Language Ideology and Order in Rising China by M. Zhou: Book Review

Plotnikova Maria V.,

Candidate of Philology,

Associate Professor of the Foreign Languages Department

Ural Federal University named after the first President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin

e-mail: plotnikova_mary@mail.ru

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9391-9539

Bogoyavlenskaya Yulia V., 

Doctor of Philology, Associate Professor of the Linguistics and

Professional Communication in Foreign Languages Department

Ural Federal University named after the first President of Russia

B.N. Yeltsin;

Professor of the German and French Department

Petrozavodsk State University

e-mail: jvbog@yandex.ru

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4500-1491

The article presents a review of the book “Language Ideology and Order in Rising China” (2019) by Minglang Zhou, Ph.D. in Linguistics, Associate Professor at the University of Maryland College Park (USA). The author examines the cultural and linguistic basics for China’s rise as a world power. The language policy pursued by the state is considered as a close consistent connection between China’s internal aspirations and the country’s global expansion within the cultural and historical contexts. The author’s interpretation of the concept of language ideology is close to the traditional Confucian ideas about the role of language in shaping reality and maintaining social order through a system of values built in a language and actualized through its use. Institutional measures to support Chinese languages both within the country and abroad are examined. The author notes a contradiction between the “one China policy” promoted abroad and the absence of a single integrative preferable form of Chinese within the country that could serve as a factor of integration with “Greater China”. The book may be of interest to a wide range of readers interested in the Chinese language, history and culture, as well as to sinologists, specialists in sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology, language policy, international relations, linguistic and cultural studies, and intercultural communication.

Keywords: language ideology, language policy, China, Chinese language, sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology

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