What is language? How does it relate to the ‘collective consciousness’ of a society? How does language relate to ideology and when does language become ‘linguistic capital’? This course introduces students to some theoretical approaches to the study of language in social anthropology, such as structuralism and Marxism. This will be followed by studies of language movements, language policy in colonial and postcolonial India. The course concludes with questions of ‘free speech’, ‘hate speech’ and some debates on censorship.
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