New Approaches to Language Attitudes in the Hispanic and Lusophone World

The analysis of language attitudes is important not only because attitudes can affect language maintenance and language change but also because such reflections and discussions can bring light to social, cultural, political and educational matters that require an interdisciplinary approach. This volume fills a crucial void in the field of Hispanic and Lusophone linguistics by introducing the latest production in the discipline of attitudes toward Spanish, Spanish sign language, Portuguese, Guarani and Papiamentu around the world, from South America and the Caribbean to the United States, Spain and Japan. The studies presented in this collection – a variety of sociolinguistic scenarios and methodological approaches – will make an important contribution to theoretical discussions on linguistic attitudes, specifically in the domains of language integration through education, language policy, and language maintenance. This book is intended for sociolinguists, social scientists and scholars in the humanities as well as graduate students enrolled in sociolinguistics courses.

Claudia Sánchez, Illinois State University, on Linguist List 32.3437 (2021):
The appearance of this volume is timely in that the investigation of cross-linguistic influences and contexts have become more relevant; multicultural societies and communities also call for studies that take into account how both external and internal factors can have an effect on individuals’ language use and attitudes, as well as on how these factors may have a different impact on bilingual or even multilingual individuals, and the contexts which they navigate on a daily basis. Finally, this volume appears at a time when language has been put forward as a means of expression of personal identity, in spaces where minority languages may have been regarded as irrelevant, unimportant, or even illegitimate.