Revitalising Language in Provence: A Critical Approach

Few question the importance of the survival of languages in today s world. Yet why is it that many language revitalisation movements have a wider social agenda? And why do people choose language and not, say, religion, ethnicity, or politics to express claims and positions in the world? A stark rise in language revitalisation movements in recent years has necessitated a clearer understanding of the field a need filled by  Revitalising Language in Provence: A Critical Approach. Through a detailed analysis Southern France s Provençal movement, one of Europe s longest standing language revitalisation projects, noted sociolinguistic James Costa reveals that language revitalisation is often more than it appears to be and how saving a language may not be the primary objective of many such movements. Costa shows that language revitalisation constitutes an attempt to renegotiate the very terms of historical contact between groups which are themselves generated through that very process. Opening chapters explore how revitalization has emerged as a theoretical and empirical object of scholarly discussion with Costa challenging the field s main tenets. The next sections focus on language revitalization as a form of conflict, and Costa shows how the revitalisation movement often sees itself in a minority role pitted against a dominant group. He argues that the aim of revitalisation movements is to renegotiate the unequal terms of this contact a task enabled only through groupness work. Questions are then answered about how language revitalisation generates groupness, and how one is to distinguish between legitimate language and speaker the underlying question of all such movements.  Revitalising Language in Provence: A Critical Approach offers illuminating insights into not just keeping language alive, but how people come together to act and articulate opinions on how society should be ordered and who should take part in ordering it in the contemporary world.

James Costa is Associate Professor of Sociolinguistics and Linguistic Anthropology at the Université Sorbonne Nouvelle in Paris, France.