1. SIXTH MEETING National Language and Official Language

2. NATIONAL LANGUAGE  It is the language of a political, cultural and social unit.  It is used in everyday’s life.  It is used and developed as a symbol of national identity.  It identifies the nation and unite the people.  The language of solidarity, love, humor and poetry.

3. OFFICIAL LANGUAGE  A language which may be used for government business or office function only  Used in formal context, administration, a great deal of education, legal, business  Its function is primarily utilitarian rather than symbolic

4. E.G :  In Paraguay, the national language is ‘Guarani’ and the official language is ‘Spanish’ (both are declared as National language in 1967)  In Indonesia ‘Bahasa Indonesia’ is the national language as well as the official language.

5. THE PROCESS OF CHOOSING A NATIONAL LANGUAGE  Choosing the most prestigious language (the dialect used in the golden triangle – London, Oxford, Cambridge)  Choosing the language of the political/social elite.( Tagalog in Philipine reflected political and economic power)  Choosing the variety which is widely used/most acceptable (Malay which is acceptable in many areas in Indonesia)

6. STEPS TO HAVE A NATIONAL OFFICIAL LANGUAGE  Selection: choosing the variety or code to be developed.  Codification: standardising its structural or linguistic features (= corpus planning)  Elaboration: extending its function for use in new domains.  Securing its acceptance: the status of the new variety is important, so the domains of its use must be developed.

7. THE FUNCTION OF NATIONAL LANGUAGE  Unifying: it must unify the nation and offer advantages to speakers over their dialects and vernaculars.  Separatist: it must set the nation off from surrounding nations and should be an appropriate symbol of seperate national identity.  Prestige: it should be recognised as a proper or ‘real’ language with higher status than local dialects and vernacular languages.  Frame of refernce function: becomes the standard variety as a yardstick for correctness.