In this book, the author examines the transformation of the Pacific language region under the impact of colonization, westernization and modernization. By focusing on the linguistic and socio-historical changes of the past 200 years, it aims to bring a new dimension to the study of Pacific linguistics, which up until now has been dominated by questions of historical reconstruction and language typology.

In Language in History, Tony Crowley provides the analytical tools for answering such questions. Using a radical re-reading of Saussure and Bahktin, he demonstrates, in four case studies, the ways in which language has been used to construct social and cultural identity in Britain and Ireland. For example, he examines the ways in which language was employed to construct a bourgeois public sphere in 18th Century England, and he reveals how language is still being used in contemporary Ireland to articulate national and political aspirations and why the Irish language died.
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As South Africa moves towards majority rule, and blacks begin to exercise direct political power, apartheid becomes a thing of the past - but its legacy in South African history will be indelible. this book is designed to introduce students to a range of interpretations of one of South Africa's central social characteristics: racial segregation. It:
- brings together eleven articles which span the whole history of segregation from its origins to its final collapse
- reviews the new historiography of segregation and the wide variety of intellectual traditions on which it is based
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The disciplines of school effectiveness research and school improvement practice and research have been apart for too long. This book is the first major attempt, by leading writers and practitioners in these fields, to bring the areas together in a coherent way.
Existing knowledge about the characteristics of good' schools is outlined, together with the knowledge base about how to make schools good schools'.
The book also makes an entirely original contribution to re-thinking practice in school improvement that can revolutionise our thinking in the late 1990s, and which can be of use...

Spanish is now the third most widely spoken language in the world after English and Chinese. This book traces how and why Spanish has arrived at this position, examining its role in the diverse societies where it is spoken from Europe to the Americas. Providing a comprehensive survey of language issues in the Spanish-speaking world, the book outlines the historical roots of the emergence of Spanish or Castilian as the dominant language, analyzes the situation of minority language groups, and traces the role of Spanish and its colonial heritage in Latin America. The book is structured in four...

Spanish is now the third most widely spoken language in the world after English and Chinese. This book traces how and why Spanish has arrived at this position, examining its role in the diverse societies where it is spoken from Europe to the Americas. Providing a comprehensive survey of language issues in the Spanish-speaking world, the book outlines the historical roots of the emergence of Spanish or Castilian as the dominant language, analyzes the situation of minority language groups, and traces the role of Spanish and its colonial heritage in Latin America. The book is structured in four...

For almost a thousand years language has been an important and contentious issue in Ireland but above all it reflects the great themes of Irish history: colonial, invasion, native resistance, religious and cultural difference.
Collected here for the first time are texts on language from the date of the first legislation against the Irish: the Statute of Kilkenny, 1366, to the constitution of the Free State in 1922. Crowley's introduction connects these texts to current debates, giving The Belfast Agreement as a textual example and illustrating that the language debates continue...

Is the English language neutral, global and open to everyone? This text suggest not. Alastair Pennycook argues that the context of colonialism produced particular cultural constructs - discourses - that became linked to English. He questions the extent to which English is, as commonly assumed, an unencumbered medium of communication, and to what extent it is, by contrast, a language that comes laden with meanings. By examining colonial language policies in India, Malaysia and Hong Kong, this book shows how various policies emerged which both reflected and produced colonial discourses. Caught...

English and the Discourses of Colonialism opens with the British departure from Hong Kong marking the end of British colonialism. Yet Alastair Pennycook argues that this dramatic exit masks the crucial issue that the traces left by colonialism run deep.
This challenging and provocative book looks particularly at English, English language teaching, and colonialism. It reveals how the practice of colonialism permeated the cultures and discourses of both the colonial and colonized nations, the effects of which are still evident today. Pennycook explores the extent to which English...

By looking closely at the multilingual democracies of India, France and the USA, Harold F. Schiffman examines how language policy is primarily a social construct based on belief systems, attitudes and myths.
Linguistic Culture and Language Policy exposes language policy as culture-specific, helping us to understand why language policies evolve the way they do; why they work, or not; and how people's lives are affected by them. These issues will be of specific interest to linguists specialising in multilingual/multicultural societies, bilingual educationalists, curriculum planners...