The Politics of English as a World Language: New Horizons in Postcolonial Cultural Studies

Christian Mair

Rodopi, 2003 - Literary Criticism - 497 pages

The complex politics of English as a world language provides the backdrop both for linguistic studies of varieties of English around the world and for postcolonial literary criticism. The present volume offers contributions from linguists and literary scholars that explore this common ground in a spirit of open interdisciplinary dialogue.
Leading authorities assess the state of the art to suggest directions for further research, with substantial case studies ranging over a wide variety of topics - from the legitimacy of language norms of lingua franca communication to the recognition of newer post-colonial varieties of English in the online OED. Four regional sections treat the Caribbean (including the diaspora), Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and Australasia and the Pacific Rim.
Each section maintains a careful balance between linguistics and literature, and external and indigenous perspectives on issues. The book is the most balanced, complete and up-to-date treatment of the topic to date.

About the author

CHRISTIAN MAIR is a professor of English linguistics at Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. While his major research interest is the corpus-based study of change and variation in present- day English, he has always made a point of placing his linguistic activities in a wider context. He is the author of two widely used introductory handbooks (Englisch für Anglisten, 1995; Das heutige Englisch, with Emst Leisi, 1999) and has championed a linguistically based approach to Caribbean cultural studies in numerous articles in journals and contributions to books.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Politics of English as a World Language: New Horizons in Postcolonial Cultural Studies; Volume 7 of ASNEL papers; Volume 65 of Cross/Cultures: Readings in the Post/Colonial Literatures in English Series
• Editor: Christian Mair
• Contributor: Christian Mair
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: Rodopi, 2003
• ISBN: 9042008660, 9789042008663
• Length: 497 pages
• Subjects: Literary Criticism / European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh