What about the problem of attitudes to these two varieties? Though Norwegian nationalists enthusiastically welcomed Nynorsk, the Norwegian-based variety, and rejected the modifi ed Danish alternative, many infl uential educated city-dwellers did not. They regarded a standard based on rural dialects as rustic and uncivilised. If Nynorsk was to be accepted at all, govern- ment support was essential. And it was also necessary to persuade infl uential public fi gures to endorse and to use the new variety in public contexts. Aasen succeeded in this to the extent that in 1885 Landsmål was voted offi cial equality with Danish, in 1929 it was relabelled Nynorsk, and at its peak in 1944 it was the chief language of instruction for 34.1 per cent of all schoolchildren. Since then, Nynorsk has had mixed fortunes, and by 2008 it was the language of instruction for only 13.4 per cent of pupils in primary school. Many people use both Bokmål and Nynorsk depending on the context. What is more, Bokmål forms continue to displace Nynorsk forms rather than vice versa.
In practice, then, while political activists continue to argue about the appropriate form of a written Norwegian standard, it is clear that Bokmål rather than Nynorsk has been winning out. It is used in most books and by most schools as a medium of instruction. Though some people insist on Nynorsk as the only possible variety for a ‘true’ Norwegian to use, and stress its signifi cance as a more democratic variety, many dislike its ‘country bumpkin’ associations.
Bokmål has urban and sophisticated connotations. These attitudes are now widespread and their effects on people’s usage are likely to make government intervention and language planning irrelevant in the long run.
In some countries, a standard dialect of a language, suitable for offi cial uses and acceptable as a national symbol, has emerged naturally, with little or no help from government agencies or linguistic experts. In Norway, as in many more recently developing nations, things have not been so simple. The government has considered it necessary to make deliberate choices, to accelerate the process of language standardisation and to legislate on the status of particular varieties. It is clear that language planning is a fascinating mixture of political and social con- siderations, as well as linguistic ones.
Exercise 7
The development of a standard language has sometimes been described as involving the following two steps:
(i) create a model for imitation
(ii) promote it over its rivals. ▲
‘Top-down’ signs are offi cial signs, designed by public authorities, while ‘bottom-up’ signs are non-offi cial signs, usually produced by individuals or groups. However, the distinction is not always clear: e.g. professional signs produced by commercial organisations may be perceived by some as relatively ‘offi cial’, especially if they have passed through a design and approval process, or are required to follow a set of guidelines and can be found in identical form nationwide. A more useful classifi cation that has been proposed is a continuum from offi cial to non-offi cial rather than a simple either-or categorisation.
On the other hand, Nicholas Coupland suggests that all linguistic landscaping is generated
‘from above’, since people’s reasons for choosing what to portray are infl uenced by language ideologies. Whether they conform to the offi cial language policy or challenge it, they unavoid- ably give the policy credence by implicitly acknowledging its existence. This gives a clue concerning the implications for language planning of the distinction between top-down and bottom-up or relatively offi cial vs relatively unoffi cial signage. An analysis of the linguistic landscape can provide useful clues to the gap which often exists between offi cial language policy and actual linguistic practices. What the government legislates and what happens on the ground is often quite different as illustrated in example 6 .
Example 6
Timor-Leste is a multilingual Pacifi c country with approximately 17 indigenous lan- guages, and three non-indigenous languages, Portuguese, Indonesian and English, each associated with a different period of outside infl uence. There are two offi cial languages, Portuguese and Tetun, the country’s indigenous lingua franca which is spoken by about 70 per cent of the population. The choice of Portuguese as an offi cial language refl ects 400 years of colonial rule. This was followed by 24 years under Indonesian rule. In 2002, the UN peace-keeping forces arrived to assist the transition to independence, bringing with them an infl ux of English.
Exercise 8
Researchers in the area of linguistic landscapes (introduced in chapter 3 ) usually distinguish between ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ signs. What do you think this distinction refers to? Is it an easy-to-apply clear-cut distinction? What implications does it have for language policy and planning?
These issues are discussed in the next paragraphs .
Linguists are often involved as advisers at both stages. Some people have argued that linguists can provide useful linguistic expertise for achieving step (i) but they have no contribution to make to step (ii). Do you agree?
Answer at end of chapter
An analysis in 2010 of the linguistic landscape in Dili, the capital of Timor-Leste, identifi ed material in eight different languages, with Portuguese clearly the dominant offi cial language.
Map 5.3 Timor-Leste
Astonishingly, Tetun the indigenous offi cial language was not evident at all on offi cial signs in the linguistic landscape surveyed. Most surprising perhaps was the dominance of English.
Monolingual English signs accounted for 60 per cent of the signs surveyed, and signs involving English and another language accounted for a further 15 per cent. The linguistic landscape of Dili thus provides a dramatic example of the gap between offi cial language policy and actual language practice in Timor-Leste.
Once again we see the importance of examining the interaction between political con- siderations, social considerations and linguistic behaviour. The extensive use of English in signage in Timor-Leste provides further evidence of the steady effects of globalisation. The fi nal section of this chapter changes focus from telescope to microscope, and examines a few of the nitty-gritty linguistic issues that language planners deal with when they get involved in codifying a variety.
The linguist’s role in language planning
Example 7
Lexicographer: a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.
( Johnson, Samuel (1755) Dictionary of the English Language )
Language academies have existed for centuries, but it is also true that individuals have often had an enormous infl uence on language planning, and especially on the standardisation or codifi cation of a particular variety. Samuel Johnson’s 40,000-word dictionary was a land- mark in the codifi cation of English, though, as example 7 demonstrates, he had few illusions about the lexicographer’s role. Ivar Aasen in Norway created a composite variety of Norwegian
(Landsmål/Nynorsk) from a range of dialects. In Israel, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda was the most infl uential proponent of the vernacularisation of Hebrew. Francis Mihalic wrote the fi rst authoritative grammar and dictionary of Tok Pisin in the 1950s. And in New Zealand Harry Orsman completed the fi rst dictionary of New Zealand English on historical principles in 1997.
More often these days, the nuts and bolts of language planning are handled by committees, commissions or academies. Moreover, the focus of much language planning activity has altered from the promotion of national and offi cial languages in countries trying to establish their autonomy, to include concern for minority and endangered languages. The Kanak Languages Academy, for example, has been established to preserve the indigenous languages of New Caledonia. Codifi cation and vocabulary expansion are typically of prime concern for language academies, and in the next section, I briefl y illustrate these processes, drawing mainly on Maori for exemplifi cation.