, Readings:
• Fellman, Jack. 1974. The role of Eliezer Ben Yehuda in the revival of the Hebrew language: an assessment. In, Advances in Language Planning, ed. J. Fishman. pp. 427-55.
• Nahir, Moshe. 1998. Micro language planning and the revival of Hebrew: a schematic framework. Language in Society27:335-357.
Thursday January 23, Reading:
• Levy, Lital. 2014. Ch. 1: From the “Hebrew Bedouin” to “Israeli Arabic” Arabic, Hebrew, and the Creation of Israeli Culture. Poetic Trespass: Writing between Hebrew and Arabic in Israel/Palestine. Princeton University Press. Read pp. 21-53. This reading provides historical context on the development of the relationship between Arabic and Hebrew languages in Israel.
***QUIZ 1 (take-home, due Sunday)
WEEK 4: Conflicts and complexities of identity and language in Israel
• Lefkowitz, Daniel. 2004. Ch1 & Ch3. Words and Stones: The Politics of Language and Identity in Israel.
Tuesday January 28 Reading: focus on Ch.1
Be prepared to discuss: What are Lefkowitz’s main arguments? What evidence does he bring forward to support them? Explain your favorite or most compelling ethnographic examples from the reading, and what they reveal. What theoretical points are made by Lefkowitz? Which do you find most compelling, confusing, or problematic? How does the author’s identity get invoked and how does it affect his research?
Thursday January 30 Reading: focus on Ch.3 of the Lefkowitz book
WEEK 5: Beyond Diglossia: Classical & Colloquial Arabics and the Self
Tuesday February 4, Reading:
• Haeri, Niloofar. 2000. Form and ideology: Arabic Sociolinguistics and Beyond. Annual Review of Anthropology 29(1):61-87.
Thursday February 6, Readings:
• Suleiman, Yasir. 2011. Ch. 3 (pp. 44-76) Arabic, Self and Identity: A study in conflict and displacement. Oxford U Press.
• Van den Hout, Charlotte E. 2013. Arabic or French? The Politics of Parole at a Psychiatric Hospital in Morocco. In, Encountering Morocco, ed. By David Crawford, Rachel Newcomb, Kevin Dwyer. pp. 16-39. Indiana University Press.
Research methods focus: self-reflexive ethnography
WEEK 6: Language and Legal Rights in the US; the impact of Global Evangelism on the survival of languages and cultures
Tuesday February 11: In winter quarter last year I (the instructor) did jury duty, and so I linked that experience to this day's focus on potential discrimination based on language and race/ethnicity in jury selection, and the more general issue of language rights in the US. Tuesday will include a recorded presentation by Calico Goodrich Seders.
Reading: • Supreme Court Case: Hernandez v. New York, (1991).
Thursday February 13: Global Evangelism and Language politics
In-class viewing of film: The Tailenders (2001, directed by Adele Horne, 72 min.) The "Tailenders" are the last people to be reached by worldwide evangelism. This film looks at a missionary group's efforts to record and distribute Bible stories in every language on Earth. While these efforts have documented (and so helped preserve) endangered languages, they have also been tightly intertwined with global capitalism and disruption of indigenous cultures and communities.
WEEK 7: Post-Soviet & post-colonial: Language politics in Ukraine
Tuesday February 18: Language Politics in Ukraine: the historical context
• Bilaniuk,Laada. 2005. Chapter 3 of Contested Tongues: Language Politics and Cultural Correction in Ukraine.
• Bilaniuk, Laada. 2017. Purism and pluralism: Language use trends in popular culture in Ukraine since independence. The Battle for Ukrainian: A Comparative Perspective, ed. by M. Flier and A. Graziosi. Pp. 343-363. Harvard University Press.
Thursday February 20: Language politics in Ukraine: agency, affect, & contemporary dynamics
• Bilaniuk, Laada. 2016. Ideologies of Language in Wartime. In, Revolution and War in Contemporary Ukraine: The Challenge of Change, ed. by Olga Bertelsen. Pp. 139-160. Ibidem.
• Shuvalova, Iryna. 2021. Ukraine at 30, Part III: The “Mova” I Live In. Los Angeles Review of Books. August 24. https://lareviewofbooks.org/short-takes/ukraine-at-30-part-iii-the-mova-i-live-in/Links to an external site.
***QUIZ 2
WEEK 8:
Tuesday February 25: Ukraine: linguistic conversions
• Bilaniuk,Laada. 2020. Linguistic conversions: Nation-building on the self. Journal of Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society 6(1): 59-82.
• Dovzhyk, Sasha. 2023. Mother Tongue: The Story of a Ukrainian Language Convert. How one Ukrainian woman made the switch from her native Russian tongue to Ukrainian. New Lines magazine, 23 February. https://newlinesmag.com/first-person/mother-tongue-the-story-of-a-ukrainian-language-convert/Links to an external site.
Thursday Feb. 27: discussion of examples of language politics submitted by students
Weeks 9 & 10: presentations and readings related to the +2 credit independent study student projects.
Tuesday:
• Readings TBA
Thursday:
• Readings TBA
final paper due March 16