On the Role of Literature and Translation in Language Maintenance

Abstract

The paper investigates the actual and potential role which is played by the promotion of traditional and innovative literature in efforts to maintain minority language under threat from a dominant language. The arguments advanced in the controversy surrounding the incorporation of translated material in a minority language’s corpus are discussed, and the view represented that the appropriateness or otherwise of translating material into a minority language depends on the (sometimes implicit) ideological goals of the maintenance movement. Fishman’s (1991, 2001) Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale provides a framework for this discussion.