language conflict research: a state of the art

Jeroen Darquennes*

Language conflict research: a stateof the art

DOI 10.1515/ijsl-2015-0012

Abstract: After a broad overview of the history and the areas of focus of researchon language conflict, this article pays particular attention to a number ofselected features of societal language conflict. A discussion of the causes, thevisibility, the manifestations, the discursive focal points, the management andthe outcomes of the management of societal language conflict precedes a sketchof methodological approaches in language conflict research. The snapshot oflanguage conflict research ends with a list of research desiderata.

Keywords: language conflict, language contact, language policy, languageplanning, macrosociolinguistics

1 Introduction

Although language conflict as a topic is dealt with in linguistic literature priorto the second half of the twentieth century (cf. Kremnitz 1990), it took until the1960s before it started to be more prominently explored. Scholars such asHaugen (1966), Inglehart and Woodward (1972[1967]), Joy (1972 [1967]),Mackey (1967) and Das Gupta (1970) contributed to putting it on the researchmap in North America. In the European realm, Catalan sociolinguists(cf. Aracil 1966; Ninyoles 1969) as well as Occitan sociolinguists (cf. Lafont1971) helped to boost a multidisciplinary approach to the study of languageconflict. During the 1970s and 1980s political scientists (e.g. McRae see below),sociologists (e.g. Braga and Monti Civelli 1982; Strassoldo and Delli Zotti 1982),and social psychologists (e.g. Bourhis 1984) started to uncover and analyse themultiple dimensions of linguistic strife in a systematic way. They were joinedby the geolinguist Williams (1984) and sociolinguists including Calvet (1999[1987]), Haarmann (cf. infra), Kremnitz (cf. infra), Mattheier (cf. infra) andNelde (cf. infra), all of whom developed a special interest in linguistic strifein situations of societal multilingualism. Especially McRae, Haarmann,Kremnitz and Nelde made major contributions to secure a prominent place

*Corresponding author: Jeroen Darquennes, University of Namur, Namur, Belgium, E-mail:[email protected]

IJSL 2015; 235: 7–32

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for language conflict within research on language contact and societal multi-lingualism. McRae started a book series on Conflict and Compromise inMultilingual Societies (with volumes on Switzerland, Belgium and Finlandthat were published in 1983, 1986 and 1997, respectively). Haarmann (1990)introduced a general theory on language conflict inspired by Haugen’s ideason language planning and the ecology of language. Kremnitz (1979, 1990) keptthe legacy of the Catalan sociolinguists alive and elaborated their ideas bymeans of contemporary and historical case studies in the field of Romancelinguistics. Nelde, finally, launched a series of international conferences onContact & Conflict in June 1979 (cf. Nelde 1980: 3) and devoted eight out of 30volumes of his Plurilingua series explicitly to the topic of language conflict.

Despite of all these research efforts in a community that got closely knit inthe slipstream of the successive Contact & Conflict conferences, research onlanguage conflict lost some of its momentum in the second half of the 1990s.From a present day perspective and notwithstanding valuable interdisciplinarycontributions to the field by Mac Giolla Chríost (2003), Rindler Schjerve (2003,2007) and Conill (2007), Haarmann’s observation that language conflict theoryand methodology would deserve to be fleshed out a bit more, still holds(cf. Haarmann 1990: 1–2). In an attempt to contribute to the constructivedevelopment of research on language conflict this contribution provides asystematic state of the art of language conflict research. Rooted in what somewould refer to as “traditional” macrosociolinguistics, the sociology of languageor contact linguistics (cf. Wildgen [2005] on the overlap), it first of all provides asketch of the main areas of focus of research on language conflict. Building onideas previously expressed in Darquennes (2013a, 2015)1 it then continues toexplore different features of societal language conflict. Before rounding off witha number of research desiderata that could help to align the more traditionalapproaches to language conflict with current trends in critical (micro)

1 Section 3 of this article takes up ideas expressed in Darquennes (2013a: 109–113) which moregenerally deals with aspects of language policy and planning in the context of indigenousEuropean language minorities. This contribution is also to be considered as a revised andexpanded version of Darquennes (2015) in the sense that an additional scan of the availableliterature has resulted in a considerable expansion of the number of references in the text (morethan 40 references have been added), a revision of the ideas expressed in Section 2.2, anenlargement of Section 4, a total make-over of Section 5 and the addition of relevant footnotes.Also quite some examples have been changed in this contribution as compared to Darquennes(2015). The reason for adding this contribution to this issue despite the overlap with Darquennes(2013a, 2015) is that it adds to the coherence of this issue and gives readers who are not thatfamiliar with language conflict literature an insight into its dimensions and its developmentfrom the second half of the twentieth century until the present day.

8 Jeroen Darquennes


sociolinguistics (cf. also the contributions of Gasquet-Cyrus and Vetter to thisissue) it offers an overview of existing methodological approaches to languageconflict research.

2 Research on language conflict: Main areasof focus

Given the close connection between (research on) language contact and(research on) language conflict (cf. Nelde 1997), it is hardly surprising that themain areas of focus of research on language conflict closely resemble those ofresearch on language contact. Drawing on Nelde (1992) and Clyne (1996), theseinterrelated areas can be described as “language”, “the individual language user(s)”and “society”.

2.1 Language

The first area of focus concerns the existence of possible conflicts arising at thelevel of the contact languages themselves. Of interest here are mechanisms thathamper or block the processes by which one language (or, in broader terms: alanguage variety) borrows morphological, phonological, phonetic, lexical andsyntactic features from another language or language variety (cf. Wölck 1997;Görlach 2009). With or without reference to the notion of conflict, examples ofthis kind of research can be found in literature on contact-induced languagechange and code-switching. Meyers-Scotton’s discussion of morphosyntacticconstraints on codeswitching in her Duelling Languages (1993) particularlyappeals to those interested in the study of the linguistic features of languageconflict. The same counts for discussions of whether or not some linguisticfeatures would be unborrowable (cf., e.g., Thomason 2001; Treffers-Daller 2010).

Much in line with the ideas of the founding fathers of sociolinguistics, pre-sent-day literature on contact-induced change and code switching points to theimportance of recognizing the “interrelationship between socio-cultural conditionsand linguistic phenomena” (Weinreich (1968 [1953]: 83). Languages are seen as “aproduct of, and a vehicle for, communication among people” (Thomason andKaufman 1988: 4). The individual language users are seen as “the locus oflanguage contact” (Weinreich 1968 [1953]: 1). Translating these general principlesof language contact to language conflict, Haarmann (1990: 2–3) notes that “alanguage conflict is not a state of affairs where one linguistic system is in conflict

Language conflict research 9


with another system”. Language conflicts rather result “from contact settingswhose conditions are controversially evaluated by people who are involved”.Without the capacity to evaluate events in his/her environment “the individualwould not be capable of even identifying a language contact as a conflict”. Thefact that “the evaluation of a situation in terms of language conflict is an activityin the individual’s mind” brings Haarmann to the conclusion that “the actuallanguage conflict exists in the person’s consciousness”. When studying linguisticfeatures of language conflict, one therefore needs to be aware of the intimate andintricate interplay that in every situation of language contact exists between intra-linguistic phenomena, the socio-psychological disposition of the language usersand the sociolinguistic environment in which the language users are active.

2.2 The individual language user(s)

In the second area of focus of research on language conflict, the attention shiftsfrom a focus on conflict at the intra-linguistic level to the study of conflictsrelated to language use in interaction. At the centre of attention here is languageconflict both in situations of interpersonal language contact in which personsuse different languages belonging to different diasystems as well as in situationsof interpersonal language contact in which persons use varieties belonging tothe same diasystem. Language conflict in interpersonal communication con-cerns both intracultural as well as intercultural communication. Werlen (1997),e.g., illustrates intracultural “Kontaktkonflikte” by referring to a situation of“dialect contact” in Switzerland. Examples of language conflict in the case ofintercultural communication can be found in the work of Ehlich (1994) whoprefers the notion of “communication disruptions” to refer to language conflict.In much of her work, Oksaar (1984, 1997) approaches both intra- and intercul-tural language conflicts through the lens of cultureme theory.2

2 It is worth mentioning at this point that research on language conflict related to language usein interaction as portrayed here is closely related to research that focuses on the study oflanguages in conflict or the study of the language of conflict. The use of language in conflict isdealt with in the contributions of Wright (1997), Chilton (1997) and Smith (1997) to Volume 4 ofCurrent issues in language and society. It is also dealt with in volumes of the Palgrave studies inlanguages at war (cf. Footitt and Kelly 2012; Kelly and Baker 2013). Furthermore, it is the centraltopic of the languages in conflict group at the University of Huddersfield (cf. www.language-sinclonflict.org). The language of conflict is treated, e.g., in Hawes-Bilger’s account of linguisticaspects of the conflict in Northern Ireland (Hawes-Bilger 2007) as well as in the Journal ofLanguage Aggression and Conflict (John Benjamins) that was launched in 2013. In view of thefurther development of language conflict theory, it might be useful to reflect on the question

10 Jeroen Darquennes


www.languagesinclonflict.org

www.languagesinclonflict.org

That research on language conflict in the area of interpersonal communica-tion is not just interesting in and of itself is convincingly illustrated by Watts(1988). Watts analyses the socio-communicative interaction of German-speakingand French-speaking Swiss participants in a half-an hour television discussionin German-speaking Swiss television. His analysis illustrates how micro-socio-linguistic studies focusing on communicative interaction help to provide a morefine-grained understanding of the relationship between language, ethnic iden-tity and national identity that is at the centre of focus in many macro-studiesdealing with language conflict at the societal level.

2.3 Society

Language conflict at the level of society is without any doubt the area of focusresearch on language conflict is mostly associated with. Case studies that cometo mind are the French-English language conflict in Québec (cf. Larrivée 2003),the Basque-Spanish language conflict in the Basque Autonomous Community(cf. Urla 2003), the Irish-English conflict in Northern Ireland (cf. Muller 2010)and the French-Corsican language conflict (cf. Fabellini 2010). These (and other)conflicts have received quite some attention in literature exploring the linksbetween language, nationalism and ethnic identity. By contrast, macro-levelresearch on language conflict in societal settings where historically grownethnolinguistic tensions played little or no role did not really gain momentum.Quite recently, Ammon (2006) has made an attempt to study such forms of“artificial language conflicts” (Nelde 1997: 294) at the institutional level of theEuropean Union. Such research is, however, still in its infancy. The remainder ofthis paper therefore exclusively deals with what Nelde (1997: 293) refers to as“natural” societal language conflict emerging from the (long-standing) coexis-tence of different speech communities.

3 Societal language conflict

So as to allow for a better understanding of the multifaceted nature of societallanguage conflict in traditional language contact settings, available literaturehas been analyzed with the aim of identifying a number of features that allowfor a systematic description of language conflict. In what follows, the focus will

whether it would be worthwhile to make a distinction between research on language conflict,research on languages in conflict and research on the language of conflict.



be on “causes”, “visibility”, “manifestations”, “focal points” and “management”of societal language conflict as well as on “outcomes of language conflictmanagement”. Readers should be aware that the list of features is nowherenear exhaustive (cf. Section 5). Furthermore, it is also important to realize thatthe discussion of the features of language conflict as presented here is atentative one. Not all of the available literature has been consulted (cf. alsoSection 5). Besides that, language conflict is being approached mainly from aEuropean point of view.

3.1 Causes of language conflict

Literature on societal language conflict emphasizes that language conflict at thesocietal level comes about in situations of societal language contact (cf. Haugen1980).3 These situations are characterized by asymmetrical rather than symme-trical multilingualism. This means that the differences in prestige, status,power, social organization, values and beliefs as they exist between a speechcommunity A and a speech community B are reflected in the prestige, status,legitimization and institutionalization of language (or: language variety) A vis-à-vis language (variety) B (cf. Nelde et al. 1996). As a consequence of thesedifferences – others refer to them as “divisions” or “cleavages” (cf. McRae 1983:16–23; Labrie 2003: 41) – language often develops into a significant symbol ofsocial conflict, even if it is not the direct cause of the conflict. In that sense, it ispossible to characterize language conflicts as “umgeleitete Sozialkonflikte”[diverted social conflicts] (Mattheier 1989: 1) or as conflicts that are “at bottomsocial conflicts of one kind or another (ethnic, economic, cultural, ideological,political, etc.)” (Bugarski 1990: 41).4 In order to track down the causes of alanguage conflict one needs to carefully consider the ecology of the languagecontact situation (cf. also Section 4) which reveals a lot about the nature of thesocial or other cleavages that characterize a situation of language contact. Italso reveals a lot about the way in which these differences are perceived.

3 The close connection between “language contact” and “language conflict” as put forward inearly sociolinguistic, language sociological and contact linguistic writings mirrors the attentiongiven to the connection between “ethnic contact” and “ethnic conflict” in sociological literaturedealing with the study of the interrelatedness of ethnic contact and racial tensions (cf., e.g.,Lieberson 1961).4 In her study of conflict in American society, Schmid (2001: 4) notes that language has rarelybeen the major source of conflict, but instead “has been the proxy for other conditions that havechallenged the power relations of the dominant group(s)”.



3.2 Visibility of language conflict

Essential for a good understanding of societal language conflict is that in somecases the social or other divisions that in other cases would lead to languageconflict either go unnoticed or are not experienced as being problematic. Dua(1996: 10) expresses this as follows:

Social groups in a given community often show distinct objective differences in socialorganization, cultural values and beliefs, independently of their use of language varieties,dialects or registers. Not only do people live with these differences, but under normalcircumstances they may even fail to notice them, let alone consider them responsible fortheir grievances. Only when they become aware of these differences, consider them to beresponsible for their grievances, and feel that their identity is being threatened, do thedifferences and inequalities become a source of conflict.

In this quote, Dua very adequately clarifies the distinction which the Congrés deCultura Catalana (1978: 13; quoted in Klug 2000: 2) made between “latent” and“acute” conflicts and the one which Nelde (1987a), based on the writings ofKrysmanski (1971), made between “latent” (or: subcutaneous) and “manifest”language conflict. It is precisely this dichotomy that inspired Nelde (1987b) toclaim that “language contact means language conflict”. At first sight, Nelde’s one-liner might indeed seem somewhat far-fetched or exaggerated (cf. the criticismraised by de Bot [1997]). However, if one takes into account the asymmetricalnature that, albeit to different degrees, characterizes every situation of languagecontact, one has to conclude that language conflict is pre-programmed, yet mightnot always be visible (cf. Haarmann 2001: 204). In that sense, there is indeed nolanguage contact without language conflict, since the latter can either be latent,manifest or latent on the way of becoming manifest. And once a language conflictis manifest, then the question is how it manifests itself.

3.3 Manifestations of language conflict

The word “conflict” conjures up images of violence, i.e. the sort of violencetypical of war, riots or terrorism. In some cases language conflict has indeedbeen accompanied by or has given cause to language riots or violent actions.Belgium is known for its language riots, for example those in the 1970s whenFlemish people protested in Schaerbeek (a suburb of Brussels) because themayor refused to treat Dutch-speaking inhabitants on equal footing with theFrench-speaking inhabitants in the town hall (cf. Defoort 1998). The AustrianLand of Carinthia was the scene of screaming rows over the use of Slovene onstreet nameplates (cf. Jodlbauer 1996). And language conflict in Québec in the



1960s and 1970s was accompanied by terrorist actions of members of the Frontde Libération du Québec (cf. Levine 1990: 40–41). Yet, despite of these outburstsof language conflict related violence (examples could be added from the BasqueCountry, Canada, Greece, South Tyrol, Wales, etc.), one can go along with Laitin(1999: 24) who states that in cases of language conflict in the OECD states “noneof them was linked in any way to significant guerrilla activity”. Whether thisclaim can be generalized with respect to other parts of the world is something tobe left aside for lack of sufficient research findings. However, as Rindler Schjerve(2003: 49–50) argues, it does seem to be the case that in democratic societiesconflicts in general, and language conflicts in particular, are “battled out” on adiscursive level (cf. also Chilton 1997). The study of language conflict – mostcertainly in the present-day European realm – is thus more to be seen as thestudy of differences of opinion or incompatibilities between two or more opi-nions over language in society. That makes it worthwhile to try and shed somelight on the discursive focal points around which language conflict centres.

3.4 Focal points of language conflict

One way of coming to terms with the discursive focal points of language conflict isto focus on the aspects of “language” to which the differences of opinion pertain.The distinction which Dua (1996: 8–9) makes between what language “is” andwhat language “has” can be taken as a useful starting point. In the latter sense(what language “has”), the distribution of a language (variety) in society is at thecenter. In the former sense (what language “is”), the structural properties of alanguage (variety) are addressed. A discourse that emphasizes structural proper-ties seems to prevail in the case of contact between speech communities using alanguage variety that belongs to the same diasystem. Discussions on language useseem to be more typical of language contact involving speech communities thatuse a language (variety) belonging to a different diasystem. Surely, differencesexist as to the intensity with which language conflicts are discursively battled outas well as to the actors that take part in the conflict. These differences will,however, not be elaborated here. The following paragraphs provide a more gen-eral description of how language conflict discursively tends to pivot primarily onthe “is” or the “has” of language.

3.4.1 Structural properties of language as a focal point

The examples of language conflicts that discursively center around structurallanguage features are manifold. Most of them are documented in literature on



linguistic nationalism or language standardization. A case that is often dis-cussed in literature is the Norwegian language conflict over the developmentof a national standard written idiom different from the other Nordic languages(cf. Haugen 1966, 1980; Jahr 1993, 2003). Other examples include the debatesover the development of written standards in minority settings such as those ofthe Bretons in Brittany (Jones 1995) or the Sardinians and the Ladins in Italy(cf. Darquennes 2012; Tufi 2013).

Typical of quarrels over the development of a written standard is theexistence of competing varieties that belong to the same diasystem, yet areassociated with different social, political, economic, religious, cultural, histor-ical or other forces in society. In the case of the examples mentioned, thedebates over the selection of a standard variety (the first stage in Haugen’slanguage planning model, cf. Haugen [1987: 627]) are not only colored bydiscussions on what the “most authentic” or “purest” basis for the new standardis or ought to be. The debates (most of them fought out in the media or viva vocein language commissions, governmental assemblies, cultural committees, etc.)are also loaded with what Haugen (1987: 630) refers to as “power brokerage”.Especially the analysis of processes of language standardization shows howdifferent forces in society attach emotional values to specific historicallygrown linguistic varieties and sometimes experience the rejection of their ownvariety (or even the rejection of specific features of it) almost as a denial of theirlinguistic identity. These emotions interfere with the process of codification (thesecond stage in Haugen’s language planning model). They certainly also havean impact when it comes to implementing the codified version of the selectedvariety with the aim of diffusing it and having it accepted across society. Giventhe “power measurements” that surround it, the implementation stage (i.e. thethird stage in Haugen’s language planning model) can therefore indeed beseen as the “Achilles heel” of the standardization process (Deumert andVandenbussche 2003: 7). It is the implementation stage that decides on thesuccess or the failure of the decisions made during the preceding stages ofselection and codification.

Turning to the final stage of the standardization process as described byHaugen, i.e. elaboration, research shows that this stage is not debate-proofeither. Especially the modernization of the lexicon is again likely to lead todiscussions on the “authenticity” and the “purity” of the selected, codified andimplemented standard variety (cf. also Fishman [2006] in this respect).Confronted with the task of language elaboration, the question arises whetherone should rely on the word stock of the own language to build new words orwhether one should rather rely on neighbouring or more distant languages. Thatis a point of discussion in the case of so-called “Ausbau”-languages such as



Luxembourgish, Croatian and Serbian (cf. Kloss 1952, 1978) since languageelaboration can be used to increase the distance with the “roofing” languagethe Ausbau-language community tries to get away from (cf. Fishman 2003: 107–108). Language elaboration is also debated in many language minority settingswhere the question is to what extent one should allow the language of thesurrounding majority to influence the vocabulary of the minority language orwhether one should rather try to refrain from doing that so as not to deliberatelyreproduce the social pressure which the majority exerts on the minority in thelanguage itself (cf. the topic of “new speakers” in minority language settings asdescribed, for example, in O’Rourke and Ramallo [2011]).

3.4.2 Language use as a focal point

Language use in a language contact setting concerns the use of a language (or,again, in broader terms: a language variety) A and a language (variety) B in so-called private, semi-public or public domains or contexts of language use. Thequestion is to what extent the use of language (variety) A versus language(variety) B is institutionalized (i.e.: taken for granted or not in particular con-texts) and the way in which the use of A versus B is legitimised by means of lawsor (in)formal language policies that support the use of a language in a specificcontext or not. The degree of institutionalization and legitimization of a lan-guage mirrors its status and prestige in society and is obviously also linked tothe status, prestige, social power, and balance of the group that uses thelanguage. Discussions about the use of language in a particular context arethus not discussions about the languages themselves but about the weight thatlanguages have in society, about the relationship between language and socialmobility, and about the social pressure exerted by one speech community onanother speech community (cf. most of the contributions in Gasquet-Cyrus andPetitjean [2009]).

As Mattheier (1984) shows, such conflicts over language use can also occurin “monolingual communities”, i.e. in communities in which different varietiesof the same diasystem are used by different groups. Mattheier (1984: 202)explains the occurrence of language conflict in such a community in the“Rheinland” whereas Kachru and Bhati (1978) focus on the emerging “dialect”conflict in Hindi and Gasquet-Cyrus (this issue) describes “monolingual lan-guage conflict” in Marseille. The attention that has been given to these sortsof language conflicts is, however, rather low. More attention is given to conflictsover the use of language in situations where contact exists between speechcommunities that use a language (variety) belonging to a different diasystem.



Examples include studies on language conflict in bilingual cities: cf. the devel-opment of English–French language conflict in Montreal (Levine 1990),German–French language conflict in Fribourg (Haas and Loelinger 1989) andBiel (cf. Elmiger this issue), German–Czech language conflict in early twentiethcentury Vienna (Fischer 1989), Dutch–French language conflict in Brussels(cf. Nelde 1987c; Janssens this issue) and the Russian–Latvian language conflictin cities like Riga (cf. Schmid 2008). There are also studies describing languageconflict within an entire state (such as Witte and Van Velthoven [2011] onBelgium or McRae’s already cited volumes on Switzerland, Belgium andFinland) as well as many descriptions of language contact in regional languageminority settings in which it is shown that the (lack of opportunity to make) useof the minority language on public road signs, in public administration, inhealth care, the courts, education, etc. gives rise to emotion-laden languageconflicts that cover a (whole) range of social tensions (cf. many of the articles inthe Plurilingua series that was published between 1979 and 2007; cf. Darquennes[2007: 192] for an overview of the 30 volumes of this series). Especially insituations where the language conflict keeps building up, there is a demandfor the elaboration of solutions that could help to settle the conflict.

3.5 The management of language conflict and its outcomes

Before briefly discussing some possible approaches to the management oflanguage conflict, it seems useful to refer once more to the stratification oflanguage conflict. Following Nelde (1997: 290), language conflict has both a“surface structure” and a “deep structure”. The surface structure of the languageconflict (i.e. the debate about language or language use) functions as a sort of“lightning rod” in that it distracts the attention from the real social motivationsbehind the conflict (i.e. the “deep structure” of the conflict). As such, “languageconflict appears to be the lesser evil, since apparently it can be more easilycorrected and neutralized than primary socio-political conflicts” (Nelde 1997:292). In order to correct, neutralize, or de-emotionalize a situation of languageconflict, language policy and planning come into play.

In early writings on sociolinguistics and the sociology of language, onealready notices how language policy and planning are closely linked to thetopic of language conflict. Without explicitly using the notion of languageconflict, Fishman (1972: 173), e.g., considers the relevance of what he refers toas “applied sociology of language” (of which language policy and planning arethe essential parts) in that it assists “in the solution of societal languageproblems” (cf. also Jernudd and Das Gupta 1971: 211). Whereas attempts have



been made especially since the 1970s to distinguish policy and planning(cf. Calvet [1999 [1987]: 154–155], for an example), literature these days tendsto focus on the inextricable link between policy and planning, hence theincreasing use of the LPP designation (“language policy and planning”,cf. Hornberger [2006: 24–25]). As to the dimensions of LPP, there seems to bea consensus (cf. Darquennes [2013b] for a discussion) on the fact that LPPconcentrates on the corpus, the status, the prestige and/or the acquisition of alanguage (variety).5 Relating language policy and planning to language conflictmanagement now, it appears obvious that language policy and planning activ-ities that aim at the status, the prestige and the acquisition of a language(variety) can help to find solutions to language conflicts with language use asa focal point (cf. Section 3.4.2 above). Language policy and planning activitiesthat aim at the “corpus” of a language (variety) can help to provide solutions tolanguage conflicts with language features as a focal point (cf. Section 3.4.1above). Given the particularity of each language conflict, it is difficult to givea precise description of the way in which language policy and planning are orcan be used to provide solutions to language conflict as a societal languageproblem. Therefore, the following paragraphs only provide some generalexamples.

3.5.1 Corpus policy and planning

A rather well-known approach to settle conflicts over the selection of a variety ofa language (or to avoid them from the onset) is to resort to the method of“dialect synthesis” as Wölck (2006: 322) refers to it or “Ausgleich” as it is alsocalled. This basically means that a standard variety is developed based oncommon characteristics of all the available (written) varieties of the language.In one way or another, this approach is at the basis of many standardizationprocesses in the European realm (cf. Deumert and Vandenbussche [2003] forexamples concerning Germanic languages). It has been used with a certaindegree of success in Latin America (cf. the case of Quechua). It was also quiterecently used in the Ladin community in Northern Italy where the corpusplanners of SPELL (Servisc de Planificazion y Elaborazion dl Lingaz Ladin) triedto develop a common Ladin standard for the competing written versions of

5 As stated by Baldauf (2004: 2), the division of LPP into activities that aim at the corpus, thestatus, the prestige and the acquisition of a language (variety) makes sense “for descriptive-pedagogical purposes”. One should, however, be aware of the fact that in reality the overlapand the interplay between these activities are far more complex than the neat division suggests.



Ladin as used in the Ladin valleys. Building on the work of the Swiss scholarHeinrich Schmid (1994) the SPELL team developed a grammar for and a dic-tionary in standard Ladin (cf. www.spell-termles.ladinia.net). Hope existed thatSPELL’s endeavors would lead to a general acceptance of “Ladin Dolomitan” asa unified written variety of Ladin that could help to further status and acquisi-tion planning measures (e.g. the production of teaching materials, the avail-ability of laws and administrative documents in the minority language, etc.).This hope, however, was in vain. Shortly after Ladin Dolomitan was launched,the government of South Tyrol decided to formally exclude it from all its legaltexts, publications and websites. At the local level, Ladin Dolomitan is alsohardly used in administration and its use in schools is blocked in favor of localidioms.

As the Ladin example shows, the road to the spread of the new norm is ahard and weary one. Quite some institutional support and a positive social andpolitical climate is needed for it to be accepted by the language community. Ifthat climate is lacking, then corpus planning efforts meant to settle languageconflict over language matters might very well intensify existing conflicts and/orlead to new language conflicts (cf. Jahr 1993: 1).

3.5.2 Status, prestige and acquisition policy and planning

How positive discrimination, bilingual education and the principle of territori-ality can be used to try and settle language conflict over the use of languageshas been shown by Labrie et al. (1993) and Nelde (1997). As far as the use andthe function of status and acquisition language policy and planning for settlinglanguage conflicts in language minority settings is concerned, one could alsolook at the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages that waspublished in 1992 and entered into force in 1998. The Charter holds an importantposition as a frame of reference in European discussions on the preservation oflinguistic diversity. It contains a catalogue of measures that could help topromote the use of the selected regional or minority languages in areas includ-ing education, the courts, administration and public services, media, culturalactivities and facilities, economic and social life and trans-frontier exchanges.The parties that ratify the Charter have to choose 35 mutually reinforcingmeasures from the catalogue (cf. Darquennes [2011] for a more detailedoverview).

Obviously, the success of language shift reversal in minority settings doesnot solely depend on the mere ratification of the Charter by a member state ofthe Council of Europe, nor by the mere existence of other (complementary)



www.spell-termles.ladinia.net

policy documents or even language laws at that state’s national or regionallevel. It also depends a lot on the means that are put at the disposal “fromabove” and the way in which these means allow to facilitate and implementmeasures that can help to create a climate in which the minority language canflourish next to the majority language in some sort of a diglossic constellation(whereby diglossia does not necessarily have to be thought of in the sense ofrelatively stable diglossia as originally put forward by Ferguson and criticised inearly Catalan and Occitan literature on language conflict, cf. Kremnitz [1979] andBoyer [1991]). Next to that it also depends on the willingness of the population toaccept the measures in different domains of society as they are implementedfrom above and to complement them with grassroots initiatives “from below”.The success of language policy and planning aiming at resolving languageconflict over language use depends on many factors (cf. Williams 2008).Because of that, the road to success might not be an instant one. And the dangerof elaborating measures that magnify rather than reduce the language conflict isalways lurking. Language policy and planning aiming at the management oflanguage conflict is therefore best based on a careful analysis of the languageconflict situation.

4 Methodological approaches

Since a comprehensive inventory of the methodological approaches applied inlanguage conflict research would go beyond the scope of this article, only twowidely used methodological approaches will be briefly discussed: “linguisticprofiling” and “discourse analysis”.

The approach known as “linguistic profiling” dates back to the 1960s. Atthat time scholars such as Ferguson (1962), for example, promoted the idea thatstudies based on a profile of the broad social environment in which a languageis used allow for a better judgment of the changes in the status and function ofthat language. Haugen soon picks up this idea and pleads for a multidimen-sional and interdisciplinary approach to the interplay between language and itsenvironment. He labels this approach “the ecology of language” (Haugen 1972).In his writings, he emphasizes that the ecology of language wants to cover “abroad range of interests within which linguists can cooperate significantly withall kinds of social scientists towards an understanding of the interaction oflanguages and their users” (Haugen 1972: 328–329). What the ecology of lan-guage (like other sorts of profiling such as Wölck’s Community Profiles,cf. Wölck [1985]) aims for is to discover major social distinctions and structuraldivisions in a community and to identify a subset of the population that



represents such features or structural divisions. As such, it can be shown howthese divisions or structural features are paralleled by or correlate with linguisticfeatures or differences in language use (cf. Wölck 1985: 33). Therefore, a broad(historical, demographic, political, linguistic, social, cultural, religious, etc.)description of the community investigated is necessary whereby especiallysuch sectors of society that influence language use and language attitudes areof primary interest. Haarmann (1986) has identified the variables that should betaken into account when describing the community that is being studied in mostdetail. They include ethnodemographic, ethnosociological, ethnopolitical, eth-nocultural, ethnopsychological, interactional and ethnolinguistic variables.Haarmann’s approach has been constructively criticized and refined by MacGiolla Chríost (2003). The description of the language community as called forby Haarmann and Mac Giolla Chríost can be based on a careful study ofavailable literature and policy documents. However, it proves useful to combinethis phase of “armchair linguistics” with a (quantitative and/or qualitative)empirical study of the language community under investigation (cf. Wölck[1985] for details).

Qualitative research on language conflict can benefit from the principles ofdiscourse analysis. As Ricento (2006: 131–132) notes, linguistic analysis usingthe principles of critical discourse analysis “can provide greater detail andspecificity about how particular social beliefs, values and ideologies are …reproduced (often implicitly) in a variety of written and spoken genres in definedcontexts”. Rindler Schjerve and Vetter (2003), for example, have successfullyapplied the method of critical discourse analysis in their analysis of the interplaybetween diglossia and power in the Habsburg Empire. And in his monographson conflict and compromise in Switzerland, Belgium and Finland, McRae alsomakes use of discourse analysis to provide contextualized data on each of thefour “guide posts” which he identifies as essential for a study of languageconflict situations: (1) historical and developmental patterns; (2) the socialstructure of the language communities and the relations between languagedivisions and other social divisions; (3) the perceptions and attitudes of lan-guage communities and the expression of these attitudes in political life; and (4)formal institutional arrangements concerning languages, including constitu-tional and legal provisions (McRae 1983: 27–33).

For a further development of research on language conflict, it would beworthwhile to take stock of existing methods that are scattered over the avail-able literature and to try to build synergies where possible: e.g., the onesdeveloped by Goebl (1986, based on Werlen [1984]), Labrie (1997, 2003),Dumbrava (2004) and the contributors to Joseph et al. (2003). In this respect,language conflict research would undoubtedly profit a lot from the ethnographic



approaches as they are applied in critical (micro)sociolinguistic research thatapproaches language conflict issues mainly through the lens of language ideo-logical debates (cf. Blommaert 1999). That brings us to the last point of thiscontribution, i.e. a brief list of research desiderata that could help to fuel futureresearch on language conflict.

5 Desiderata

(1) Taken together, the references included in this article as well as in the othercontributions to this volume of the International Journal of the Sociology ofLanguage only represent a fraction of the available literature on languageconflict. The inventory of available research on language conflict needs tobe enlarged. With the rise of the digital humanities, this once weary taskfortunately has become far less daunting. These days, it is relatively easy topurchase or to get online access to books that for one reason or another didnot make their way into mainstream literature over the past decades(examples include Joy [1972 (1967)] and Terracini [1951, 1957]). It is alsomuch easier than ever before to comb out journals for contributions inwhich language conflict is either directly or indirectly dealt with. A quicksearch with the search engine on the webpage of the International Journalof the Sociology of Language yielded 93 potentially relevant results for“language conflict” and 498 potentially interesting results for “conflict”(the search was conducted on 16 January 2014). A more detailed queryshould, of course, also include notions that are related to language conflictsuch as “linguistic strife”, “conflicting language ideologies”, “contestedlanguage varieties”, etc.

(2) When making an inventory of research on language conflict, care should betaken to include relevant literature not only from the language sciences butalso from neighboring disciplines such as sociology, political science, poli-tical philosophy and economy. Quite a number of references can be found,e.g., in Schmid (2001), Rindler Schjerve (2003, 2007), Mac Giolla Chríost(2003) and Conill (2007). These references can, however, surely be comple-mented by books as well as contributions to edited volumes and journalsdealing with conflict from various disciplinary angles (cf., e.g., http://www.peacejusticestudies.org/resources/journals.php for a list of journals).

(3) Parallel to building a comprehensive language conflict bibliography, thetheoretical foundations of language conflict research need to be furtherdeveloped. One possible way of proceeding in the case of research on



http://www.peacejusticestudies.org/resources/journals.php

http://www.peacejusticestudies.org/resources/journals.php

societal language conflict could be to elaborate the already available knowl-edge on the causes, the visibility, the manifestations, the focal points, themanagement and the outcomes of the management of language conflict.Aspects of language conflict that were not dealt with in this contribution, yetshould be added include the role of the different actors in language conflictsettings. So far, too little is known about the agenda of the parties (indivi-duals and/or groups) that “steer” language conflicts (who is responsible forlabelling a particular situation of language contact as a situation of languageconflict? how does this happen?). Research would also profit from a carefulstudy of the extent, the stability and the intensity of language conflict (cf. deVries 1990: 21–22). That could give rise to a well-grounded reflection on theexistence of different “degrees” of language conflict and to a refinement ofthe still somewhat vaguely defined existing typologies of language conflict(cf. Weber [2003: 105–107] on ethnolinguistic conflicts, language politicalconflicts and politicised language conflicts). More attention should also bepaid to the – in this contribution largely neglected – interrelationshipbetween the various features of societal language conflict (i.e. the causes,the visibility, the manifestations, etc.). In the same vein, also the overlapbetween the main areas of focus of language conflict research (i.e. languageconflict at the level of “language”, “the individual language user(s)” and“society”) deserves to be more closely examined. Of special interest here isthe question how interpersonal and societal language conflict relate to eachother (cf. Watts [1988], as referred to in Section 2.2). Combined research oninterpersonal and societal language conflict would be an interesting exercisein merging the different views on “language” and “society” that – since theearly days of sociolinguistics and the sociology of language – mark theusually more macro-oriented approaches to societal and the more micro-oriented approaches to interpersonal language questions (including ques-tions related to language conflict).

(4) The language conflict literature dealt with in this contribution ismainly rootedin “traditional” macro-sociolinguistics and the sociology of language whichtend to focus on “language problems” in pre-defined social groups (forexample “speech communities”; “majorities”; indigenous, immigrant, afflu-ent or other “minorities”, etc.). These “language problems” concern thecorpus, the status, the acquisition and/or the prestige of a “named language”used by the pre-defined social group(s) in a supranational, a national, regio-nal and/or a local setting (cf. Truchot 2008; Darquennes 2010; Plasseraud2012). This approach contrasts with the approach that marks research that isrooted in the ethnography of speaking. That kind of research takes a view onlanguage as being dynamic, personal, free, creative, open, and constantly



evolving as a starting point (cf. Shohamy 2006) and focuses on the intricateinterplay of different “repertoires”, “styles” and “registers” that color much ofeveryday interpersonal communication in the “transnational” and “hyperdi-verse” urban “communities of practice” or “networks” as they emerge incontemporary society (cf. Keim 2006; Blommaert and Rampton 2011).Building on the work of Gumperz and Hymes this sort of research has recentlybeen intensified by the attention of the social sciences to phenomena ofmigration and globalization that characterize contemporary society. It wouldgo much too far to state that research that deals with the intricate interplaybetween language and society is either entirely rooted in a discoursethat celebrates “homogeneity” or in one that celebrates “heterogeneity”.Nevertheless, the fact that different points of view (macro vs. micro), differentmethods and a different kind of vocabulary are used does not make it easy tocombine these discourses. The search for possible synergies between dis-courses on “heterogeneity” and discourses on “homogeneity” thereforeposes a challenge to research dealing with language diversity, societal multi-lingualism, language contact and language conflict. Backed-up by Johnsonand Ricento (2013: 14) it can be claimed that currently attempts are made tocombine macro- and micro-perspectives. It would be worthwhile to pursuethese initiatives that are mainly to be witnessed in the “ethnography oflanguage policy” in the study of language conflict. That would certainlyhelp to highlight the heterogeneity and the permeability of notions such as“(standard) language”, “speech community”, “minority”, “majority”, “diglos-sia”, “identity” etc. (cf. much of the contributions in Coupland [2013] for acritical view on these notions from the perspective of the sociolinguistics ofglobalization). When doing so, advantage could be taken of the ideasexpressed by Mac Giolla Chríost in Chapter 10 of his monograph on languageconflict where he, among other things, addresses the need to take the hetero-geneity and the dynamics of the groups that are at the centre of conflict intoaccount through thickening the relationship between the “individual” and the“group” (Mac Giolla Chríost 2003: 167). Doing that would allow for a betterview of what happens to heterogeneous features of, e.g., “language”, “group-ness” or “identity” under the circumstances of conflict. It often seems that insituations of conflict the contours of the previously mentioned, under “nor-mal” circumstances rather blurred concepts become much clearer or more“exclusive”. Through focusing on the vaporization of certain features of“language”, “groupness” or “identity” under the circumstances of conflict,language conflict research could not only very well serve the current attemptsat bridging the macro-micro gap. A renewed attention for the heterogeneity ofmany of its central notions could also help macrosociolinguistics to change



“from within”, i.e. to discover new units of analysis that would help it tosurpass themethodological nationalism (cf. Beck and Grande 2010) inwhich itis still largely entrapped and to provide more adequate responses to thecomplex challenges that language diversity poses in a society that is hardlycomparable to the post-war society in which the many branches of hyphe-nated linguistics emerged (cf. Darquennes 2014).

(5) A final point which has not been addressed, yet deserves some considera-tion as well is the question whether the concept of “language conflict” is auseful or an appropriate one at all. One cannot deny that there is a“sensation-seeking” dimension to language conflict (cf. Fishman 1980: xi)and that especially non-scientific literature does not always capture theintricate – most often, if not always: secondary – role which languageplays in situations that are labelled as situations of “societal languageconflict”.6 However, that there are many conflicts that in one way oranother evolve around or most certainly are perceived as evolving aroundlanguage, is clear. In this respect, Cooper (1989: 178–180) writes that likeother conflicts, language conflicts are endemic to society and lead to socialchange. A better understanding of the mechanisms of language conflictcould therefore help to gain a better understanding of social change andcould even help to positively influence processes of social change(cf. Nelde 1997: 292–293). That makes it worthwhile to keep investing inthe potential of the sociology of language, sociolinguistics and contactlinguistics as sub-disciplines of linguistics that can be of assistance infinding solutions to the many societal language problems that surround us.

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