The changing role of minority languages in Australia: The European and the Asia‐pacific Nexus

• Autores: Marianne Bodi
• Localización: Journal of multilingual and multicultural development, ISSN 0143-4632, Vol. 15, Nº. 2-3, 1994, págs. 219-227
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Although government and community support for the policy of multiculturalism has remained unchanged in the nineties, both for the purpose of national self‐identification and as a means of improving the image of the country in the Asia‐Pacific region, newly defined national economic priorities and the strongly felt need for closer trade and cultural links in the area have recently affected language policy and education on all levels. The strategic change of direction towards ‘Asia literacy’ for the mainstream has resulted in diminishing support for some smaller, mostly European minority languages and programmes in favour of ‘priority’ languages such as Japanese, Bahasa and Mandarin. Equity and mobility for those with a less preferred language background are to be achieved more via English competency than through the maintenance of the mother tongue. It is to be hoped that some adverse effects of this shift will, in the long term, be corrected by a more balanced view of Australia as a nation of both European and Asian affiliations.