Language Attitudes and Minority Rights

✍ Scribed by James Hawkey

• Publisher: Springer International Publishing;Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2018
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 232
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book presents a detailed sociolinguistic study of the traditionally Catalan-speaking areas of Southern France, and sheds new light on language attitudes, phonetic variation, language ideologies and minority language rights. The region’s complex dual identity, both Catalan and French, both peripheral and strategic, is shown to be reflected in the book’s attitudinal findings which in turn act as reliable predictors of phonetic variation. The author’s careful discursive analysis paints a clear picture of the linguistic ideological landscape: in which French dominates as the language of status and prestige. This innovative work, employing cutting-edge mixed methods, provides an in-depth account of an under-examined language situation, and draws on this research to propose a number of policy recommendations to protect minority rights for speakers of Catalan in the region. Combining language attitudes, sociophonetics, discourse studies, and language policy, this will provide an invaluable reference for scholars of French and Catalan studies and minority languages around the world.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter ....Pages i-xxii
Research Context: Northern Catalonia (James Hawkey)....Pages 1-46
Theoretical and Methodological Considerations (James Hawkey)....Pages 47-77
Quantitative Approaches to Language Attitudes in Northern Catalonia (James Hawkey)....Pages 79-114
Phonetic Variation and Language Attitudes in Northern Catalonia (James Hawkey)....Pages 115-147
Qualitative Analysis: Spatial Discourses and Language Ideologies in Northern Catalonia (James Hawkey)....Pages 149-179
Discussion: Minority Language Rights in Northern Catalonia (James Hawkey)....Pages 181-205
Back Matter ....Pages 207-216

✦ Subjects

Linguistics; Sociolinguistics; Minority Languages; Language Policy and Planning; Area Studies; Linguistic Anthropology; Phonology and Phonetics