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"Language and culture Political aspects Case studies."
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Nationalism, Language, and Muslim Exceptionalism
In an era of ethnopolitical conflict and constitutional change worldwide, nationalist and Islamist movements are two of the most powerful forces in global politics. However, the respective roles played by nationalism and Islamism in Muslim separatist movements have until recently been poorly understood. The conventional view foregrounds Muslim exceptionalism, which suggests that allegiance to the nation of Islam trumps ethnic or national identity. But, as Tristan James Mabry shows, language can be a far more reliable indicator of a Muslim community's commitment to nationalist or Islamist struggles.
Drawing on fieldwork in Iraq, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines,Nationalism, Language, and Muslim Exceptionalismexamines and compares the ethnopolitical identity of six Muslim separatist movements. There are variations in secularism and ethnonationalism among the cases, but the key factor is the presence or absence of a vernacular print culturea social cement that binds a literate population together as a national group. Mabry shows that a strong print culture correlates with a strong ethnonational identity, and a strong ethnonational identity correlates with a conspicuous absence of Islamism. Thus, Islamism functions less as an incitement, more as an opportunistic pull with greater influence when citizens do not have a strong ethnonational bond. An innovative perspective firmly grounded in empirical research,Nationalism, Language, and Muslim Exceptionalismhas important implications for scholars and policymakers alike.
eBook
Culture, catastrophe, and rhetoric
This volume explores political culture, especially the catastrophic elements of the global social order emerging in the twenty-first century. By emphasizing the texture of political action, the book theorizes how social context becomes evident on the surface of events and analyzes the performative dimensions of political experience. The attention to catastrophe allows for an understanding of how ordinary people contend with normal system operation once it is indistinguishable from system breakdown. Through an array of case studies, the book provides an account of change as it is experienced, negotiated, and resisted in specific settings that define a society's capacity for political action.
eBook
Language Learning and Forced Migration
This pioneering piece of research on the situated study of
language issues in the context of forced migration provides
interdisciplinary insights into language as learned, used and lived
by 12 Congolese refugees in Norway. It offers an innovative
contribution to the field of SLA by bringing together structural,
cognitive, social and critical approaches to data collected among
the same individuals, these individuals being underrepresented
within the field of SLA research as both refugees and learners
whose experiences with language stem from the Global South. Their
histories of mobility and their learning contexts are rarely
reflected in theories and concepts from the Global North and this
book thus makes a much-needed contribution to the field.
eBook
How Many Languages Do We Need?
In the global economy, linguistic diversity influences economic and political development as well as public policies in positive and negative ways. It leads to financial costs, communication barriers, divisions in national unity, and, in some extreme cases, conflicts and war--but it also produces benefits related to group and individual identity. What are the specific advantages and disadvantages of linguistic diversity and how does it influence social and economic progress? This book examines linguistic diversity as a global social phenomenon and considers what degree of linguistic variety might result in the greatest economic good.
Victor Ginsburgh and Shlomo Weber look at linguistic proximity between groups and between languages. They describe and use simple economic, linguistic, and statistical tools to measure diversity's impact on growth, development, trade, the quality of institutions, translation issues, voting patterns in multinational competitions, and the likelihood and intensity of civil conflicts. They address the choosing of core languages in a multilingual community, such as the European Union, and argue that although too many official languages might harm cohesiveness, efficiency, and communication, reducing their number brings about alienation and disenfranchisement of groups.
Demonstrating that the value and drawbacks of linguistic diversity are universal,How Many Languages Do We Need?suggests ways for designing appropriate linguistic policies for today's multilingual world.
eBook
The Routledge Handbook of Arabic Sociolinguistics
The Routledge Handbook of Arabic Sociolinguistics comprises 22 chapters encompassing various aspects in the study of Arabic dialects within their sociolinguistic context.
This is a novel volume, which not only includes the traditional topics in variationist sociolinguistics, but also links the sociolinguistic enterprise to the history of Arabic and to applications of sociolinguistics beyond the theoretical treatment of variation. Newly formed trends, with an eye to future research, form the backbone of this volume.
With contributions from an international pool of researchers, this volume will be of interest to scholars and students of Arabic sociolinguistics, as well as to linguists interested in a concise, rounded view of the field.
eBook
The media and globalization
The Media and Globalization offers: a clear and accessible overview of globalization and the pivotal role of the media; an introduction to the concepts and theories of globalization; empirical data on the production and consumption of media; and a methodology for relating individual, local experiences to the global picture.
eBook
Tatar Teaching and Learning Resources in Finland
Tatar-language education has been organised by the Tatar communities in Finland for more than a century. This traditional minority, today comprising less than a thousand members, was already literate and valued education on arriving in Finland in the second half of the nineteenth century. With very little official support, they have continued to transmit their language, culture, and religion through original and adapted teaching and learning resources (TLRs) for more than six generations. The TLRs target mainly children and young people of kindergarten and school age, but many publications and activities are aimed at all age groups. This overview approaches the production of Tatar TLRs in Finland from cultural, multilingual, and social points of view, discussing less-common aspects in minority research such as the role of women, the significance of traditions, religion and community organisation, attitudes to adaptation and education, as well as the impact of the political and economic situation, multilingualism, and multiculturalism on a minority with a high number of polyglots and transnational connections. The qualitative case study is interdisciplinary, based on a literature review and several decades of participatory observation, interviews, and informal discussions; it uses source pluralism and memory studies to discuss the developments and the cultural and social aspects of TLR production and application of TLRs in language and culture preservation.
Journal Article
Renaming as representation of community onomastic interests: A case study of Alfred Duma Municipality
The renaming of places is a multifaceted phenomenon that reflects the dynamic interplay between historical, cultural and sociopolitical forces within a community. This article examines the renaming process as a lens through which to study the onomastic interests of communities at the Alfred Duma Local Municipality, in uThukela District Municipality, post-apartheid South Africa. The renaming of places considers a wide variety of elements that determine which places need to be renamed and why. Drawing upon social identity theory as the theoretical framework, this article investigates the motivations, mechanisms and implications of renaming initiatives at the Alfred Duma Local Municipality. This study also focuses on delineating an array of elements and backgrounds regarding the renaming of places. It addresses the topics of the deconstruction of a colonial legacy through place naming, the politics of renaming and the identity of a place in the post-apartheid era. This is a qualitative study with data collected through face-to-face semi-structured interviews. Twenty-six participants were selected to partake in this study. The findings of the data were thematically analysed.ContributionThe findings of the study revealed that the community members were pleased with the renaming of places to isiZulu. However, they recommended implementing a more transparent process, as some members were not informed about the renaming process. The new place names represent the onomastic interest of the community as they are the place names the community relates to and are recognised for their historical significance and meaning.
Journal Article
Architectural Heritage Analysis of the Yuanying Guan Pavilion: Construction and Signification
This paper aims to analyse the structural function and symbolic function of the historic building Yuan Guan during the inculturation process in the early Qing dynasty in China. This process was the dominant Western practice during the early Qing dynasty, when technology, design, aesthetics, and linear perspective were considered indispensable tools to express the nature of an architectural encounter between China and Europe. Given the artistic–cultural richness of this context, the masterwork Yuanying Guan complex can be examined from a spatial semiotic study in an original and unique way. Thus, semiotic tools were used to interpret the expression of the architectural space and to formulate a subsequent understanding of the architectural forms of this destroyed heritage, turning each element into a tool of communication.
Journal Article