A critical commentary on the discourse of language rights in the Naivasha language policy in Sudan using habitus as a method
-
Ashraf Abdelhay
Abstract
This article uses Bourdieu's theory of practice to discuss the discourse of language rights in the Naivasha language policy in Sudan. The article argues that understanding language as a form of practice inseparable from the whole class habitus leads to the avoidance of any monothetic and totalizing discourses that treat language as a self-sufficient code. Instead, it argues for a recognition of the temporality and multidirectionality of language framed in a broad (critical) ethnographic sense. It contends that the statement of language rights in the Naivasha language policy cannot sanctify local languages as media of education unless it addresses the possibilities of creating the economic and social conditions for their use. It is these historical conditions that provide a value to the linguistic habitus of the subjugated groups in the Sudan. The endeavor invites a rethinking of the relationship in language rights campaigns between the academic habitus of linguists and the practical habitus of members of communities. The article concludes by arguing that any technical linguistic activities under the banner of Naivasha language policy that are not informed by the practicalities of everyday life are alienating; hence, they remain reproductive of the existing unequal power relations.
© 2010 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/New York
Articles in the same Issue
- Sociolinguistics and some of its concepts: a historian's view
- A critical commentary on the discourse of language rights in the Naivasha language policy in Sudan using habitus as a method
- Mixed language usage in Belarus: the sociostructural background of language choice
- Expressing age salience: three generations' reported events, frequencies, and valences
- “We should keep what makes us different”: youth reflections on Turkish maintenance in Australia
- From trilingualism to monolingualism? Sicilian-Italians in Australia
- Hong Kong and modern diglossia
- Streetwise English and French advertising in multilingual DR Congo: symbolism, modernity, and cosmopolitan identity
- Local and global perspectives on overcoming literacy challenges in South Africa
- Comparative accounts of linguistic fieldwork as ethical exercises
- Instrumental music and Gaelic revitalization in Scotland and Nova Scotia
- Indigenous students in bilingual Spanish–English classrooms in New York: a teacher's mediation strategies
- Book reviews
Articles in the same Issue
- Sociolinguistics and some of its concepts: a historian's view
- A critical commentary on the discourse of language rights in the Naivasha language policy in Sudan using habitus as a method
- Mixed language usage in Belarus: the sociostructural background of language choice
- Expressing age salience: three generations' reported events, frequencies, and valences
- “We should keep what makes us different”: youth reflections on Turkish maintenance in Australia
- From trilingualism to monolingualism? Sicilian-Italians in Australia
- Hong Kong and modern diglossia
- Streetwise English and French advertising in multilingual DR Congo: symbolism, modernity, and cosmopolitan identity
- Local and global perspectives on overcoming literacy challenges in South Africa
- Comparative accounts of linguistic fieldwork as ethical exercises
- Instrumental music and Gaelic revitalization in Scotland and Nova Scotia
- Indigenous students in bilingual Spanish–English classrooms in New York: a teacher's mediation strategies
- Book reviews
