Linguistic discrimination
[4] UNESCO reports have noted that this has historically benefitted only the African upper class, conversely disadvantaging the majority of Africa's population who hold varying level of fluency in the European languages spoken across the continent.
For example, in the United States speaking General American (a variety associated with the white middle class) is widely preferred in many contexts such as television journalism.
Linguistic ideology can be defined as the beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions that society holds about language, including the idea that the way an individual speaks can serve as a powerful indicator of their social status and identity within a community.
This perspective enables researchers to unpack how certain linguistic features—such as accents, dialects, and speech patterns—are often laden with social meanings that can perpetuate stereotypes about different groups.
Consequently, linguistic discrimination can be understood as a phenomenon deeply rooted in societal beliefs and cognitive biases, which highlight the intersectionality of language, identity, and power dynamics within various populations.
By focusing on linguistic ideology, sociolinguistics provides a more targeted lens through which to examine the social consequences of language use and the systemic inequalities that arise from such perceptions.
This innovative approach not only enriches our understanding of language as a social tool but also emphasizes the importance of critically examining the underlying ideologies that inform our judgments about speech and the speakers themselves.
In regions such as the western coast of Africa as well as the Americas, trade relations between European colonizers and indigenous peoples led to the development of pidgin languages.
[20] In contrast, in countries that pursued policies of "integration", such as Mexico, Guatemala and the Andean states, indigenous cultures were lost as aboriginal tribes mixed with colonists.
[20][23] Today, in countries such as the United States, Canada and Australia, which were once settler colonies, indigenous languages are spoken by only a small minority of the populace.
Prominent Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong'o, for example, argues in his book Decolonizing the Mind that language is both a medium of communication, as well as a carrier of culture.
[27] In addition, D. L. Sheath, an advocate for the use of indigenous languages in India, also writes that the Indian elite associates nationalism with a unitary identity, and in this context, "uses English as a means of exclusion and an instrument of cultural hegemony”.
[27] Scholars such as Hebblethwaite argue that Creole-based education will improve learning, literacy and socioeconomic mobility in a country where 95% of the population are monolingual in Creole.
Kenya therefore began to offer Kiswahili as a compulsory, non-examinable subject in primary school, but it remained secondary to English as a medium of instruction.
For example, when representative institutions were introduced to the Algoma region in what is now modern-day Canada, the local returning officer only accepted the votes of individuals who were enfranchised, which required indigenous peoples to "read and write fluently... [their] own and another language, either English or French".
[citation needed] The law makes French the official language of Quebec and mandates its use (with exceptions) in government offices and communiques, schools, and in commercial public relations.
The law is a way of preventing linguistic discrimination against the majority francophone population of Quebec who were for a very long time controlled by the English minority of the province.
[44] The law is credited with successfully raising the status of French in a predominantly English-speaking economy, and it has been influential in countries facing similar circumstances.
These terms are used widely by linguists and non-linguists when discussing varieties of American English that engender strong opinions, a false dichotomy which is rarely challenged or questioned.
[63] AAVE is often perceived by members of mainstream American society as indicative of low intelligence or limited education, and as with many other non-standard dialects and especially creoles, it is usually called "lazy" or "bad" English.
[66] The linguist John McWhorter has described this particular form of linguicism as particularly problematic in the United States, where non-standard linguistic structures are often deemed "incorrect" by teachers and potential employers in contrast to other countries such as Morocco, Finland and Italy where diglossia (the ability to switch between two or more dialects or languages) is an accepted norm, and non-standard usage in conversation is seen as a mark of regional origin, not of intellectual capacity or achievement.
The assigned linguists determined that the differences, stemming from a history of racial segregation, were significant enough for the children to receive supplementary teaching to better understand standard English.
According to a survey, when a person speaks in AAVE, listeners tend to believe that the speaker is an African American from North America and is more related to adjectives such as poor, uneducated, and unintelligent.
The fact that the person uses a very broad vocabulary creates even more cognitive dissonance on the part of the listener who will immediately think of the speaker as either undocumented, poor, uneducated or even insulting to their intelligence.
However, this low English literacy level and lack of translation discourages many Asian immigrants to obtain access social services, such as health care.
This attitude was explicitly expressed in the Milan Conference of 1880 which set precedence for public opinion of manual forms of communication, including ASL, creating lasting consequences for members of the Deaf community.
[78] The conference almost unanimously (save a handful of allies such as Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet), reaffirmed the use of oralism, instruction conducted exclusively in spoken language, as the preferred education method for Deaf individuals.
Linguist Sherman Wilcox concludes that given that it has a body of literature and international scope, to single ASL out as unsuitable for a foreign language curriculum is inaccurate.
For example, some workplaces enforce an English-only policy, which is part of an American political movement that pushes for English to be accepted as the official language.
In the United States, the federal law, Titles VI and VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects non-native speakers from discrimination in the workplace based on their national origin or use of dialect.
