What is “Language Making”?

Abstract

This article introduces a new concept called “Language Making”. The term covers all kinds of processes in which speakers or non-speakers collectively conceptualize linguistic entities. Such processes are usually perpetual, they operate based on language ideologies and attitudes, and they bring about functional and structural norms which determine the boundaries of linguistic entities such as languages, dialects or varieties. The article discusses the significance of standardization, language policy and planning, and of stakeholders and agency for processes of Language Making. Raising the question as to why a new concept is needed in the first place, the article concludes with a demarcation of Language Making from opposite processes which may be called “un-Making” of Languages.

Another ‘language that failed’?

“…The combination of pre-existing (primarily North Hamgyŏng) Korean dialect constellations on the ground, ideologically motivated orthographic choices that (coincidentally) reinforced salient dialect differences, Soviet korenizatsiia (indigenization) policies, and the workings of the Piedmont Principle (Soviet Koreans as a shining beacon for their oppressed brethren across the border in Japanese-occupied Korea), conspired to launch a new variety of 'Soviet' Korean called Koryŏmal or Koryŏŏ -thanks in large part to local bottom-up initiatives on the part of Soviet Korean intellectuals -along a pathway to emerging as a new Korean "Nebensprache", "Ausbausprache" and/or distinct Korean "Kultur"-dialect or Korean "langue collatérale". Krämer et al (2022) have recently described an emergent field of sociolinguistics and the sociology of language that they call "Language Making, " and which they define (ibid. : 3) as "conscious or unconscious human processes in which imagined linguistic units are constructed and perceived as a language, a dialect or a variety. "…”

Accents of Russian in Performative Use: Ethnic Styles, Language Attitudes, and Identities of Young Non-native Speakers

“…The videos, therefore, highlight groups that are important for the speaker; they represent different categorizations and provide more or less detailed descriptions of each group. The name for a specific accent shows а process of 'making language' (Krämer et al 2022) or 'language labelling' (Pennycook, Otsuji 2015).…”