Prof. Tomasz Wicherkiewicz, with assistance of Anne Egaña Asensio, PhD Intern
ELLDo Summer Semester 2025/2026
Wednesday, 13:15-14:45, Room C1
Course description
This course introduces language policies as complex, plural, and multi-level phenomena shaping language use in contemporary societies.
Language policies are discussed across different scales, including the micro level of everyday interaction, the meso level of institutions and organizations, and the macro level of state and supranational frameworks. Attention is given to the ways in which language policies circulate between these levels and take form through both formal regulations and informal practices.
The course presents a broad overview of language policy processes, including top-down initiatives, institutional mediation, and community- and family-based or grassroots dynamics. Rather than limiting the discussion to official legislation or classical language planning models, the course also considers how language policies become visible through public language use, institutional routines, documentation practices, and everyday communicative norms, including within families. Particular emphasis is placed on contexts in which policies are implicit, fragmented, or inconsistent, especially in minoritized and multilingual settings.
Designed for AMU students of Empirical Linguistics & Language Documentation, the course provides conceptual tools for understanding how language policies are produced, interpreted, and negotiated in different social domains. It highlights the role of institutions, communities, and professional actors – such as linguists and language documenters – in shaping language policy environments, while treating policy conflicts and contradictions as common and structurally inherent features of linguistic life.
Course content
- Language policies as empirical objects
- Scale in language policy analysis: micro, meso, macro
- Macro-language policies: state and supranational frameworks
- Top-down policies and implementation
- Meso-language policies: institutions and mediation
- Conflicts and contradictions across scales
- Bottom-up and grassroots language policies
- Micro-language policies in interaction and community practice
- Family language policies
- Linguists and documenters as language policy actors
- Language policies in minoritized contexts
- Empirical methods in language policy research
- Case study analysis and synthesis
Assessment methods and criteria
1. Active participation and engagement – 40%
Students are assessed on regular, informed participation in lectures and guided discussions. Participation is understood not as frequency of speaking, but as demonstrated engagement with empirical material and readings
2. Short empirical observation task – 30%
Students complete a short empirical task (1–2 pages), which requires them to:
- identify a language policy in practice,
- locate it at a specific scale (micro / meso / macro), and indicate whether it operates primarily top-down, bottom-up, or as a grassroots policy.
Tasks may be based on:
- interactional data,
- institutional documents or routines,
- language documentation materials,
- linguistic landscape data.
3. Final integrative reflection – 30%
A short reflective text (approx. 1000 words) in which students:
- synthesise insights from the course,
- reflect on how language policies shape empirical linguistic work,
- consider their own position as researchers, documenters, or analysts.
This is not a research paper, but an integrative analytical reflection.
Literature
Blommaert, Jan. 2013. Ethnography, Superdiversity and Linguistic Landscapes. Multilingual Matters.
Heller, Monica. 2007. Bilingualism as Ideology and Practice. University of Toronto Press.
Hornberger, Nancy H. 2006. “Frameworks and Models in Language Policy and Planning.” In An Introduction to Language Policy, ed. by T. Ricento. Blackwell.
Johnson, David Cassels. 2013. Language Policy. Palgrave Macmillan.
May, Stephen. 2012. Language and Minority Rights: Ethnicity, Nationalism and the Politics of Language. Routledge.
Pennycook, Alastair. 2010. Language as a Local Practice. Routledge.
Shohamy, Elana. 2006. Language Policy: Hidden Agendas and New Approaches. Routledge.
Spolsky, Bernard. 2004. Language Policy. Cambridge University Press.
Tollefson, James W. 2002. Language Policies in Education: Critical Issues. Routledge