Title

Who Is Responsible for Saving the Language? Performing Generation in the Face of Language Shift

Publication Date

2015

Description

In the literature on language shift and revitalization, generations are defined a priori as existing social categories that are mapped onto sociolinguistic features. In contrast, we take a performance-based perspective and develop a view of generations as discursively constructed frameworks that are aligned with sociolinguistic and moral features that attend language retention and associated factors. Using this perspective and empirical data from a high school speech contest held in a language-shifting Lakota community where revitalization efforts are underway, we show how contestants and participants perceive and experience language loss and renewal.

Journal

Journal of Linguistic Anthropology

Volume

25

Issue

2

First Page

128

Last Page

149

Department

Education

DOI

10.1111/jola.12083

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