The New Cosmopolitan Monolingualism: On Linguistic Citizenship in Twenty‐First Century Germany

Abstract

In the early years of the twenty‐first century, being German has become a matter of linguistic competence and performance. An acute shift in citizenship statutes at the end of the 1990s brought about a peripatetic departure from Germany's “right of blood” (ius sanguinis) toward a French‐inspired “right of territory” (ius soli). Yet in the nine years since the policy's implementation, a paradigm quite removed from territorial citizenship has taken hold—one that I will outline as a ius linguarum, or “right of languages.” This article analyzes the civic discourse on German language use as it has evolved from the late 1990s in immigration statutes, press discourse, school reform initiatives, and national service awards. Together, these developments serve as interlocking case studies in the emergence of a new cosmopolitan monolingualism—amid the fluctuating conditions of European integration and economic globalization. The article concludes with some speculations on the impact of a ius linguarum for teachers of literature and language in the German Studies context.