Back to Search Start Over

Insecurity through diversity: a case study from the Northwest Amazon.

Authors :
Shulist, Sarah
Source :
Journal of Multilingual & Multicultural Development. Apr2022, Vol. 43 Issue 3, p200-213. 14p.
Publication Year :
2022

Abstract

This paper uses the themes of language rights, language choice, and language risk to consider linguistic insecurity in the Northwest Amazon (Upper Negro river) region of Brazil. Because the region is home to a large number of languages (c. two dozen), the idea of preserving this diversity is a popular theme in discourses about language in the Upper Negro river. I argue that the ideologies underlying the goal of preserving 'diversity' as a concept are not, in fact, the same ones that have sustained the presence of these languages thus far, especially as concerns the Tukanoan languages of the Uaupés basin (Jackson, J. E. 1983. The Fish People: Linguistic Exogamy and Tukanoan Identity in Northwest Amazonia. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press). Paradoxically, the reification of 'diversity' as a characteristic of the Northwest Amazonian Indigenous population has tended to promote homogenisation among groups that have historically valued differentiation from one another. In examining ideologies and practices surrounding each of the three themes of this issue, I suggest that discourses of 'diversity', applied at the local level, can create complex outcomes for the languages they are used to promote. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
01434632
Volume :
43
Issue :
3
Database :
Academic Search Index
Journal :
Journal of Multilingual & Multicultural Development
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
156580673
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2022.2039674