Regional Language Policies in France during World War II by Aviv Amit

Poland has a centuries long tradition of being a tolerant country, manifested as well by the symbolic offi cial name: Poland of Both Nations (1569–1795). Poles, Lithuanians and numerous national minorities lived side by side in the territory of the Polish Republic and today their descendants are Polish citizens. During the time of partitions Poles maintained strong national community feelings, which subsequently helped in the building of the Second Polish Republic. The reborn Poland was again a multi-national state, however, certain nationalistic feelings started to emerge. After World War II as a result of the extermination of minorities and mass resettlements, the historical multinational character disappeared and the minimal set of rights granted to minorities in the Constitution of 1952 had led to their ethnic exclusion. After March 1968, the rights of minorities had become drastically limited. This continued till the Third Republic of Poland when the policy of the Communist authorities promoting the building of Poland for the Poles had been abandoned and the new government pursued to preserve and protect national and ethnic minorities. Today, members of minorities have the same rights as ethnic Poles, and their rights are guaranteed in the Constitution of 1997 and other legislative acts including the most important one, i.e. the Act on National and Ethnic Minorities and the Regional Language of 2015, which deﬁ nes national and ethnic minorities and determines the competences of the State bodies in the area of enforcing minorities rights. These solutions have secured Poland an opinion of a model state when it comes to the protection of minorities rights. There are nine national minorities ofﬁ cially recognised in Poland. Each has a diff erent situation resulting from historical conditions, circumstances, national stereotypes, relationship with the States of their origin and the position of the Polish minority in this State. Two main problems which minorities in Poland are facing today is their shrinking populations and threats to their culture from the Polish and global cultures. Immigration might be a possible remedy but low economic attractiveness of Poland fails to attract new immigrants which means that in the future Poland may practically become a one-nation state.

Download Full-text

Plurilinguismo all'australiana

Language Problems & Language Planning ◽

10.1075/lplp.21.1.07bet ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 21 (1) ◽

pp. 58-65

Author(s):

Camilla Bettoni

Keyword(s):

World War Ii ◽

State Of The Art ◽

The State ◽

The Other ◽

Raw Material ◽

The Political ◽

Official Language ◽

Language Policies ◽

World War ◽

Scientific Rigor

SUMMARY Multiculturalism the Australian Way: Between Rigorous Documentation and Passionate Defense Australia is an extraordinary country, not only because of the wealth of its linguistic raw material, but also for the scientific rigor with which it tries to document it and the political passion with which it tries to preserve it. The books here reviewed are but two recent examples of this exceptional activity. They are considered together because they complement each other: one documents the state of the art for the numerous immigrant languages, the other the official language policies that have accompanied their arrival since World War II. RESUMO Plurlingvismo aŭstralie: Inter rigora dokumentado kaj pasia defendo Aŭstralio estas nekutima lando, ne nur pro sia abundo da lingva krudmaterialo, sed ankaŭ pro la rigoreco per kiu gi provas dokumenti gin kaj pro la politika pasieco per kiu gi provas konservi gin. La recenzataj libroj estas nur du lastatempaj specimenoj el tiu escepta agado. Ili estas traktataj kune, car ili komplementas unu la alian: unu dokumentas la aktualan nivelon de scio pri la multnombraj lingvoj de enmigrintoj kaj la alia la oficialajn lingvopolitikojn, kiuj de la dua mondmilito akompanis ilian alvenadon.

Download Full-text