JPNS 042. Language Policy and Planning in Japan

Language policy and planning is a fundamental aspect of society: it has the potential to enrich the quality of human lives or impose great conflicts and struggles in our everyday lives. Despite its image of homogeneity, Japanese society has a much linguistic diversity and a great number of linguistic minorities, including indigenous groups and immigrants; however, it is questionable if the society has provided a systematic support to maintain this diversity. Japan is also constantly facing the need to improve its language education, although, arguably, the attempts so far have been rather unsuccessful. This course aims to understand the current state of Japanese society in light of these political issues relevant to Japanese language.While learning the basic notions and theoretical approaches in language policy, the course will cover topics including historical aspects of language policy in Japan, linguistic minorities in Japan, legal issues of languages in Japan, and issues regarding Japanese language education as well as foreign/second/ heritage language education. Throughout the course, students are encouraged to critically consider the politics of using their own language as well as Japanese.
Readings and discussion will be in English. Some knowledge of Japanese is recommended but not required for this course.
Humanities.
1 credit.
Eligible for ASIA
Catalog chapter: Modern Languages and Literatures: Japanese
Department website: https://www.swarthmore.edu/japanese

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