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Preface

This book is designed to provide the reader with a thorough introduc-tion to the principal theories and methods which are used in current research  in  language  policy.  The  book  aims  to  be  accessible  to  non- specialists  from  a  variety  of  fields  in  the  social  sciences,  and  to position language policy as an area of research within sociolinguistics and,  more  broadly,  within  the  social  sciences  and  humanities.  The common element to all of the chapters in this book is language and its role in social life. If there is any “argument” that I wish to put forward it is that in order to understand how and why language is imbricated in all aspects of social life, we need to avail ourselves of a variety of perspectives  from  core  social  science  disciplines:  ethnography,  geo- graphy, historiography, linguistics, political science, psychology, and sociology.  The  theories  and  methods  described  in  this  book  provide frames  (or  lenses)  through  which  we  can  examine  the  role(s)  of language  in  social  life;  readers  will  be  able  to  ascertain  the  relative usefulness  of  these  theories  and  methods  for  their  own  research interests in language policy.

A logical question at this point is: what topics fall within the purview of language policy? Some examples are provided in part III, “Topical Areas  in  Language  Policy”;  these  were  chosen  because  they  have been  the  focus  of  research  in  recent  years,  because  they  can  be studied in diverse contexts, and because they have tended to gener-ate controversies (and social science research often gravitates toward controversy). As with any academic field, a complex set of factors is involved in choices about what is studied and how it is studied. This is especially true in the social sciences, in which major developments have often been motivated in large measure by the desire to change the social system, to validate existing social policies and practices, or to counteract hegemonic beliefs about human nature. For example, in recent years research in language policy has been motivated, at least in  part,  by  concerns  about  the  accelerating  loss  of  languages  world- wide.  This  has  led  to  theorizing  about  how  language  policies  are connected to economic, political, and social structures and processes, and  to  examination  of  the  effects  of  ideologies  about  language  and society  on  language  behavior  and  policies.  Policies  (and  policy  ap- proaches)  are  then  proposed  and/or  evaluated  on  the  basis  of  their relevance  in  slowing  or  even  reversing  language  loss  and  shift  (see chapters  1本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。