Language Ideologies and the Globalization of 'Standard' Spanish

Description

This book examines how language ideologies are manifested in newspaper media. Using the Spanish press as a case study it considers how media discourse both from and about the Real Academia Espanola constitutes a set of 'language ideological debates' in which the institution represents a vision of what the Spanish language is and what it should be like. Paffey adopts a Critical Discourse Analysis approach to a large corpus of texts from Spain's best-selling daily newspapers, El Pais and ABC. More generally, the book sheds light on how institutions produce and maintain visions of 'standard language' in the contemporary context. A global language, such as Spanish, is by nature more widely used outside of the nation state in question than in it. The book covers recent research on language ideologies, standardization and CDA and considers the application of these to three core discursive themes: language unity and a concept of a 'panhispanic' speech community; the RAE's construction of its authority; and institutional ideologies and management of language on a global scale.

Darren Paffey is a Lecturer in Spanish and Linguistics at the University of Southampton, UK.

This book makes a valuable contribution to the study of the Language Ideologies surrounding Spanish. One of the book's great contributions is to address similarities, differences and complementarities between the Critical Discourse Analysis and Language Ideologies. Also, the analysis of the attitudes of the linguistic authorities surrounding social phenomena embedded in the expansion of a language, the blurring of political boundaries of the Nation state, and linguistic requirements of neoliberal global economy is vital. -- Lorena Cordova, Center for Research and Graduate Studies in Social Anthropology, Mexico * The Linguist * This exemplary study shows in a minutious way what is behind the discourses on the standardization of global Spanish. * Sociolinguistic Studies * Paffey's book is an impressive account to what extent the Spanish Language Academy frames not only the public ideological debates about Spanish as a language, but also the standardization efforts occurring in the Spanish speaking world. -- Rainer Enrique, Hamel Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Mexico Written in an accessible and engaging style, Language Ideologies and the Globalization of 'Standard' Spanish offers a timely and comprehensive investigation of ideological debates - past and present - about the Spanish language.Nationalism, identity, standardization, globalization and commodification are some of the fascinating issues upon which Paffey anchors his critical scrutiny of the workings of key 'ideology brokers' of the Spanish language, such as the Real Academia Espanola and the mass media. -- Professor Nuria Lorenzo-Dus Swansea University, UK, and Chair of the International Association for the Study of Spanish in Society