Instrumental music and Gaelic revitalization in Scotland and Nova Scotia
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Jonathan Dembling
Abstract
Music is a popular tool for language revitalization efforts, providing both an attraction for potential language learners and a cultural context for language-related activities. In both Scotland and Nova Scotia, Canada, Gaelic revitalization is further linked with instrumental music, especially fiddle and bagpipe music, because the language is regarded as directly informing its rhythm and articulation. While this relationship creates the potential for a rich interaction between language and music enthusiasts, it is also complicated by a long history of contested definitions of authentic Gaelic expression. When local self-esteem is an important component of successful language revitalization, such complications must be addressed.
© 2010 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/New York
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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
