Pluricentric languages in different theoretical and educational contexts

This is the second of two volumes that presents part of the outcome 9th World Conference on Pluricentric Languages that took place from August 26-28 2021. The volume contains eight contributions. Seven of them were presented at the confer-ence. A further paper was included for topicality reasons. The conference was or-ganised by the “Working Group on Non-Dominant Varieties of Pluricentric Lan-guages (WGNDV), this time hosted by the Austrian German Research Centre in Graz. Due to the pandemic and ensuing complications for travelling, the conference was held online via ZOOM much to the satisfaction of all participants. The conference had three focal points: (1) Pluricentric languages in the Americas; (2) The localisation of global audiovisual and print media in pluricentric language areas; (A seperate volume will be published at the end of 2022); (3) General section – Pluricentric languages worldwide. The papers of this volume refer to the topics and (3) while the papers of theme (1) are pub-lished in volume (1). A separate volume concerning topic (2) is planned to be published at the end of 2022. The articles of this volume deal with theoretical and educational matters.

This paper is a report on personal experiences when I submitted a paper that was meant to be published in the volume “Pluricentricity and Pluriareality: Dialects, Variation, and Standards”, that was to comprise the presentations of a conference at the University of Münster in 2019. The paper was not accepted for publication, with many comments inserted into the text that demanded many alterations of my text. What makes the process particular is not only the large number of reviewer comments, but also their quality. A large number of the comments give the impres-sion that they were not intended to improve the text, but are rather de-structive in the sense that central parts of my text are demanded either to be deleted, rewritten or backed up with additional references even though there is no need for that and no space either. Five destructive strategies have been outlined and are presented with the original text of my paper and the respective comments. The paper finishes with a chapter on the ethics of reviewing that does not seem to be discussed in German sociolinguistics.

This paper examines the “pluriareal model” in German linguistics and reviews the claims of the literature review that yielded eight claims by the first group that was active until the mid 2000s. A second group of supporters started after 2010, by drawing on many claims made by the first group and by adding new claims. A critical discussion of these claims, however, shows that they are not tenable. A multitude of data was presented and refuted all but one of the claims of the PLAGs. More-over, we show that the data of the Variantengrammatik (VARGR) is seriously flawed as the underlying corpus is neither balanced nor repre-sentative. This was proved by checking the data of the VARGR against the Corpus of the Austrian Press Agency, and an online survey with almost 1000 responders. The results confirm that the pluriareal model is invalid and not a viable alternative to the pluricentric language model.

This article discusses the status of the language spoken in the Republic of Moldova, which presents some particular features compared with the standard Romanian language. For almost two centuries, Moldova was part of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union and subject to their language policies, which was responsible for an independent develop-ment of the language in certain aspects. However, with the independence of Moldova in 1991, this development came to an end. The speakers of Moldovan show a strong awareness of their language. This fact and the attitude of today’s official institutions vis-à-vis their language leads to the conclusion that Moldovan is not a language of its own. The socio-linguistic situation suggests speaking of a variety of the pluricentric Romanian language. The advocates of an independent Moldovan lan-guage use arguments which are based on the notion that an own lan-guage is necessary to define statehood. Such arguments are not valid.

This paper focuses on the functioning of Belarusian Russian in the second half of 2020-21 against the background of the presidential elections in Belarus. As a prominent historical event, the elections of 2020-21 had a major impact on the sociolinguistic situation in Belarus. They caused the intensification of the creative capacity of Belarusian Russian, which led to the creation of new lexical items and the revival of some old ones to name the current concepts. A lack of dialogue between the opposing sides has caused the usage of the same words with different meanings and facilitated the formation of their pragmatic ambivalence. The innovations arise not only in Russian, but also in the Belarusian-Russian language continuum, which manifests itself in the new contact-induced formations in Belarusian Russian. And though the language of the protests which followed the elections was primarily Belarusian Russian, the symbolic role of the Belarusian language in the protest movement increases.

India has a long history of co-existence of multiple languages, ethnici-ties, cultures and religions, all growing alongside one another. The diversities help to strengthen the multilingual and multicultural character of India as a nation. However, due to some problematic approaches prevalent in various parts of the society, the survival and sustenance of the non-dominant languages and language varieties becomes a challenge. Even for the speakers of Bengali – one of the scheduled languages of India having a speaker strength of more than 95 million speakers – this pressure is seen to be exerted through various activi-ties. This paper attempts to study some of the challenges faced by the non-dominant languages and language varieties in India. It will particularly focus on the complex nature of language grouping in India, the monolingual approach of language policies in the state and in educational institutions, and problems of parochialism in some cases of language activism.

The aim of this study is to investigate and compare teachers’ and students’ perceptions of the pluricentricity of English and German, and its role in language teaching in Hungary, and to explore the extent to which teachers and students are open to pluricentricity in language teaching. As part of a large-scale research project that consists of sev-eral components, the questionnaire survey that the present paper dis-cusses is based on a national sample of 484 participants, including 134 teachers and 112 learners of English, as well as 104 teachers and 134 learners of German. Two hypotheses are used as a point of departure, namely (i) that learners are more open to different standards than their teachers, and (ii) that dominant varieties predominate over non-dominant ones. The statistical tests conducted confirm both hypotheses with a number of significant results. Furthermore, English teachers were found to be significantly more open than German teachers, but still lagging behind their students in this regard. As this discrepancy between teachers and students often causes conflicts that can under-mine the success of the language learning process, this research provides a valuable message for many actors in the education system in Hungary and beyond.

This paper first discusses the current state of research of pluricentric-ity in language education in Germany, followed by an analysis of exemplary textbooks for teaching and learning English, French and Spanish as foreign languages. Within the scope of a micro-study, 69 digital language portraits of German students were analysed with regard to the representation of language varieties. The analysis focuses on German as the native language of most of the students as well as English, French and Spanish as the most commonly learnt foreign languages. The analysis reveals what language varieties students include in their digital language portraits, how they illustrate them and the importance they have for them. On that basis, conclusions, and desid-erata about pluricentricity in language educations are discussed.

From conventional to new forms, students are transferring innovative linguistic features in digital communication to academic writing. The aim of this chapter is therefore, to examine the impact of digital com-munication as conceptualised and applied by Cameroonian university students in academic writing in pluricentric English, proposing strate-gies for awareness and discernment. From an applied linguistics perspective, the processes that recur in students’ academic writing are traceable to aspects of morpho-syntax, lexico-semantics, phonology, spelling, and translanguaging. The research questions are formulated based on the investigation of reasons for a shift from conventional writing, of the variables that influence the shift, and of inclusive peda-gogic strategies in managing pluricentricity. Methodologically, a con-tent analysis of students’ e-texts and analogue essays is done, while the Communication Accommodation Theory supports adjustments in communication and adds to reasons for the inevitability of the plu-ricentricity of English. Such pluricentricity requires an inclusive lan-guage-aware approach for teaching-learning; a stretchy model that in-corporates discernment into diversity.

The Termini Research Network was founded 20 years ago and unites the Hungarian language research institutes of the regions in the Carpathian Basin outside Hungary. Its most important research program is the ‘de-bordering’ of the pluricentric Hungarian language in the framework of an online, interactive dictionary program. The main focus of the research is to collect and analyse the specific vocabulary elements of the spoken and written Hungarian language varieties outside the borders of Hungary. In this study, we briefly report on the peculiarities of the dictionary using illustrative examples.