Deals with challenges to the maintenance of minority (or community) languages in this era of globalization and increasing transnational movements of people. The contributors, experts in language policy, language maintenance and multilingualism offer complementary perspectives from Australia and Europe on the maintenance of linguistic diversity.

In the last three decades the field of endangered and minority languages has evolved rapidly, moving from the initial dire warnings of linguists to a swift increase in the number of organizations, funding programs, and community-based efforts dedicated to documentation, maintenance, and revitalization. Sustaining Linguistic Diversity brings together cutting-edge theoretical and empirical work from leading researchers and practitioners in the field. Together, these contributions provide a state-of-the-art overview of current work in defining, documenting, and developing the world's smaller languages and language varieties. The book begins by grappling with how we define endangerment—how languages and language varieties are best classified, what the implications of such classifications are, and who should have the final say in making them. The contributors then turn to the documentation and description of endangered languages and focus on best practices, methods and goals in documentation, and on current field reports from around the globe. The latter part of the book analyzes current practices in developing endangered languages and dialects and particular language revitalization efforts and outcomes in specific locations. Concluding with critical calls from leading researchers in the field to consider the human lives at stake, Sustaining Linguistic Diversity reminds scholars, researchers, practitioners, and educators that linguistic diversity can only be sustained in a world where diversity in all its forms is valued.

The papers in this volume describe a wide variety of language contact settings in which one or more languages are in a process of shift. In the first part of the book theoretical perspectives are presented, followed by linguistic, sociological and descriptive studies of languages and countries that have attracted the interest of researchers before, as well as less well known examples. Data are presented from: the Philippines, Korea, Japan, Israel, The Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, Sweden, Spain, Denmark, Morocco, Finland, Malaysia, Germany, USA, Ireland, India, Tanzania and Australia.

This book gives fresh insight into the diverse ways in which the transmission of minority and heritage languages is carried out in a range of sociolinguistic contexts. When traditional modes of intergenerational transmission begin to break down, minority language and diaspora communities resort to other modes of transmission, out of necessity, to complement traditional mechanisms and secure language maintenance. This volume brings together a broad range of studies of these alternative modes of transmission, examining the complex and diverse practical, ideological and personal challenges that arise in different settings. Beyond addressing the dynamics of language use within the home and family, the book also emphasises the importance of the participation of the minority community itself in language and cultural transmission. These mechanisms and initiatives, sometimes overlooked or dismissed in the academic literature, will prove to be essential in maintaining and ensuring the survival of minority and heritage languages into the 21st century and beyond. The twelve chapters in the book are divided into four sections (intergenerational transmission; transmission in post-traditional families; alternatives to ‘traditional’ transmission; and transmission in diasporic contexts), and the language contexts, both minoritised and diasporic, which are discussed include Basque, Breton, Galician, Guernesais, Irish, Māori, Russian, Scottish Gaelic, Sorbian and Spanish. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of sociolinguistics, language acquisition, heritage language maintenance and revitalization, and language policy and planning.

​This book presents research on the situation minority language schoolchildren face when they need to learn languages of international communication, in particular English. The book takes minority languages as a starting point and it bridges local and global perspectives in the analysis of multilingual education contexts. It examines the interaction of minority languages and cultures, majority languages and lingua franca-s in a variety of settings across different regions and countries on all continents. Even though all chapters in this book involve minority languages, the issues discussed are relevant to any context in which more than language is used in education. The book reveals challenges and opportunities of multilingual education by discussing issues such as Northern and Southern concepts, language education policies, language diversity, interethnic understanding, multimodal language practices, power, conflict, identity and prestige, among many others. “This is the volume that finally accounts for multilingual education from a truly multilingual perspective by involving proposals and research from a variety of multilingual speech communities in the world. The (linguistically) rich Ethiopia and Mexico can teach the poor Europe and other Northern countries about multilingual education. CLIL promoters may learn from Finnish Sámi and Canadian Innu and Mi’gmaq indigenous communities as well as from Basque results. Speakers and teachers of minority and international languages will certainly be glad to hear the news. There is no need for a monolingual bias or tunnel vision in acquiring English in non-English speaking communities. This volume includes new challenging pedagogical perspectives while pointing to interesting conclusions for worldwide educational authorities”. Maria Pilar Safont Jordà, Universitat Jaume I, Castelló, Spain

This book looks closely at Yi bilingual education practice in the southwest of China from an educationalist’s perspective and, in doing so, provides an insight toward our understanding of minority language maintenance and bilingual education implementation in China. The book provides an overview on the Yi people since 1949, their history, society, culture, customs and languages. Adopting the theory of language ecology, data was collected among different Yi groups and case studies were focused on Yi bilingual schools. By looking into the application of the Chinese government’s multilingual language and education policy over the last 30 years with its underlying language ideology and practices the book reveals the de facto language policy by analyzing the language management at school level, the linguistic landscape around the Yi community, as well as the language attitude and cultural identities held by present Yi students, teachers and parents. The book is relevant for anyone looking to more deeply understand bilingual education and language maintenance in today’s global context.

The theme of this volume is comparative research on minority languages and development of theories. The three previous volumes focused mainly on problems of definition, on language in society and on the linguistics of minority languages. This fourth ICML attempts to go forward by concentrating, on the one hand, on comparative research regarding minority languages and on the other hand on the development of theories in this field. It allows for a confrontation of different emerging theoretical perspectives.