ILanguage issues may have a political dimension, and English has played a major role in this around the world. In this chapter, we look into sociolinguistic aspects involved in politics and nation building, for instance whether English should be adopted to serve in all official functions as a national or official language, or whether a local language, accessible to larger sections of a community, should be adopted instead. We discuss how and to what extent governments should plan and orchestrate language-related activities in education and public discourse, and we look at language policies implemented in the US and Ireland as cases in point. We discuss the impact of governmental bodies on language planning as in the Speak Good English movement in Singapore, and present efforts to achieve language revitalization, which are preeminent considering language obsolescence around the world. The chapter ends with a look at language rights in migrant communities.

The second chapter traces the trajectories of Muslim leaders of the UOIF, leading them from North African middle-class families to the uneasy condition of Arab foreigners in France. Despite obtaining French citizenship, their status remains vulnerable, with state authorities and political elites regularly questioning their national loyalty. Owing to the intense scrutiny and suspicion, French Muslim leaders tend to engage in various practices of “Frenchification.” These practices consist of distancing themselves from homeland politics, providing evidence of cultural (notably linguistic) integration, and promoting a form of “pure Islam” that is detached from their homeland traditions. The chapter demonstrates that proving Frenchness is irreducible to legal status and implies nourishing a specific set of emotions, such as national pride, feelings of belonging, and a “love” of France. These expressions of emotional attachment can be understood in light of the emotionalization of citizenship that now characterizes the politics of belonging in Western Europe. However, such credentials of membership are not socially neutral; rather, they are layered with class considerations and can, in some cases, feed into anti-migrant sentiments against less privileged coreligionists, whom they regard as insufficiently French.

Diane Dagenais highlights her parents' resistance to linguistic assimilation and her own path between alternating and mixing languages. She quickly became aware of the boundaries between languages and of artificial and oppressive school policies. Her research has led her to explore children's linguistic practices, stereotypical representations, and to fight against social inequalities by supporting multilingual pedagogies against unfair and oppressive practices.