Language testing and citizenship: A language ideological debate in Sweden

This article explores a public debate that took place in Sweden in 2002 in relation to the Swedish Liberal Party's proposal to introduce a language test for naturalization. On the basis of textual analysis of relevant policy documents and newspaper articles, it examines the explicit and implici...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Language in society 2008-02, Vol.37 (1), p.27-59
Main Author:	MILANI, TOMMASO M.
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Bilingualism Bourdieu Bourdieu, Pierre Citizenship Critical Discourse Analysis Debates Discourse analysis Government policy HUMANIORA och RELIGIONSVETENSKAP HUMANITIES and RELIGION iconization Ideology Immigration Language Language ideologies language ideology Language Policy language proficiency testing language testing Language tests Languages and linguistics Liberal parties Liberalism Linguistic subjects Linguistics Lingvistikämnen Minority & ethnic groups Naturalization Political debate Political Factors Political parties Politics Racism Shohamy, Elana Society Språkvetenskap Sweden Swedish language Text analysis Tvåspråkighet
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Summary:	This article explores a public debate that took place in Sweden in 2002 in relation to the Swedish Liberal Party's proposal to introduce a language test for naturalization. On the basis of textual analysis of relevant policy documents and newspaper articles, it examines the explicit and implicit facets of an ideology of language testing. It is argued that a seemingly liberal, anti-racist, and anti-discriminatory ideology is emerging, which, in its explicit facet, calls for the introduction of a language test for citizenship as a practical way of diminishing social differentiation. However, drawing upon Bourdieu's notion of rites of institution, it is shown that such a test would actually contribute to, rather than challenge, the reproduction of social differentiation, thereby legitimizing the exclusion of certain groups from both the civic and symbolic domains of Sweden as a nation-state.I want to acknowledge that the research that resulted in the present article was conducted at the Centre for Research on Bilingualism, Stockholm University. However, my current affiliation and address for correspondence is Department of Linguistics and Phonetics, School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT, UK; email: T.Milani@leeds.ac.uk. I also want to take the opportunity to thank Kenneth Hyltenstam, Sally Johnson, Barbara Johnstone, Ingrid Piller, and two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on previous drafts of this article.
ISSN:	0047-4045 1469-8013 1469-8013