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Latvia
(2019)
This chapter deals with current issues in bilingual education in the framework of language and educational policies in Latvia, and also outlines similarities or common tendencies in the two other Baltic states, Estonia and Lithuania. As commonly understood in the 21st century, the term ‘bilingual education’ includes ‘multilingual education, as the umbrella term to cover a wide spectrum of practice and policy’ (García, 2009: 9).
Our paper discusses family language policies among multilingual families in Latvia with Russian as home language. The presentation is based on three case studies, i.e. interviews conducted with Russophones who have chosen to send their children to Latvian-medium pre-schools and schools. The main aim is to understand practices and regards among such families “from below,” i.e. which family-internal and family-external factors influenced the choice of Latvian-medium education and what impact this choice has on linguistic practices.
The paper shows that there have been critical events which both encouraged and discouraged the choice of Latvian-medium education. The wish to integrate into mainstream society has been met by obstacles both from ethnic Russians and Latvians. Yet, the three families consider their choices to be the right ones for the future development of their children in a multiethnic Latvia in which Latvian serves as the unifying language of society.
This chapter explores the Linguistic Landscape of six medium-size towns in the Baltic States with regard to languages of tourism and to the role of English and Russian as linguae francae. A quantitative analysis of signs and of tourism web sites shows that, next to the state languages, English is the most dominant language. Yet, interviews reveal that underneath the surface, Russian still stands strong. Therefore, possible claims that English might take over the role of the main lingua franca in the Baltic States cannot be maintained. English has a strong position for attracting international tourists, but only alongside Russian which remains important both as a language of international communication and for local needs.
This chapter will present results of a linguistic landscape (LL) project in the regional centre of Rēzekne in the region of Latgale in Eastern Latvia. Latvia was de facto a part of the Soviet Union until 1991, and this has given it a highly multilingual society. In the essentially post-colonial situation since 1991, strict language policies have been in place, which aim to reverse the language shift from Russian, the dominant language of Soviet times, back to Latvian. Thus, the main interests of the research were how the complex pattern of multilingualism in Latvia is reflected in the LL; how people relate to current language legislation; and what motivations, attitudes and emotions inform their behaviour.
In der akademischen Diskussion zum Global English hat sich seit den 1980er Jahren ein Modell etabliert, das die Staaten, in denen Englisch gesprochen wird, idealtypisch in drei Kreise einteilt: Den Inneren Kreis, in dem Englisch wichtigste Sprache der Gesellschaft sowie L1 eines Großteils der Bevölkerung ist, den Äußeren Kreis, wo Englisch L2 und eine wichtige Sprache unter mehreren ist, sowie den Erweiterten oder Expandierenden Kreis, in dem Englisch als Fremdsprache und als Lingua Franca dominiert (Kachru, 1985). Dieser Beitrag zeigt anhand einer Bestandsaufnahme gesellschaftlicher Funktionen des Deutschen weltweit, dass dieses Modell auch auf das Deutsche übertragen werden kann. Allerdings unterscheidet sich das Deutsche in einigen erheblichen Aspekten vom Englischen: Zum Inneren Kreis gehören die Länder des deutschsprachigen Kerngebietes, zum Äußeren Kreis Länder, in denen Deutsch anerkannte Minderheitensprache ist, und zum Erweiterten (oder im Falle des Deutschen eher Bröckelnden) Kreis Länder, in denen es einzelne deutsche Sprachinseln oder eine deutschsprachige Diaspora gibt, wobei letztere auch erst in jüngster Zeit entstanden sein kann. Schließlich diskutiert der Aufsatz die Position des Baltikums in diesem Modell.
The establishment of Scottish Parliament: What difference does it make for the Gaelic language?
(2004)
After the Labour government takeover in Westminster in 1997, followed by the referendum on establishing a Scottish Parliament, hopes for more support for the Gaelic language in Scotland were nourished. In the election campaign to the Scottish Parliament in 1999, all parties which were elected to Parliament had mentioned Gaelic, and all parties except the Conservatives had promised an increase in support for Gaelic (cf. Scottish parties’ election manifestoes, obtainable from the parties or via their web sites). Now that the new Scottish Executive, formed by Labour and the Liberal Democrats, has been in power for some time, it is interesting to see if these hopes have been fulfilled.
The two core questions of this paper will thus be:
1. What is the status of Scottish Gaelic after the devolution process?
2. What difference does the existence of the Scottish Parliament make for the status of Gaelic?
It is important to note that this paper refers to language status and Gaelic’s position from a mere language policy perspective. The results are mostly based on an analysis of Parliament documents, the method of investigation being strictly philological. Empirical research has not yet been undertaken. The reference time of my paper will be the first year of Scottish Parliament and the new executive. Even though this is an arbitrary time break, the first year is a symbolic point of time. As the first legislation period as a possibly more natural reference point is not over yet, this choice seems legitimate.
This chapter analyses the impact of political decentralization in a state on the position of ethnic and linguistic minorities, in particular with regard to the role of parliamentary assemblies in the political system. It relates a number of typical functions of parliaments to the specific needs of minorities and their languages. The most important of these functions are the representation of the minority and responsiveness to the minority’s needs. The chapter then discusses six examples from the European Union (and Norway) which prototypically represent different types of parliamentary decentralization: the ethnically defined Sameting in Norway and its importance for the Sámi population, the Scottish Parliament and its role for speakers of Scottish Gaelic, the German regional parliaments of the Länder of Schleswig-Holstein and Saxony and their impact on the Frisian and Sorbian minorities respectively, the autonomy of predominantly German-speaking South Tyrol within the Italian state, and finally the situation of the speakers of Latgalian in Latvia, where a decentralized parliament is missing. The chapter also makes suggestions on comparisons of these situations with minorities in Russia. It finally argues that political decentralization may indeed empower minorities to gain a greater voice in their states, even if much ultimately depends on individual factors in each situation and the attitudes by the majority population and the political center.
This paper seeks to apply the principles of the famous 3-Circle-Model devised for the description of the ecolinguistic position of English world-wide to the position of German around the world.
On the one hand, the 3-Circle-Model for English with its "Inner", "Outer" and "Extended/Expanding" Circles was invented by Kachru in the 1980s and has since then been adopted, refined and criticised by numerous authors. The situation of German world-wide, on the other hand, has only been scarcely discussed in the past 20 years. While the global extension of German is obviously by far weaker than that of English, there are also a number of noteworthy similarities in terms of historical spread and the current position of these two languages.
This paper therefore discusses the analogies of global English and German by establishing three circles for German: the Inner Circle for the core German-speaking area, i.e. Germany, Austria and Switzerland; the Outer Circle including a number of German minority areas (mostly in Europe), and finally the Extended Circle which may be denoted as "Crumbling" rather than "Expanding". The latter comprises traditional German diaspora communities in different parts of the world which either result from migration, but also reflect the previous functions of German as a language of culture and as a lingua franca in regions like Eastern Europe. The paper argues that there are some striking structural similarities, but also shows the limits of this comparison.
Linguistic Landscapes (LL) sind in der internationalen Soziolinguistik und verwandten Disziplinen in aller Munde. Seit Mitte der 2000er Jahre sind Studien, die sich als Teil dieses Ansatzes verstehen, wie Pilze aus dem Boden geschossen. Seit 2008 hat es in fast jährlichem Rhythmus gut besuchte Tagungen gegeben, die sich ausschließlich mit Linguistic Landscapes beschäftigen - sowohl mit Fallstudien aus aller Welt als auch mit theoretischen und methodologischen Fragen. Folgerichtig sind nicht nur eine Vielzahl von Einzelaufsätzen erschienen, es hat auch mehrere Sammelveröffentlichungen gegeben, und seit 2015 erscheint ein eigenes Journal unter dem Titel „Linguistic Landscapes“ (vgl. Gorter 2013 für einen Überblick über die Entwicklung des Ansatzes).
Obwohl auch Wissenschaftler, die im deutschsprachigen Raum tätig sind, sich in den letzten Jahren den Linguistic Landscapes gewidmet haben, hat die Methode in deutschsprachigen Publikationen jedoch bisher nur einen vergleichsweise geringen Stellenwert eingenommen. Dieser Beitrag möchte somit zum einen Grundlagenarbeit leisten, indem er die Idee der Linguistic Landscapes noch einmal vorstellt und seine Entwicklung der vergangenen Jahre nachzeichnet. Zum anderen soll im Kontext dieses Bandes der Nutzen des Ansatzes für die Analyse von Sprachen von Migrantengruppen diskutiert werden. Schließlich wird der Beitrag durch einige Bemerkungen dazu abgerundet, in welchem Maße die Untersuchung von LL einen Nutzwert haben kann, der über wissenschaftliche Kreise hinausgeht. Grundlage für diesen Beitrag sind internationale Veröffentlichungen der letzten Jahre, vor allem aber gehen Erfahrungen aus eigenen Studien mit ein, die wir seit 2007 mit unterschiedlichen Zielsetzungen im Baltikum und in Deutschland durchgeführt haben.
This chapter investigates policies which shape the role of the German language in contemporary Estonia. Whereas German played for many centuries an important role as the language of the economic and cultural elite in Estonia, it severely declined in importance throughout the twentieth century. Mirrored on this historical background, the paper provides an overview of the current functions of German and attitudes towards it and it discusses how these functions and attitudes are influenced by policies of various actors from inside and outside Estonia. The paper argues that German continues to play a significant role: while German is no longer a lingua franca, it still enjoys a number of functions and prestige in clearly defined niches involving communication within German-speaking circles or between Estonians and Germans. The interplay of language policies of the Estonian and the German-speaking states as well as by semi-state and private institutions succeed in maintaining German as an additional language in contemporary Estonia.
This chapter introduces readers to the context and concept of this volume. It starts by providing an historical overview of languages and multilingualism in Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia, highlighting the 100th anniversary of statehood which the three Baltic states are celebrating in 2018. Then, the chapter briefly presents important strands of research on multilingualism in the region throughout the past decades; in particular, questions about language policies and the status of the national languages (Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian) and Russian. It also touches on debates about languages in education and the roles of other languages such as the regional languages of Latgalian and Võro and the changing roles of international languages such as English and German. The chapter concludes by providing short summaries of the contributions to this book.
Dieser Beitrag vergleicht die Ansätze ,Linguistic Landscapes' (LL) und ,Spot German' (SG) in Hinblick auf ihr Potenzial für die Untersuchung des Vorkommens und der Funktionen der deutschen Sprache in Regionen außerhalb des deutschsprachigen Kerngebietes. Als Beispiele wurden eine LL-Studie im Baltikum sowie eine SG-Untersuchung auf Zypern gewählt. Der Vergleich zeigt, dass beide Methoden - trotz ihrer unterschiedlichen Präzision - ähnliche Aussagen zur Rolle des Deutschen erlauben: In beiden Ländern erscheint Deutsch als „Ergänzungssprache“ zu den gesellschaftlichen Hauptsprachen in bestimmten Nischen, z.B. im Tourismus und in Verbindung mit bestimmten Firmen und Produkten.
Studies on the Linguistic Landscapes (LLs) investigate frequencies, functions, and power relations between languages and their speakers in public space. Research on the LL thereby aims to understand how the production and perception of signs reflect and simultaneously shape realities. In this sense, the LL is one of the most dynamic places where processes of minoritization take place: the (in)visibility of minority languages and the functional and symbolic relationships to majority languages are in direct relationship with negotiations of minorities’ place in society. This chapter looks at minority languages in the LL from two major perspectives. Firstly, it discusses language policies, focussing on which policy categories and which domains of language use are of particular relevance for understanding minority languages in the LL. Then, it turns to issues of conflict, contestation, and exclusion by providing examples from a range of geographically and typologically prototypical case studies, including Israel, Canada, Belgium, the Basque Country, and Friesland.
This paper discusses how the regional language of Latgalian in Latvia has benefitted from societal discourse on the antagonism between speakers of Latvian and Russian in Latvia. Triggered by the 2012 referendum on Russian as a possible second state language of Latvia, Latvian politics (exemplified by politicians' statements since 2012 as well as by 2014 election manifestoes) as well as society at large (displayed by e.g. increased attention in the educational sector and the media) have started to devote considerably more attention to the region of Latgale, including its cultural and linguistic heritage. The paper thereby argues that speakers of Latgalian have gained a noteworthy increase in voice, even though the future of the variety is still considered to be uncertain.
Sprachliche Zeichen im öffentlichen Raum (Linguistic Landscape - LL) tragen neben ihrer primären Bedeutung und Funktion wie Auskunft und Werbung auch sekundäre Informationen zur Sprachenhierarchie, zur Repräsentation von Minderheitensprachen, zur sprachlichen Toleranz gegenüber der Mehrsprachigkeit in diesem Raum, etc. Diese Vielschichtigkeit macht die sprachlichen Zeichen im öffentlichen Raum zu wertvollen Lernobjekten, an denen die im Berufsleben so bedeutende diskursive Lesefähigkeit der Studierenden trainiert werden kann. Der Beitrag öffnet Perspektiven auf die Möglichkeiten der Verknüpfung der LL-Analyse mit den Inhalten der traditionellen germanistischen Curricula wie auch benachbarter Fachbereiche und verweist auf bisherige Studien in diesem Bereich.
Research on language politics, policy, and planning is of importance to contact linguistics, since political relations between groups of language users, the way in which the use of language(s) is organized, and how language issues are politicized fundamentally shape the political and social conditions under which language varieties are in contact. This chapter first provides a short sketch of how language policy, planning, and politics have so far been conceptualized. Major subfields will be discussed, and then relevant actors and factors in these processes will be introduced. At the end, these aspects will be discussed from a contact linguistic perspective and summarized in a graphic visualization.
This chapter discusses functions of the German language in the Linguistic Landscape (LL) of the Baltic states, with a focus on the Latvian capital Riga. For this end, it applies the "Spot German" approach (cf. Heimrath 2017) in the context of debates on the international role of German (cf. Ammon 2015). It argues that German is an "additional language of society" (cf. Marten 2017b), i.e. it is not a dominant language in the Baltics but can regularly be found in a variety of functions. These relate both to the historical role of German in the region (including its contemporary commodification) and to current relations between the Baltics and the German-speaking countries. These include tourism, business, or educational and political institutions, but also point to, e.g., discourses on the quality assigned to products from the German-speaking region. In this sense, the Baltic states are part of what may, in accordance with Kachru's (1985) 3-circle-model for English, be labelled as "extended circle" of German. At the same time, the chapter discusses how conclusions from Linguistic Landscape research can be used for understanding marketing both in and for the German language: On the one hand, German carries the potential of persuading customers to opt for a certain product. On the other hand, the abundance of situations where German can be "spotted" suggests that the LL may successfully be used for language-marketing purposes, as exemplified by a brochure and a poster created by the DAAD Information Centre for the Baltic states in Riga.
Numerous academics and politicians have in recent years contributed to the description and analysis of language policy for the benefit of smaller languages. The present paper tries to add to these by taking up the notion of yet another aspect of politics and language, exemplified by two case studies. The political aspect is the decentralization of parliamentary power for the benefit of minority languages. The two case studies deal with the relationship between the Scottish Parliament and the Gaelic language on the one hand, and between the Norwegian Sarni Parliament, the Sameting, and the Sami language on the other hand. The underlying idea is to consider whether parliamentary bodies may contribute to the empowerment of speakers of minority languages regarding the language of individual choice in as many instances as possible. This applies to any domain of language use, but in particular public bodies, education, and the media, at local, regional and national levels.