268 Raphael Berthele
oppression; the dialects are the “real” and authentic expression of local
culture and individual and local identity.
In Berthele (2008, 2001) I used the theory of conceptual metaphors (La-
koff and Johnson 1980) in order to get a better grip on language policy
debates in different countries. These debates typically address issues such
as official or national languages, the choice of the main language(s) of in-
struction or more generally the order and choice of foreign language in-
struction in schooling. The metaphors I identified in these language policy
debates can be related to Geeraerts’ two models, as shown in Table 1.
Table 1. Metaphors used in language policy debates (cf. Berthele 2008, 2001) and
cultural models of standardization (Geeraerts 2003)
Romantic Model – Language Is ... Rationalist Model – Language Is...- the Soul of A People - a Tool, Key, Bridge
- a Bond, Glue, Tie
(nation, speech community)- a Bond, Glue, Tie
(nation, humanity)
- a Bond, Glue, Tie
- Home - Art, a Balanced Structure, a Building
- a Resource (cultural, heritage) - a Resource, raw material
- a Barrier: Standard blocks the
vertical mobility of L-Minorities- a Barrier: Dialects/Minority Ls as means
of (self-)exclusion
- a Barrier: Dialects/Minority Ls as means
As Table 1 clearly shows, some metaphors can be used in both models, e.g.
the very powerful idea of LANGUAGE IS A BOND can be applied with dif-
ferent levels of granularity, either to a national society as a whole in the
rationalist perspective or to the local speech community in the romantic
perspective. As Geeraerts (2003: 28) points out, both models can converge
in nationalistic ideologies, with a romantic flavor for the ethnically based
“Volksnationalismus” and a rationalist flavor in the case of the “Staatsna-
tionalismus”. Correspondingly, the Bond-metaphor applies both to ethnic
groups that are equated with nations and to national groups that can be
multi-ethnically composed. In similar ways, the mapping of LANGUAGE IS
A BARRIER can be applied both to the standard and to non-standard varie-
ties, depending on the general stance being taken.
Other metaphors are clearly related to one of the two models, such as
the idea of a language being a perfectly designed structure such as, e.g., an
architectural masterpiece (building), a piece of art or – more abstractly – a
perfectly logical theory. Again, particularly the French metalinguistic dis-