Examines factors influencing language maintenance among secondary school students of Vietnamese ethnic background. Students' Vietnamese language ability and frequency of Vietnamese language use were evaluated and correlated with demographic, cultural, social, and attitudinal factors. Length of residence in Australia was more influential in…

Examines the question of language revitalization against the background of the use of Hebrew as the language of public life in Israel and of Irish as an official language of Ireland. Notes that the organizing principles of nationalism are complex and disputed. The different linguistic outcomes in these two countries point up the complexity and…

Examines the impact of language policy in Ukraine on language utilization patterns of school children in Kyiv. Using quantitative data from student responses to a questionnaire focusing on subject background, native and home language, including reported usage of interactive and interpretive language, examines the extent to which language shift or…

Discusses the consequences of "language shift through erosion" on the basis of an analysis of the gradual disappearance of Dutch as a native language in French Flanders. Sketches the theoretical language-in-contact framework, breaking down the chronological evolution into diglossic, bilingual and (almost) monolingual phases. (37…

Discusses the regional identities operating within and influencing the reality of the European Union. Specific focus is on INTERREG, plurilingualism, English as an auxilary language, minority languages, modern languages in secondary and tertiary education, responding to the needs of business, and a national policy toward foreign language…

Highlights the lifelong work of linguists Robert W. Young and William Morgan in developing written Navajo. In contrast to technical orthographies, Young and Morgan developed a practical orthography that took advantage of native speakers' implicit knowledge and opened up possibilities for producing materials in written Navajo. Young and Morgan also…

Traces the history of institutionalized violence--both physical and symbolic--within American Indian education; the legacy of shame and guilt from the boarding school era, when oppression was internalized; and the relationship of such "mis-education" to the decline of Tlingit language and culture in southwestern Alaska. Discusses…

Describes two major events--mass migration to New Caledonia in the 1950s and the conversion from a protectorate to a French overseas territory in 1961--that have confronted Wallis and Futuna (Central Polynesia) with the same sociolinguistic problems that have beset other Pacific islands for decades. (Author/CB)

A Federal Government Policy in Nigeria aimed at unifying the country through the use of three major languages (Hausa, Yoruba, and Igbo) has been inhibited because there are no teachers. Resistance from speakers of other languages to the enforced learning of one of the major languages also seems likely. Maintenance of English is suggested as the…

Presents a historic overview and analysis of the Sardinian language (actually a system of dialects), and defines diglossia and bilingualism. A discussion focuses on research conducted in two junior high schools to determine the differences in linguistic behavior in two contrasting situations (village and city) in regard to Sardinian and Italian.…

Study of native language maintenance of 10- and 11-year-old children of Lebanese immigrants in Australia found that most could speak but not read or write Lebanese. Lebanese competence depended on subjects' parents' literacy level and interest in language quality, and actual use reflected children's opportunities or necessity to speak Lebanese.…

An interview with Guy Roy, adjunct minister of education and professional education in Manitoba (Canada), explores the role of French, French language instruction, and French-language education outside Quebec Province, and specifically in Manitoba. Issues discussed include language and cultural maintenance, immersion education, language attitudes,…

Drawing on social and political theory, this article argues that the retention and promotion of specific group-based rights--in this case, indigenous language and education rights--need not result in social and linguistic closure. Principles underlying such rights are illustrated by an extended analysis of recent Maori language-immersion…

Examines the Aotearoa/New Zealand context, charting the history of colonial educational provision for Maori from the nineteenth century, and then contrasting it with the recent developments in Maori-medium language programs within education. The reemergence of Maori tribal and urban authorities and their central role in the provision of new forms…

Examines literacy practices at Genoa Industrial Indian School (Nebraska), 1884-1934, one of the largest federal Indian boarding schools. Focuses on literary texts that students read, particularly "Stiya: A Carlisle Indian Girl at Home" and "Ramona"; student essays about preservation versus extinction of Indian languages and…