The Handbook of World Englishes, 2nd Edition

36A Recurring Decimal: English in Language Policy and Planning

AYỌ BAMGBOṢE

1 Introduction

Language policy is sometimes overt in terms of pronouncements, laws, regulations, constitutional provisions and a series of measures by governmental and nongovernmental organizations and agencies. Quite often, however, language policy is covert and can be inferred only from observed practices. Whether overt or covert, language policy is ever present, and, by implication, so is language planning, irrespective of number, status, size, geographical spread, and power of the languages in a country.

One reality of language policy discourse in the world today is that it inevitably gravitates toward the role of English. This is regardless of whether such discourse relates to any of Kachru’s categories of Inner, Outer, and Expanding Circles. It is, of course, entirely understandable that English should loom large in language policy in Inner Circle countries, such as the USA, Britain, and Australia. However, even in countries of other Circles, language policy discourse eventually ends up either as a discussion of the position and role of other languages in relation to English or vice versa. To this extent, English is always present – in the words of Pennycook (1994: 4), “It seems to turn up everywhere.” In other words, in any language policy discourse, English must be an inevitable factor (Spolsky 2004: 91), and there is an “ideological clustering” of policies around English (Ricento 2000; Sonntag ...