Carrying out a language policy change: advocacy coalitions and the management of linguistic landscape

Abstract

This paper focuses on agency in language policy change. The object of the analysis is the processes of bilingualization of signage in three European towns. Located in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Wales, the towns differ in various respects, including the extent to which signage language policies have faced opposition and threatened social cohesion. Two theoretical frameworks are combined to analyse what facilitated or hindered language policy changes at the three sites. Language management framework provides a model of behaviour through which language and communication evolve in response to deviations from communicative expectations. Advocacy coalition framework, developed in political science, is used to gain an understanding of how such behaviour by coordinated social actors influences macro-level processes such as policy change.