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Globality: The Point of View of Language and Literature

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Abstract

The phenomenon of globality has had significant consequences for both languages and literatures. The disciplines of linguistics and literary studies are in the process of redefining their subject matter as well as their theoretical and methodological approaches to meet the challenge of adopting a global perspective. In linguistics, the “global turn” has for instance led to a growing interest in the properties and dynamics of “global languages” in general and “World Englishes” in particular. In literary studies, the growing impact of Postcolonial Studies since the late 1970s and the awareness of globalization have caused an extension with respect to the subject matter and the theoretical and methodological approaches that are drawn upon. There also appear to be more and more literary texts which address issues related to globalization in terms of their themes and/or structural and linguistic features. With its increasing interest in “world literature,” the field of comparative literature faces new challenges such as having to rely on translations and negotiating between the global and the local in readings of literary texts.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Cf., for instance, the controversy caused by Harold Bloom’s The Western Canon. The Books and School of the Ages. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1994.

  2. 2.

    Cf., for instance, the contributions in the following volume edited by Haun Saussy: Comparative Literature in an Age of Globalization. Chicago: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006.

  3. 3.

    Cf. Jan Blommaert, The Sociolinguistics of Globalization, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010, p. 1: “Sociolinguistically, the world has not become a village. That well-matured metaphor of globalization does not work, and that is a pity for sociolinguistics—a science traditionally more at ease when studying a village than when studying the world.”

  4. 4.

    David Crystal, English as a Global Language, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 14.

  5. 5.

    For a more detailed account, cf. the chapter “Cultural Imperialism in Science, the Media, and Education,” in Robert Phillipson’s Linguistic Imperialism, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, pp. 57–65.

  6. 6.

    Cf. David Crystal, English as a Global Language, op. cit., p. 3.

  7. 7.

    Cf. Ibid., p. 4.

  8. 8.

    Ibid., p. 5.

  9. 9.

    Cf. David Northrup, How English Became the Global Language, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. Northrup provides an overview of the development of English into a global language.

  10. 10.

    Cf. David Crystal, English as a Global Language, op. cit., p. 4.

  11. 11.

    Eddie Ronowicz describes the use of English in a wide range of different areas as follows: “Examples include the international agreement to adopt English for air traffic control and the use of English in the numerous bodies providing international aid and administration, in the international media such as radio, television, magazines and newspapers, in the international pop music industry, in space science and computing technology and so on.” Eddie Ronowicz, Introduction, in: Eddie Ronowicz/Collin Yallop (eds.), English. One Language, Different Cultures. London/New York: Cassell, 1999, p. 14.

  12. 12.

    Cf. Barbara Wallraff, What Global Language?, in: Atlantic Monthly 286.5–8 (2000), pp. 52–66.

  13. 13.

    Philip Seargeant, Exploring World Englishes. Language in a Global Context, London/New York: Routledge, 2012, p. 62.

  14. 14.

    On the phenomenon of language loss, cf. Mary Louise Pratt: “In the twenty-first century, languages are disappearing at a rapidly accelerated rate. In many parts of the planet, especially areas that were relatively isolated until recently, communities are facing excruciating dilemmas about whether and how to preserve their waning languages. Of the approximately six thousand languages now thought to exist, at least half are predicted to disappear in this century, perhaps within 50 years. Of those six thousand or so languages, the vast majority are spoken by groups of fewer than ten thousand people; half have fewer than two thousand five hundred speakers. It is languages in this group that are disappearing (though only some of them are—others are doing just fine).” Mary Louise Pratt, Comparative Literature and the Global Languagescape, in: Ali Behdad/Dominic Thomas (eds.), A Companion to Comparative Literature, Maldon, MA/Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, p. 278.

  15. 15.

    For an overview of the situation of endangered languages around the world and analyses of the reasons behind the disappearance or endangerment of languages, cf. the contributions in Language Diversity Endangered (Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter), edited by Matthias Brenzinger in 2007.

  16. 16.

    Cf. David Crystal, English as a Global Language, op. cit., pp. 20–21.

  17. 17.

    Cf. Robert Phillipson, Linguistic Imperialism, op. cit., p. 19.

  18. 18.

    David Crystal, English as a Global Language, op. cit., pp. 2–3.

  19. 19.

    Cf., for instance, Kumiko Murata/Jennifer Jenkins (eds.), Global Englishes in Asian Contexts. Current and Future Debates, Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009 and Philip Seargeant, Exploring World Englishes. Language in a Global Context, London/New York: Routledge, 2012.

  20. 20.

    Philip Seargeant, Exploring World Englishes. Language in a Global Context, op. cit., p. 3.

  21. 21.

    Jan Blommaert, The Sociolinguistics of Globalization, op. cit., pp. 1–2.

  22. 22.

    On the development of Spanish from a colonial language into a global one, cf. Clare Mar-Molinero, The Politics of Language in the Spanish-Speaking World. From Colonisation to Globalisation, London/New York: Routledge, 2000 and Clare Mar-Molinero/Miranda Stewart (eds.), Globalization and Language in the Spanish-Speaking World. Macro and Micro Perspectives, Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.

  23. 23.

    Cf. Robert Phillipson, Linguistic Imperialism, op. cit., pp. 120–128.

  24. 24.

    Thomas Babington Macaulay, Minute on Indian Education, in: Bill Ashcroft/Gareth Griffiths/Helen Tiffin (eds.), The Post-Colonial Studies Reader, London/New York: Routledge, 1995, pp. 428–430.

  25. 25.

    Peter Strevens, English as an International Language. Directions in the 1990s, in: Braj B. Kachru (ed.), The Other Tongue. English across Cultures, Urbana/Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992, p. 30.

  26. 26.

    For a discussion of the negative impact the global significance of English has had on other languages, cf., for instance, the contributions in the volume Globalization and the Future of German (Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2004), edited by Andreas Gardt and Werner Hüppauf.

  27. 27.

    For an assessment of the status of English in various countries and regions of the world, cf., for instance, the contributions in Post-Imperial English. Status Change in Former British and American Colonies (Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 1996), edited by Joshua Fishman/Andrew W. Conrad/Alma Rubal-Lopez.

  28. 28.

    Cf. Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2010, p. 146.

  29. 29.

    David Damrosch. What is World Literature?, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003, p. 4.

  30. 30.

    Cf. Marion Gymnich, Anglo-amerikanischer Sprachraum (UK, Irland, USA, Kanada, Neuseeland, Australien), in: Rüdiger Zymner/Achim Hölter (eds.), Handbuch Komparatistik: Theorien, Arbeitsfelder, Wissenspraxis, Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler, 2013, p. 30.

  31. 31.

    Emily Apter, The Translation Zone. A New Comparative Literature, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005, p. 10.

  32. 32.

    Vilashini Cooppan, World Literature and Global Theory. Comparative Literature for the New Millennium, in: Symploké 9 (2001), 1–2, p. 26.

  33. 33.

    Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism, London: Vintage, 1993.

  34. 34.

    Cf. David Murphy, How French Studies Became Transnational; Or Postcolonialism as Comparatism, in: Ali Behdad/Dominic Thomas (eds.), A Companion to Comparative Literature, Malden, MA/Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 408–420.

  35. 35.

    Cf. Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, op. cit., p. 147.

  36. 36.

    Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Decolonising the Mind. The Politics of Language in African Literature, London: James Currey, 1986.

  37. 37.

    Cf. Marion Gymnich, Metasprachliche Reflexionen und sprachliche Gestaltungsmittel im englischsprachigen postkolonialen und interkulturellen Roman, Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2007.

  38. 38.

    Cf. Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, op. cit., p. 165.

  39. 39.

    For a more detailed discussion of the implications of translations for the study of world literature, Cf. Simon Gikandi, Contested Grammars: Comparative Literature, Translation, and the Challenge of Locality, in: Ali Behdad/Dominic Thomas (eds.), A Companion to Comparative Literature, Malden, MA/Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 254–272.

  40. 40.

    Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, op. cit., p. 147.

  41. 41.

    Cf. Lothar Bredella, Das Verstehen des Anderen, Tübingen: Narr, 2010; Lothar Bredella, Narratives und Interkulturelles Verstehen. Zur Entwicklung von Empathie-, Urteils- und Kooperationsfähigkeit, Tübingen: Narr, 2012 and Prisca J. Martens, Building Intercultural Understandings through Global Literature, in: The Reading Teacher 68.8 (2015), pp. 609–617.

  42. 42.

    Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, op. cit., p. 151.

  43. 43.

    Ibid.

  44. 44.

    Ibid.

  45. 45.

    Cf. Hubert Zapf, Literature as Cultural Ecology: Notes Towards a Functional Theory of Imaginative Texts with Examples from American Literature, in: REAL 17 (2001), pp. 85–100.

  46. 46.

    Ulfried Reichardt, Globalisierung. Literaturen und Kulturen des Globalen, op. cit., p. 162. For a very detailed and critical assessment of the relationship between literature and globalization, cf. Suman Gupta, Globalization and Literature, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2009.

  47. 47.

    Ibid., p. 171.

  48. 48.

    Ibid.

  49. 49.

    Vilashini Cooppan, World Literature and Global Theory. Comparative Literature for the New Millennium, op. cit., p. 29.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. English Literature and Culture, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany

    Marion Gymnich

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  1. Political Science, University of Bonn/Center for European Integration Studies (ZEI), Bonn, Germany

    Ludger Kühnhardt

  2. Political Science, History of Ideas and Contemporary History, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany

    Tilman Mayer

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Gymnich, M. (2019). Globality: The Point of View of Language and Literature. In: Kühnhardt, L., Mayer, T. (eds) The Bonn Handbook of Globality. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90382-8_62

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