Sociological realism and language policy analysis : a way forward

• Main Author: Mirvahedi, Seyed Hadi
• Other Authors: School of Humanities
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2021
• Subjects: Humanities::Language; Language Planning and Policy; Realist Social Theory
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/150753
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Language planning and policy has evolved from considering policy as one of states’ affairs at its early stages to how policy actors exercise their agency to appropriate and enact policy in micro and local contexts. Ethnography of language policy is predominantly used today to explore why policies are enacted in a certain way and not otherwise, shedding light on policy actors’ ideologies and their role in bringing about specific consequences. This article engages with the ethnographic approaches to language policy studies from the perspective of sociological realism. It argues that grounding ethnographic studies in realist social theory can not only accommodate recent developments in the field but also further our understanding of how policy actors’ agency is informed by factors from other strata of the society which could go unnoticed in ethnography of language policy. To illustrate, the case of policy enactment in kindergartens and preschools in Tabriz is presented.