Politicas linguisticas desenvolvidas em Cabo Verde (Africa) / Language policy developed in Cape Verde (Africa)

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2009

RESUMO

This work investigates the language policies developed in Cape Verde, one of the African countries whose official language is Portuguese. In Cape Verde, the Portuguese and the Capeverdian languages share the interactional spaces. The Capeverdian language is a creole language and has the status of "official language under construction". In the light of the studies developed by Louis-Jean Calvet (2002, 2007), and supported by studies that evaluate the Cape Verde society in a socio-historical perspective, we analyzed the language policies implemented in this country from the Colonial Period until 2006. We organized our study so that we could contemplate separately the linguistic in vitro and in vivo policies in the Colonial Period and after the Independence. The in vivo policies we analyzed dialogue with the in vitro policies. For the in vitro analysis, we considered the juridical-administrative documents as the object of study. The documents of the Colonial Period aimed at orienting the administration of the Portuguese Colonies, determining the functions of the Catholic Church (main institution partner of the Colonial State) and setting up the natives status of these Colonies. We observed that the linguistic in vitro policies of these Colonies were linked to the construction of the Portuguese Nation-Empire, which was established upon a national unit in a discontinuous territory. Considering education as a means, these in vitro policies characterized themselves by the imposition of the Portuguese language on the Capeverdian speakers and by the discursive formulation of the superiority of this language over the Capeverdian language. The judicial-administrative documents of the period after the Independence show that the linguistic in vitro policies are linked to the debates undertaken during the Colonial Period and dialogue with the policies oriented by international organisms. After the Independence, the State of Cape Verde has promoted the Capeverdian language as a traditional language, and has produced the necessary means to make this language official. Understanding that the debates about the languages and about the ideologies of the languages are political actions undertaken by social actors distinct of the State, who may or may not be socially organized, our study of the in vivo policies sought to analyze debates about the languages carried out by Capeverdian literate groups. These groups became socio-political mediators and sponsors of the Capeverdian culture, during the Colonial Period as well as after the Independence. The debate about the languages, which is inserted in the promotion of the Capeverdian identity, ascribes to the Portuguese language the function to express the modernity and the scientific contents, and to the Capeverdian language the function to maintain the cultural tradition and express the feelings of the speakers

ASSUNTO(S)

politicas linguisticas language policy africa cape verde cabo verde sociolinguistics sociolinguistica africa

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