Speaking Like a State
Language and Nationalism in Pakistan

This book examines Pakistan's troubled history by exploring the importance of culture to political legitimacy.

Alyssa Ayres (Author)

9781107404434, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 10 May 2012

230 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.2 cm, 0.31 kg

'… Ayres's engaging and thought provoking study is required reading for historians of South Asia interested in language politics. Moreover, as she stresses, India, Pakistan and Indonesia are not anomalous cases but are the outcomes of significant postcolonial movements … As such, their language politics cannot be ignored by scholars of language and the nation-state in general.' Javed Majeed, The American Historical Review

Alyssa Ayres' fascinating study examines Pakistan's troubled history by exploring the importance of culture to political legitimacy. Early leaders selected Urdu as the natural symbol of the nation's great cultural past, but due to its limited base great efforts would be required to make it truly national. This paradox underscores the importance of cultural policies for national identity formation. By comparing Pakistan's experience with those of India and Indonesia, the author analyzes how their national language policies led to very different outcomes. The lessons of these large multiethnic states offer insights for the understanding of culture, identity, and nationalism throughout the world. The book is aimed at scholars in the fields of history, political theory and South Asian studies, as well as those interested in the history of culture and nationalism in one of the world's most complex, and challenging, countries.

List of illustrations
List of tables
Acknowledgments
Note on transliteration
Introduction
1. Articulating a new nation
2. Urdu and the nation
3. The nation and its margins
4. The case of Punjab, part I: elite efforts
5. The case of Punjab, part II: popular culture
6. History and local absence
7. Bringing back the local past
8. Speaking like a state: language planning
9. Religion, nation, language
10. Conclusion
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Constitution: government & the state [JPHC], Asian history [HBJF], Sociolinguistics [CFB]