Abstract
As an important part of a nation’s soft power, national multilingual capacity refers to a nation’s ability to use a variety of languages acquired in dealing with domestic and international affairs in the development of a nation. The nation-security-oriented language planning in the post-9/11 America is closely related with the teaching, using and developing of the minorities’ heritage languages, which has to some extent facilitated the America’s national multilingual capacity. Taking National Security Language Initiative proposed by the American federal government as an example, this paper suggests that minorities’ heritage language planning be an endogenous shortcut to build the national multilingual capacity. Furthermore, the relationship between minorities’ heritage language planning and national multilingual capacity building is established by matching the five key parameters in heritage language planning with the five components of national multilingual capacity respectively, i.e., exploring the correlations between languages planning, talent planning, education planning, industry planning, policy planning and national multilingual resources capacity, individual’s multilingual capacity, national multilingual education capacity, national multilingual service capacity and national multilingual management capacity in detail by using an analytical method.
Highlights
Since the term “heritage language” was transferred from Canada to the field of language policy and planning in America in the late 1990s, studies focused on its protection, development and inheritance have attracted more and more scholars from various fields, including linguistics, pedagogy, policy science, sociology, etc
Taking National Security Language Initiative proposed by the American federal government as an example, this paper suggests that minorities’ heritage language planning be an endogenous shortcut to build the national multilingual capacity
The relationship between heritage language planning and national multilingual capacity building is studied in this paper, which will provide some reference for the ecological development of minority languages and the enhancement of national language capacity in the multiethnic and multilingual nations
Summary
Since the term “heritage language” was transferred from Canada to the field of language policy and planning in America in the late 1990s (see Krashen, 1998; Tse, 1997), studies focused on its protection, development and inheritance have attracted more and more scholars from various fields, including linguistics, pedagogy, policy science, sociology, etc. The minorities’ heritage languages in America have been taken as the acknowledged resources at present rather than the object of assimilation in the past. The nation-security-oriented language planning in the post-9/11 America is closely related with the maintenance and development of the minorities’ heritage languages, which has in a way facilitated the America’s national multilingual capacity. A sustainable utilizing and developing of language resources require more attention to be paid to the values and social functions of minority languages from individuals, academia, nations and international organizations. The relationship between heritage language planning and national multilingual capacity building is studied in this paper, which will provide some reference for the ecological development of minority languages and the enhancement of national language capacity in the multiethnic and multilingual nations
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