Joseph Errington (Yale University)
Linguistics in a Colonial World A Story of Language, Meaning, and Power
Blackwell Publishing, 2007.
Description
Drawing on both original texts and critical literature, Linguistics in a Colonial World surveys the methods, meanings, and uses of early linguistic projects around the world.
Explores how early endeavours in linguistics were used to aid in overcoming practical and ideological difficulties faced in colonial rule
Traces the uses and effects of colonial linguistic projects in shaping the identities and communities that were under, or in opposition to, imperial regimes
Examines how the linguistic face of colonial scholarship's history continues to shape the thinking about language and cultural difference today Brings new insight into post-colonial controversies including endangered languages and language rights in the globalized twenty-first century
Preface
Acknowledgments
List of Figures and Table
1. The Linguistic in the Colonial
2. Early Conversions, or, How Spanish Friars Made the Little Jump
3. Imaging the Linguistic Past
4. Philology's Evolutions
5. Between Pentecost and Pidgins
6. Colonial Linguists, (Proto)-National Languages
7. Postcolonial Postscript
References
Language Index
Persons Index
Subject Index Joseph Errington is currently Professor of Anthropology and International and Area Studies, as well as Chair of the Council of Southeast Asian Studies, at Yale University. His research and writing have focused on linguistic dimensions of modernization and identity in Java and Indonesia, reflecting his broader interests in semiotics and the politics of language.