“Minority language” as a notion emerged in scientific and legal discourse in the last decades of the twentieth century. Its definition has never been clear and looking at how it is used in discourse, it becomes obvious that its meaning is context-dependent. This Multilingua issue is dedicated to the investigation of what it means to designate a language as a minority language in the twenty-first century in Europe.

中文翻译：

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少数民族语言是什么意思？欧洲观点

作为一种概念的“少数民族语言”在二十世纪最后几十年出现在科学和法律话语中。它的定义从来都不是很清楚，并且看着它在话语中的用法，很明显它的含义是上下文相关的。这个Multilingua问题致力于研究在二十一世纪欧洲将一种语言指定为少数民族语言的含义。