Ethnic Identity and the Maintenance of Heritage Languages Essays

Ethnic Identity and the Maintenance of Heritage LanguagesNeither ethnicity nor m otherwise tonguenor even identities can be treated as things, commodities, that matchless can choose and discard like an old coat at willTove Skutnabb-Kangas (qtd in Fishman 55) Broadly speaking, language polity in the United States is apprehension of as a covert policy. Schiffman (2000) writes of the challenges of researching this field, given that issues of language are usually addressed subordinately to other issues. In Schiffmans view, it is a fallacy to assume that the U.S. presidency is neutral in regard to issues of language simply because the U.S. does not have an official language in actuality, the strength of this covert policy lies in how the political science deals with issues of language in conjunction with, for example, education and immigration policies (Schiffman 211). Despite Americas history of immigration and linguistic diversity, the only overt piece of law passed whose pur pose was to protect a specific languages use was the Native American Languages Act of 1990 (Schiffman 263), which stated that protecting Native American languages was the policy of the United States government. From the 19th century onward, English, then, has served as a de facto language of the United States, although no laws in addition to the previously mentioned act have been enacted to protect the rights of speakers of languages other than English. Many researchers have pointed out how the federal government did not intervene in issues of language, because the right to speak a language was considered a natural lengthiness of living in a democratic society, and therefore did not have to be protected under the law (as cited in Bey... ...--if supportEmptyParas-- Steve. Personal Interview. 28 April, 2003. whole kit and boodle Consulted Gold Mountain Dreams, and Between Two Worlds. Becoming American The Chinese Experience. Narr. Bill Moyers. Producer Thomas Lennon. PBS. 25-26 March 2003. Jen, Gish. Mona in the Promised Land. New York Vintage, 1997. Piller, Ingrid. Passing for a Native Speaker Identity and Success in Second Language Learning. Journal of Sociolinguistics 6.2 (2002) 179-206. Spolsky, Bernard. Sociolinguistics. Oxford University Press, 1997. Tong, Yuk Yue, et al. Language Use as a Carrier of Social Identity. supranational Journal of Intercultural Relations. 23.2 (1999) 281-296.