"Speak White" : Language Policy, Immigration, Discourse, and Tactical Authenticity in a French Enclave in New England

"Speak White" : Language Policy, Immigration, Discourse, and Tactical Authenticity in a French Enclave in New England

Article analyzing the Sentinelle Affair in 1920s Rhode Island as a case study in <i>la survivance</i>, for the role of language politics in spectres of assimilation and white ethnicity in the United States, and as a lens to the political economies that have historically upheld English Only language policy arguments. An expansive reading of Sentinellist responses to American Catholic Church English language policies for parochial schools. How events like the Sentinelle Affair imply what have been historical, multifaceted linguistic realities in education throughout the United States, and in particular in New England French-heritage enclaves of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Argument in favor of Franco American "settlement" in New England as best understood in the discourse of diaspora instead of the "resistance-assimilation" dichotomy that often accompanies discussions of local culture in American immigration.

Peters, Jason

2013-07-00

en

Journal article

507095240, 1564053

20th century; Rhode Island

2161-8178; 0010-0994

6

563-581

College English

75