African Languages, Development and the State

When compared to the European standard of one nation, one language, Africa's 2,000 indigenous languages--not to mention its languages of colonial provenance, Arabic and numerous locally developed pidgins and creoles--would seem to pose insuperable problems of economic and political organization. The contributors to this volume, both African and European, examine the political consequences of multilingual societies which choose to develop certain languages over others. Working from the perspectives of anthropology and language planning, the contributors argue that the terms of the language development debate are biased because they borrow from inappropriate European models of nationhood. In their exploration of such issues as government language planning and the effects of planning on communities, the contributors offer an insightful, interdisciplinary examination of the African language experience.