ABSTRACT

In 2003, Mary Louise Pratt published a hugely influential paper in Profession where she took to task misconceptions about multilingualism and language learning apparent in the USA in the wake of 9/11 and consequent counter-terrorism measures. She argued that a new public idea about language was necessary in order to ensure unity and security. This article argues that in the aftermath of Brexit, the UK also needs to develop a new public idea about language to ensure a future that is prosperous, socially, culturally and economically. To do so, it first challenges a number of prevalent myths about language learning and multilingualism in the UK through a review of scholarship, media articles and reports which focus on languages and multilingualism since 2013. It then suggests that interest in the Anglosphere has meant that the value of English is now artificially inflated and that the value of other languages is underplayed. We argue that this turn to the Anglosphere and to (English) monolingualism should be challenged through proposing a new public idea about language for post-Brexit UK.

摘要

2003 年，玛丽·路易丝·普拉特 (Mary Louise Pratt) 在《职业》杂志上发表了一篇极具影响力的论文在 9/11 事件和随之而来的反恐措施之后，她对美国出现的多语言和语言学习的误解进行了分析。她认为，为了确保统一和安全，需要一种关于语言的新公共观念。本文认为，在英国脱欧之后，英国还需要发展一种关于语言的新公共理念，以确保未来在社会、文化和经济上都繁荣昌盛。为此，它首先通过回顾自 2013 年以来专注于语言和多语言的学术、媒体文章和报告，挑战了一些关于英国语言学习和多语言的流行神话。然后它表明，对英语圈的兴趣意味着英语的价值现在被人为夸大了，而其他语言的价值被低估了。