Language and language-in-education planning in multilingual India: a minoritized language perspective

Abstract

This article explores India’s linguistic diversity from a language policy perspective, emphasizing policies relevant to linguistic minorities. The Kumaun region of Utterakhand provides a local, minority-language perspective on national-level language planning. A look at the complexity of counting India’s languages reveals language planning implicit in the Indian census. The more explicit status planning involved in the naming of official languages is explored in the Indian Constitution. An overview of India’s language-in-education policies for languages to be taught and languages to be used as media of instruction further illustrates status and acquisitions planning affecting India’s linguistic minorities. The Indian example informs and stretches the language planning frameworks used to analyze it, adding status-planning goals of legitimization, minimization, and protection. Finally, the question of what actually happens in education for linguistic minorities opens up a conversation about the pluralistic language practices common in multilingual contexts beyond the implementation of official language and education policies.