Post-National Acts of Identity? Language Ideologies in Multilingual Belize

研究的重点是全球化时代语言的符号功能。在全球一体化进程中，它们变得更加多样化和复杂；然而，语言民族主义的传统优势——假设一个民族和一种语言之间的一致性——阻碍了对多语言环境中语言的多种象征意义的理解。中美洲国家伯利兹是这项研究的重点。由于使用的语言数量众多，在个人层面上，伯利兹代表了语言多样性的极端案例，使其成为研究后国家社会语言学趋势的绝佳环境。研究的关键问题是：语言选择或语言混合的象征意义是什么？这些意义与哪些其他社会或政治话语交织在一起？政府的语言政策如何应对复杂的语言环境？复杂性是否影响话语建构的语言范畴？本研究将对伯利兹的语言意识形态进行定性分析。将在历史、学术和政府文本的基础上提供该国社会语言学经济的概述，其次，基于对公共媒体中流行文化话语的分析。这构成了语言意识形态将被研究的另外两个领域的背景：政府语言政策的话语分析和伯利兹学校课堂语言实践的语言民族志。文献记载的语言选择的社会意义及其与地方、国家或跨国话语的关系揭示了多语言社会中语言意识形态的复杂性。讨论了这些结果与应用环境的关系，如学校课程、国家语言政策和当代社会的社区构成，以及它们对（社会）语言学理论的意义。

The study focuses on symbolic functions of language in the era of globalisation. Through processes of global integration, they are becoming more diverse and complex; and yet, the traditional predominance of linguistic nationalism - the assumed congruence between a people and a language - has hindered the understanding of the multiple symbolic meanings of languages in multilingual settings. The Central American country of Belize is the focus of this study. Due to the high number of languages spoken, also on the individual level, Belize represents an extreme case of linguistic diversity, making it an excellent environment for studying post-national sociolinguistic trends. Key questions of the study are: What are the symbolic meanings of language choice or language mixing? With which other societal or political discourses are such meanings interwoven? How does governmental language policy react to complex linguistic milieus? Does the complexity affect the discursively constructed category of language?The study will conduct qualitative analysis of language ideologies in Belize. An overview of the country's sociolinguistic economy will be provided on the basis of historical, scholarly and governmental texts, and, secondly, grounded on an analysis of popular cultural discourses in public media. That forms the background to two other domains in which language ideologies will be studied: a discursive analysis of governmental language policies and a linguistic ethnography of the language practices of a Belizean school class.The documented social meanings of language choice and their relations to local, national or transnational discourses map out the complexity of language ideologies in multilingual societies. The consequences are discussed in relation to applied contexts such as school curricula, national language policies and the constitution of community in contemporary society, and in their significance for (socio)linguistic theory.