UCL - Linguistic policies

[ROM2640]

[22.5h] 5 credits

This two-yearly course is taught in 2011-2012, 2013-2014,...

Teacher(s): Philippe Hambye

Language: French

Level: Second

Aims
Main themes
Content and teaching methods
Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Aims

By the end of the course, the student shall be able to:
- understand the social, economic and political issues of language planning in mono- and multilingual contexts,
- take a critical stance towards some examples of language policies, relating them to their underlying ethical and normative principles,
- identify useful scientific methods in a way to evaluate the potential or actual impact of some language policies,
- conceive such policies in response to given empirical situations.

Main themes

Several measures in language planning will be presented and explained to the students (policies aiming at promoting bilingualism or language feminization, policies against linguistic anglicization, educational policies regarding language quality, management of language use in multilingual companies, state regulation of language use at work, in advertising, etc.).Cases analyzed will be chosen in a way to meet different spheres of activity (public services, private companies, education system, etc.) and various aspects of language use (language rights, language quality, spelling reforms, terminology, attitudes towards language, etc.). A diversity of linguistic situation will be examined, with a preference for situations involving the French language.

Content and teaching methods

The course will start with a general introduction focusing on the major concepts of research on langue policy (e.g. language planning, status vs corpus), on the main disciplines linked to this research field, and to its scientific and social stakes.

The course will then study several actual language policies, in a way to catch their ethical and political groundings, their underlying language ideology, their modalities of implementation and their linguistic, social and political consequences. The focus will be first on policies aiming at regulating the use of languages within a State (e.g. Belgium, Quebec, USA, Great-Duchy of Luxembourg) or an institution (e.g. teaching languages at school, selecting the language used in the workplace), and then on policies aiming at modifying the way to use a particular language (e.g. feminisation, orthographical reform, struggle against Anglicism).

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Assessment :
The assessment is based on students' personal research, which will be synthesised in a written paper.

Course material :
A course website will be available through Icampus and will allow students to access, exchange and discuss information and documents related to the course.