Language planning agency in China: from the perspective of the language academies

Abstract

Prof. Baldauf was one of the first who saw the planning agency as a central issue in examining the effectiveness of language planning (LP) endeavors (e.g. Baldauf, R. B. Jr. (1982). The language situation in American Samoa: Planners, plans and planning. Language Planning Newsletter, 1(8), 1–6). This paper chooses the language academy (LA) as a representation of language agency and examines its role in Chinese LP in modern history. China does not have an LA in the sense the term is used elsewhere in the world as Kaplan and Baldauf [(1997). Language planning from practice to theory. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters] describe. However, a constellation of official or semi-official LP organizations of various LA formats related to Chinese LP has existed through a century of the Chinese language modernization movement. This paper evaluates the efforts of these organizations with a focus on the interaction between the LP activities, the LP agency and socio-political conditions. We argue that the socio-political landscape as an enabler for LP in China has seen phenomenal changes as a result of the economic development and technological advancement in recent decades; the societal behavior of the people as the targeted recipients of LP goods has been increasingly governed by a postmodernist mentality. In this context, this paper concludes that a national LA would enhance the effectiveness of future LP ventures in the Chinese context.

Keywords:

• Language academy
• language planning
• China
• LP agency
• prestige

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Shouhui Zhao has worked as an Associate Professor at the Department of Foreign Languages, University of Bergen since 2014. His areas of expertise include second language acquisition (Chinese), Chinese linguistics, Chinese language modernization and character computerization, language policy analysis and curriculum evaluation (Chinese).

Guowen Shang is an Associate Professor at the School of International Studies, Zhejiang University, China. His research interests include language policy, sociolinguistics and Chinese grammar.

Notes

1. A linguistic variety which is regarded as a distinct language for political, cultural, social and historical as well as linguistic reasons.

2. Before this, the Simple Script Study Associates (Jianzi Yanjiu Hui), founded by a small group of phonetic script advocates in Beijing in 1910, was probably the first non-government LP organization.

3. The phrase was a proverbial reference (Wu bei shu ren, ding ze ding yi) coined by a scholar named Lu Fayan in the Sui dynasty (CE 581–618) when he was appointed by the government to formulate the official standard of pronunciation.

4. These organizations names in pinyin are: Zhongguo Wenzi Gaige Xiejinhui, Zhongguo Wenzi Gaige Xiehui, Zhongguo Wenzi Yanjiu weiyuanhui, Zhongguo Wenzi Gaige Weiyuanhui (Zhao & Baldauf, 2008, p. 43)

5. The first and second tasks, character simplification and alphabetization, had reached a mature phase; the third task, vernacularization, was replaced by the promotion of modern standard Chinese, known as Putonghua, the common language for all

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by China's Ministry of Education's Key Research Project on Strategic Studies on the National Language and Script in New Context [grant number 10JZD0043].