"This study examines federal education and immigration legislation from 1964 to the present time. Legislation has mandated the Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages and has an influence on nearly every literacy program for the Limited- English Proficient (LEP) population in the United States. Data for this study includes the following resources: a review of the literature on federal immigration and education legislation; an interview with an officer of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS); an interview with a refugee family; and an observation of a citizenship class. The study finds that although federal laws have legislated English as a Second Language (ESL) programs, congressional education committees initiate few of these laws. Instead, ESL refom1s are too often a result of America's immigration policies. Laws having the most effect on implementing English as a Second Language programs are the following: The Civil Rights Act of 1964; The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965; The Bilingual Education Act of 1968; Lau v. Nichols (1974), and the Lau Remedies; The Department ofHealth, Education and Welfare (HEW) guidelines of 1968 and 1970; The Aspira Consent Decree (1974); The Immigration Reform Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) or Amnesty Act; The Pottinger Memorandum of 1970, and HEW task- force compliance policy; The Legal Immigration Act of 1990 (IMMACT 90); The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (Welfare Reform Act); The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA); California Proposition 227; Washington Initiative 200; and, California Proposition 209. This thesis explores federal legislation's many and varied implications for educaivrs, institutions, Limited-English Proficient populations, and ESL programs"--Document.

Insights from the application of economic theories and research methods to the management of linguistic diversity in an era of globalization. In an era of globalization, issues of language diversity have economic and political implications. Transnational labor mobility, trade, social inclusion of migrants, democracy in multilingual countries, and companies' international competitiveness all have a linguistic dimension; yet economists in general do not include language as a variable in their research. This volume demonstrates that the application of rigorous economic theories and research methods to issues of language policy yields valuable insights. The contributors offer both theoretical and empirical analyses of such topics as the impact of language diversity on economic outcomes, the distributive effects of policy regarding official languages, the individual welfare consequences of bilingualism, and the link between language and national identity. Their research is based on data from countries including Canada, India, Kazakhstan, and Indonesia and from the regions of Central America, Europe, and Sub-Saharan Africa. Theoretical models are explained intuitively for the nonspecialist. The relationships among linguistic variables, inequality, and the economy are approached from different perspectives, including economics, sociolinguistics, and political science. For this reason, the book offers a substantive contribution to interdisciplinary work on languages in society and language policy, proposing a common framework for a shared research area. Contributors Alisher Aldashev, Katalin Buzási, Ramon Caminal, Alexander M. Danzer, Maxime Leblanc Desgagné, Peter H. Egger, Ainhoa Aparicio Fenoll, Michele Gazzola, Victor Ginsburgh, Gilles Grenier, François Grin, Zoe Kuehn, Andrea Lassmann, Stephen May, Serge Nadeau, Suzanne Romaine, Selma K. Sonntag, Stefan Sperlich, José-Ramón Uriarte, François Vaillancourt, Shlomo Weber, Bengt-Arne Wickström, Lauren Zentz

This book tackles the controversial language issues facing an increasingly diverse nation. Highlighting the roles non-English languages have had in American history, it offers a cogent argument against language restrictionism Drawing on the disciplines of linguistics, history and sociology, its analysis of language issues is scholarly yet accessible.

Important aspects of the history of language in the United States remain shrouded in myth and legend. The notion of "one nation, one language" is part of the idealized history of the United States, although in its short history it has probably been host to more bilingual people than any other country in the world. Language is more than a means of communication. It brings into play an entire range of experiences and attitudes toward life. Furthermore, language is a potent symbolic issue because it links power and political claims of ownership with psychological demands for group worth. How people belonging to different language and cultural communities live together in the same political community and how political and structural tensions arise to divide them along language lines, are questions addressed in The Politics of Language. This book analyzes the historical background and recent controversy over language in the United States and compares it to two official multilingual societies: Canada and Switzerland. It's accessibility as a survey of this topic makes it ideal for courses in linguistics, political science, and sociology.

The Oxford Handbook of Applied Linguistics contains 39 original chapters on a broad range of topics in applied linguistics by a diverse group of contributors. Its goal is to provide a comprehensive survey of the current state of the field, the many connections among its various sub-disciplines, and the likely directions of its future development. The Oxford Handbook of Applied Linguistics addresses a broad audience: applied linguists; educators and other scholars working in language acquisition, language learning, language planning, teaching, and testing; and linguists concerned with applications of their work. Systematically encompassing the major areas of applied linguistics-and drawing from a wide range of disciplines such as education, language policy, bi- and multi-lingualism, literacy, language and gender, neurobiology of language, psycholinguistics and cognition, language and computers, discourse analysis, language and concordances, ecology of language, pragmatics, translation, and many other fields, the editors and contributors to The Oxford Handbook of Applied Linguistics provide a panoramic and comprehensive look at this complex and vigorous field. This second edition includes five new chapters, and the remaining chapters have been thoroughly revised and updated to give a clear picture of the current state of applied linguistics.