Читать книгу Living Language - Laura M. Ahearn - Страница 25

Kathryn A. Woolard’s book, Singular and Plural: Ideologies of Linguistic Authority in 21st Century Catalonia (2016), also investigates the intersections between language and politics. In particular, Woolard builds on decades of her own research to ask how a language acquires authority in the eyes of the public. In Singular and Plural, Woolard demonstrates that ideologies of authenticity (in the case of minority languages such as Catalan) and anonymity (in the case of dominant languages such as Spanish in Spain) provide common routes to linguistic authority. Both authenticity and anonymity are underpinned by an ideology of “sociolinguistic naturalism,” which views languages as inherently linked to identities and visions of truth. Woolard argues, however, that Catalan speakers are gradually moving toward innovative linguistic practices that challenge these naturalist ideologies (2016:300). The book therefore provides a case study of changes in Catalan linguistic practices, identities, and ideologies over time and a more general theoretical framework for analyzing language ideologies that can be used in other contexts.