September 1st, 2010 
admin De-Hegemonizing Language Standards: Learning From(Post)Colonial Englishes About ‘English’ (Language, Discourse, Society)
This study establishes the discriminatory and elitist nature of standard languages and standardization itself, considering as counter-example the case of Sri Lankan English as symptomatic of the other or post-colonial Englishes. On the basis of this understanding of the standard, while at the same time accepting the necessity of standards, however attenuated, the writer argues for the active broadening of the standard to include the greatest variety possible – privileging meaning over other rules – and holds that this would in fact work towards extending the bounds of linguistic tolerance.
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Excerpted for customer review from the jacket flap:
“Language standards are rarely contested,m even by those who are engaged in radical and far-reaching social change. Yet, standards discriminate against those who don’t conform, and language standardisation has systematically worked against the underclass as well as women and minorities. The study of the postcolonial varieties of English, long considered inferior or at best ‘special’ cases, strips the standard of its neutrality. …”
“…An examination of so-called uneducated and otherwise non-standard English usage in the Sri Lankan context. What can be seen here is not specific to Sri Lanka, but shown to be typical of all languages in use, and in an analogous argument, the claim is extended from the narrowly linguistic sphere to the much broader field of discursive practice in general.”