The Language Difference

Language and Development in the Greater Mekong Sub-Region

By (author) Dr. Paulin G. Djité

Publication date:

06 January 2011

Publisher

Multilingual Matters

Dimensions:

210x148mm
6x8"

ISBN-13: 9781847693402

Language is a sensitive issue in the developing world, because language choice and behaviour are integral to the social, economic and political stability of multicultural societies. To what extent does this argument hold? Does language make a difference when it comes to development, and is there a perceptible difference in development between countries that is attributable to their choice of language? This book sets out to answer these questions by investigating how language has been and is being used in four countries of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (i.e. Cambodia, the Lao PDR, Myanmar and Viet Nam), especially in the critical areas of education, health, the economy and governance.

Paulin Djité poses a provocative but justified question: are students of language being 'precious' about links between language capability and material opportunity? In fine detail but with a strong linking narrative, Djité shows how personal advancement, economic success, national development and human resource planning are intimately and intricately structured according to the distribution of language and literacy skills. These connections are as reliable as are ties between human expressive abilities with personal and national identity. This is a fine and important volume due to this theoretical claim as much as for its welcome contribution to knowledge about language and development in the region and countries of the Greater Mekong area of SE Asia.