A place for second generation Japanese speaking children in Perth: Can they maintain Japanese as a community language?

Abstract

Community languages and multiculturalism were embraced by Australia’s first national language policy, but with the rise of the new agenda in industry and economic development, both have been pushed aside and monolingual ideology is reasserting its dominance. In this chapter I examine the impact of language policies at different levels on the position of the Japanese language as a community language in Perth, Western Australia. I examine the views of family and community toward language maintenance and argue that monolingual ideology is blocking the effort to maintain language diversity in the family and the community. If the spirit of multiculturalism that recognises and values differences is conceived, understood, and practiced first in the family and then in the community, it will offer a new way to language maintenance.