THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE STATE LANGUAGE IN NATIONAL AND MULTINATIONAL STATES
THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE STATE LANGUAGE IN NATIONAL AND MULTINATIONAL STATES
Zhalgas Mirzadinov
Master's student, Kazakh University of International Relations and World Languages named after Abylai Khan,
Kazakhstan, Almaty
Karlygash Baizhomartova
Candidate of juridical sciences, Kazakh University of International Relations and World Languages named after Abylai Khan,
Kazakhstan, Almaty
State (national) languages have the legal status of the State or official language or actually perform the functions of the main language in a particular country. In a multi-lingual society, it is most often the language of the majority of the population, so it is used as the language of interethnic communication. As an example, we can serve: 1) Hindi and Urdu close to it in India; 2) Thai (Siamese) is the official language of Thailand, which is native to 26 million people, despite the fact that the country's population is more than 50 million.; 3) Georgian language in Georgia (the official language in the country where, in addition to Georgian, Ossetian, Abkhaz, Svan, Russian, Armenian, Azerbaijani languages are used). Japanese, Polish, Hungarian and some others have approximately the same communicative rank of the main language in the respective relatively multinational states [1].
The term "state language" refers to the most important components of the conceptual field "language situation". Despite this, as M.N. Guboglo notes, "the historiography of the essence, content, and semantic load of the concept of the state language does not exist" [2]. One could agree with this, especially with regard to the language situation in the CIS countries, if the terms Staatsprache "state language", Amtsprache "administrative language" and Landessprache "national languages of the country" did not exist in the scientific literature.
As M.N. Guboglo notes, "the preference for the minority language was given in order for it to serve the cause of political (state) unity" [3], i.e. minority languages acquire legal equality, which allows them to be given the most favored status. Nevertheless, the definitions of the state and official languages themselves are absent in the mentioned works, except for the works of M.N. Guboglo. Moreover, the analysis of sociolinguistic literature shows that until the 1990s. these two concepts were either identified (in most cases), or were not used at all (especially in the literature of the Soviet period, with the exception of legislative acts of some former republics of the USSR).
It is no accident that M.N. Guboglo writes: "It is hopeless to look for the definition of the "state language" in domestic dictionaries. There is simply no such thing." The "Legal Encyclopedia", for example, does contain a definition of only the official, but not the state language, which is not the same thing, although these concepts are close to each other, since they reflect "one of the social functions of language: functioning in the sphere of organized communication." The identification of the concepts of "state" and "official" language in reference publications is obviously connected with the common scope of their functioning. The preference for the term "official" can be explained by the stable negative connotation of the concept of "state language" for many decades (as a kind of mandatory, "compulsory" language). And yet the substantive scope of these two, although close, concepts does not coincide: as L.L. Ayupova notes, the concept of "state language" is broader in meaning, and "official" is narrower (meaning the use of both concepts in relation to a multinational country).
It should be noted that when using the concept of "state language" in many cases (in particular, in the states that arose after the collapse of the Soviet Union), there is a substitution of objective factors with subjective ones. According to L.L. Ayupova, a multidimensional, clear, professionally thought-out program for the development of languages - the titular and others with their own linguistic environment is needed, and in assigning the status of languages, one should see not sociolinguistic, but ethnopolitical reasons, while taking into account national-Russian bilingualism, which has dominated for a long time [4]. The state language should serve the goals of the whole society, since it is a means of transmitting ideology and scientific knowledge to representatives of all ethnic groups, the national language serves the interests and goals of the corresponding nationality and ensures the transmission of meaning within the national community.
After gaining independence, the question of which language is capable of performing the four basic functions of the state language was raised in Kazakhstan for the first time: 1) the function of science, 2) the function of education, 3) the function of law, ideology and morality, 4) the function of interethnic harmony. These functions are the four components of the foundation of statehood.
That is why the State Commission under the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan was created from competent state representatives and linguists who objectively assessed the situation of bilingualism in Kazakhstan and scientifically substantiated the status and functions of the state language. To evaluate objectively means to separate language as a product of intelligence from the people who created this product and evaluate it by itself - its functions and capabilities without connection with its creator. It is equivalent to this principle that representatives of Kazakh nationality choose the Russian language because it has adequate terminology for broadcasting complex scientific knowledge. Hence, the main ideological thesis is formulated: language is not a means of respecting one people by another, language is a means of conveying meaning as a set of achievements in various fields of science and activity.
Agreeing with the above opinion, following M.P. Alekseev, we note that the ability of a language to respond to the cognitive and communicative needs of people has a significant impact on the vitality of a particular language, on its ability to perform the function of a state or official language. At the same time, as the researcher notes, "the homogeneity of languages is not always a blessing, since the proximity of individual languages to each other, on the contrary, often served as the cause of their enmity. Particularly effective here are the factors of coercion or voluntariness, which cannot be understood in an abstract socio-ethnic sense, since they are primarily conditioned historically."
In such a difficult issue as the nationalization of languages in the new, post-Soviet conditions, when the law intrudes into the delicate sphere of national-linguistic relations, it is important to "elevate the steppe without humiliating the mountains," as the famous poet and public figure Olzhas Suleimenov put it. Otherwise, negative processes in the national language life are inevitable. [5]
The conversion of any existing social functions of at least one of the so-called "non-indigenous" languages at the expense of not real, but artificial or ill-conceived increase in the social functions of another is a dangerous path leading to discrimination of the linguistic right of the individual, since there are no great and small nations, but there are great languages and great nations. Thus, in the issues of the nationalization of languages, for example, in the Republic of Kazakhstan, ethnic, political and, least of all, sociolinguistic parameters are traced. The lack of uniform criteria and principles of language lawmaking is the main reason for a wide range of opinions on this issue.
In the scientific literature, there are attempts to determine the criteria for the allocation of the state language. A.S. Gerd in an extensive article "Language policy" identified the following criteria [6]:
The first criterion - the autochthonous nature of the population ("titular", "indigenous" ethnos) prevails in the preamble of the laws on language. This very significant criterion of the nationalization of language, as evidenced by the above arguments of a chronological and ethnological nature, is not shared by all scientists, as it appears from our analysis of the scientific literature.
The second criterion is "the number of speakers in a given territory in this language as their native language, taking into account the areal compactness of the speakers' residence." It is obvious that this indicator (number) was the main criterion for the drafters of the draft Law on Languages in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The significant number of the Kazakh ethnic group and the increase in the number of speakers of the native Kazakh language have become one of the criteria for the nationalization of the language.
The third criterion - "prestige, authority of the language" - is one of the important factors in choosing the state language, as noted by A.S. Gerd. For example, in India, over time, as a result of the action of demolinguistic variables, Hindi becomes more prestigious, and English begins to occupy the position of a temporary official language.
As for the Kazakh language as the state language in the Republic of Kazakhstan, its prestige and authority are associated with the future functioning, when its knowledge and possession of it will be beneficial for certain segments of the population, primarily the Turkic-speaking, who are united in the republic in more than 10 ethnic groups.
The State language acts as an independent intermediary between any national languages. In a civilized society, the basic principle works: the national language is for one's nationality, and the state language is for an integral society as a union of all nationalities. If a person does not know his national language and culture, then he does not respect himself and his ancestors. But if he begins to impose his culture and language on people of another nationality, it means that he does not respect and tramples on the rights of these people to their own culture and language. The democratic principle of freedom of choice means that any national language can be studied by a person only on the basis of personal choice and desire and cannot be imposed by another nationality. Whereas the state language is equivalent to the principle of the law - it is known and studied by all nationalities.
Let us turn to the fourth criterion highlighted by A.S. Gerd - "neutrality of language". Many states are multilingual, therefore, as the linguist points out, a neutral language is most often chosen as the state official language, and one or two other languages are recognized as official.
The list of criteria for the allocation of the state language proposed by A.S. Gerd should be supplemented with another criterion - the criterion of the polyfunctionality of the language, which implies the presence of a wide range of social and communicative functions in the cultural, political, socio-economic and private life of peoples inhabiting a particular sovereign republic as part of a multinational state or in a single country. This criterion is more an indicator of the difference between the state and official languages, the status and functioning of which do not coincide either in terms of the repertoire of social functions or in terms of legal status in society.
Despite the fact that Kazakhstan's language policy is well-thought-out, scientifically based and consistent with the world experience of multilingual countries, the issue of the introduction and development of the state language in Kazakhstan has not yet been fully resolved. Most likely, this is a time problem. If at the beginning of the twentieth century Abai Kunanbayev promoted the idea of learning the Russian language, now it's time to learn the Kazakh language.
It is known that before the independence of Kazakhstan, 25% (according to some statements, 40%) of Kazakhs did not know their native language. If at the beginning of the twentieth century in Kazakhstan, Kazakhs made up 80% of the population, then in 1959, after the development of virgin lands, they became 29%. At the same time, the Kazakh language was used in everyday life in any Kazakh family. [7]
Analyzing the above facts, we can say that the Republic of Kazakhstan is a multinational state, on the territory of which representatives of over 100 nationalities live. By common destiny, they coexist on the basis of the principles of interethnic peace and harmony. In such conditions, the development of the state is impossible without solving the problem of the state language. According to cultural and linguistic differences, the population of Kazakhstan as a whole is divided according to the predominant orientation to one of two languages - the state (Kazakh) and Russian.
In recent decades, the following trend has been observed in Kazakhstan: more and more people of non-titular nationality are sending their children to Kazakh preschool institutions and schools. In 2005, there were more than 25 such institutions in the country. With the increase in the number of people mastering the Kazakh language, the quality of proficiency in this language is also growing. More and more people consciously relate to the study of the Kazakh language, which indicates the growing importance of the state language in the Republic of Kazakhstan.
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