This paper examines the role of language policy and needs assessments in the provision of public services to regional minority and immigrant language speakers in the UK and Finland. Semi-structured interviews with service providers in Helsinki, Rovaniemi, Manchester, and Cardiff revealed how language policy and language needs are conceptualised…

In this article, we reflect on the extent to which 'new speaker' research feeds into recent theoretical discussions in language policy scholarship, especially in connection to the discursive and ethnographically oriented perspectives which of late have become increasingly prominent. We begin with a brief overview of the 'new speaker' concept, its…

This article examines "de jure" language officialization policies in Andorra and Luxembourg, and addresses how these are discursively reproduced, sustained or challenged by members of resident migrant communities in the two countries. Although the two countries bear similarities in their small size, extensive multilingualism and the…

What almost all accounts of standardisation histories have in common is a focus on printed, formal or literary texts from writing elites. While Haugen identified the written form of a language as "a significant and probably crucial requirement for a standard language" (Haugen in Am Anthropol 68:922-935, 1966a; Haugen, in: Bright (ed)…

This article is about navigating asylum, employment and language policy in a new country as an asylum seeker. Through the story of one individual, we show that profound inequalities are exacerbated when forced migrants are limited in their choice of language they might study or use. The individual is Tailor F, an Iraqi man seeking asylum, and the…

The term 'new speaker' has recently emerged as an attempt by sociolinguists not only to understand the different types of speaker profiles that can be found in contemporary societies, but also to grasp the underlying processes of becoming a legitimate speaker in a given society. In this article, we combine the results from two studies situated in…

Taking the Norwegian construction industry as its site of study, this article discusses under which conditions migrant workers in the Norwegian construction industry obtain the status as new speakers in the workplace. These conditions are determined by language proficiency requirements and speaker hierarchies that are constructed through language…

This paper aims to illuminate the role of sub-state languages in the integration process of migrants in two sub-state regions: Wales in the UK and the Basque Autonomous Community in Spain. We investigate how language and the idea of 'belongingess' based on language learning and knowledge are constructed in the integration policies in these two…

This paper critiques the contribution made by specialists working within the COST Action Network on New Speakers Programme. It then offers an evaluation of the progress made to date in a number of fields such as conceptual advancement, ideological dispositions, migration and international mobility before contributing a series of policy related…

Drawing on theory from critical language policy literature, this article explores the impact of discourses on in-migration on Welsh language policy. By focussing on discursive debates surrounding the subject of in-migration, the article analyses how a range of actors produce and reproduce discourses on in-migration in Wales and how these…

This article examines the strategies and forms of expertise on language and communication mobilized to engineer commodifiable migrant workers. Drawing on an ethnographic account of counselling practices in a state-run Italian job guidance centre for newly arrived migrants, I examine the calculations, tactics, and forms of expertise on language and…

In language policy research, "policy" has traditionally been conceptualised as a notion separate from that of "practice". In fact, language practices were usually analysed with a view to evaluate whether a policy is being implemented or resisted to. Recently, however, Spolsky in ("Language policy". Cambridge…

A cross-national comparative study in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and Madrid, Spain examines educational policies and practices that target immigrant students for whom the language variety normally spoken in the host country represents a second dialect. Policy contexts and schooling environments of the two urban centres were analyzed to gain deeper…

The United States is home to the largest number of immigrants of any nation (United Nations 2006). In 2005, 38.5 million residents of the U.S. were foreign born. As a result, an increasing number of children in the public schools are either immigrants or the children of immigrants: more than one of every five. Most of these children come from…

The pluralist narrative of language policies suggests that language policies are influenced by public perceptions of immigrants (Darder 2004; Gonzalez 2000; Pavlenko 2002; Valdes 1997). This paper investigates the relationship between newspaper discourse about language policies and newspaper discourse about immigration. It asks how much key,…