Officialising language : a discourse study of language politics in the United States

Abstract

This is a study of the discourse contest concerning the officialisation of English in the United States. It consists of an analysis of the language of that discourse shaped by a belief that discourse is a rather neglected but potentially illuminating area of examination of language and literacy policy. The study seeks to understand the processes and content of language policy as it is being made, or performed, and is influenced by a critique of the theory and practice of language policy which tends to adopt technicist paradigms of examination that insufficiently elucidate the politics of the field. ¶ Accordingly a systematic gathering of the texts of language disputation in the US was collected. These texts were organised in response to the methods of elicitation. Semi-elicited texts, elicited texts and unelicited texts were gathered and tested to be sure that they constituted a fair representation of the concourse (what had been said and was being said about the issue) over a 15 year period. Those statements, or texts, that had particular currency during the 104th Congress were selected for further use. An empirical examination of the subjective dispositions of those activists involved in the making of official English, or of resisting the making of official English, was conducted. ¶ ... ¶ The theoretical implications for a reinvigorated language policy theory constitute the latter part of the thesis. In the multi-epistemological context that postmodernity demands, with its skepticism about the possibility of ‘disinterest’, the thesis offers its own kinds of data triangulation, and the making central of subjective dispositions and political purposes and engagements of the principal anatagonists.