Language policies for Australian languages

state / territory

NSW

The first state Aboriginal Languages Policy (NSW DAA)
http://www.daa.nsw.gov.au/data/files//languagespolicyFINAL.pdf, dated 24 May 2004

Aboriginal Languages Project, following the release of the Aboriginal Languages K-10 Syllabus in 2003
linked from http://ab-ed.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au

NSW Aboriginal Languages Research and Resource Centre (The Languages Centre), part of the NSW Department of Aboriginal Affairs, founded 2003
http://www.alrrc.nsw.gov.au/

Senator Aden Ridgeway interview, 2003?
http://www.fatsil.org/VOTL/Articles/18-1.htm

Kevin Lowe. 2001. The Need for Community Consultation to assist in the Development of Aboriginal Language Programs in schools: A Draft Discussion Paper. The full version of the extract that appeared in Voice of the Land 20 (November 2001),9,11.
http://www.fatsil.org/papers/research/lowe-1.htm

Tasmania

Western Australia

South Australia

Victoria

The Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages coordinates Community Language Programs throughout Victoria.
http://www.vaclang.org.au/

Queensland

Northern Territory

Learning Lessons: The Implementation Phase. Status Report. Learning Lessons Implementation Steering Committee. October 2005 http://www.deet.nt.gov.au/education/indigenous_education/previous_publications/docs/learning_lessons-the_implementation_phase.pdf

Indigenous Languages and Culture in NT Schools: Report 2004-05, Executive Summary http://www.deet.nt.gov.au/education/indigenous_education/previous_publications/indigenous_languages_culture_report/ilc_report_exec_summary.pdf

1999 - Northern Territory Department of Education. Learning Lessons: An Independent Inquiry into Aboriginal Education in the Northern Territory. NT Government Printer (conducted by Tess Lea and Bob Collins) 1.6MB PDF
http://www.deet.nt.gov.au/education/indigenous_education/previous_publications/docs/learning_lessons_review.pdf

ATSIC Submission to the ["Collins"] Review into Aboriginal Education in the Northern Territory. [1999?]
http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/41033/20060106/ATSIC/issues/education/Docs/Collins_review.pdf

Australian Capital Territory

The Way Forward. Multicultural Summit - Summary. 10 December 2005. p.11 'Language Policy' suggestions. http://www.dhcs.act.gov.au/community/mau/pubs/Summit%20Summary%20Booklet.pdf

ACT Languages Policy. Draft paper for discussion. December 1994. Canberra: ACT Government (Social Policy Branch, Chief Minister's Department). 28pp. See ß3, pp.17-18.

national (newer to older)

Noel Pearson, Native tongues imperilled, The Australian, March 10, 2007
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21352767-7583,00.html * includes his seven "points about language policy"

DCITA (Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts) "The Maintenance of Indigenous Languages and Records (MILR) program supports policies and community initiatives to preserve and maintain Indigenous languages."
See 'Strategy and Action Plan 2007–08', Attachment A pp.14-17 in
'Program information and guidelines 2007–08' available in Word and PDF formats
http://www.dcita.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/54023/MILR_Guidelines_2007-08.pdf
http://www.dcita.gov.au/__data/assets/word_doc/54022/MILR_Guidelines_2007-08.doc

DCITA MILR publications, including

Plan 2005-2008 based on 2004 report of Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA)
http://www.mceetya.edu.au/verve/_resources/languageeducation_file.pdf from National Statement and Plan on Languages Education in Australian Schools page

DEST (Department of Education, Science and Training) policies, issues and reviews relating to Indigenous education
http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/indigenous_education/policy_issues_reviews/policy_issues_reviews_menu.htm
including National Goals for Indigenous Education (page last modified Tue, 24 Apr 2007 3:58:35 PM)
"17.     To develop programs to support the maintenance and continued us[e] of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages."

Lo Bianco, J. 2004. A site for debate, negotiation and contest of national identity: language policy in Australia. 35 pages. Guide for the development of language education policies in Europe: From linguistic diversity to plurilingual education.  Strasbourg: Council of Europe. (French and English)
http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/Source/LoBiancoEn.pdf

Dixon, Sally. 2004. Ecological perspectives on language policy and language planning theory: towards a critical understanding of language planning in the Torres Strait Islands. Submitted for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts (Linguistics) (Honours), School of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, The University of NSW * Chapter 1 'Language Policy in Australia: towards a critical theory', pp.3-42 * copy at AIATSIS Library

Lester Irabinna Rigney. 2002. Bread versus freedom - Treaty and stabilising Indigenous Languages. Presented to National Treaty Conference.
http://www.fatsil.org/papers/research/rigney-2.htm

Review of the Australian Government Languages Other than English Programme (LOTE) - Report. Commonwealth of Australia, 2002
http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/school_education/publications_resources/lote_programme_review/recommendations.htm#In_relation_to_Indigenous_Languages,_it_is_recommended_that:

National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Policy (AEP)
http://www.dest.gov.au/archive/schools/indigenous/aep.htm (page created 2001-12-19, modified 8 Aug 2005)

Lo Bianco, Joseph, and Rosie Wickert (eds). 2001. Australian policy activism in language and literacy. Melbourne: Language Australia. 6.6MB PDF at ERIC #:ED471603 http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/Home.portal?_nfpb=true&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=%22Lo+Bianco+Joseph%22&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=au&_pageLabel=RecordDetails&objectId=0900000b8017876a&accno=ED471603&_nfls=false * introduction "Activists and Policy" (LoBianco, Wickert) * Part 1, pp.13-44, "From policy to anti-policy:  How fear of language rights took policy-making out of community hands" (LoBianco): tracks Australian language and literacy policy * "Advocating the sustainability of linguistic diversity" (Michael Singh)

Hammond, Jennifer. 2001. Literacies in school education in Australia: disjunctions between policy and research. Language and Education Vol. 15, No. 2&3. http://www.multilingual-matters.net/le/015/0162/le0150162.pdf

FATSIL Indigenous Language Policy Statement and Strategic Plan objectives summarised in Voice of the Land 16.1(2001). http://www.fatsil.org/VOTL/Articles/16-1.htm

Recognition Rights and Reform - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages (AUSTLII)
Part of Reconciliation and Social Justice Library. Page created Mon, 3 Jul 2000 2:32:51 PM http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/atsic/ntsj1/54.html

State of Indigenous languages in Australia - 2001, by P. McConvell and N. Thieberger. State of the Environment Second Technical Paper Series (Natural and Cultural Heritage), Department of the Environment and Heritage, Canberra. http://www.environment.gov.au/soe/techpapers/languages/

Royal Commission on Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Recommendations 55, 56, 188

Janke, Terri. 1998. Our Culture: Our Future: Report on Australian Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights. Prepared for Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission. © Michael Frankel & Company and Terri Janke.  2.5MB http://web.archive.org/web/20030803155859/www.icip.lawnet.com.au/culture.pdf

Commonwealth Literacy Policy: Literacy for All: The Challenge for Australian Schools. Department of Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (DEETYA), 1998. Commonwealth Literacy Policies for Australian Schools. Australian Schooling Monograph Series No. 1/1998 http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/school_education/publications_resources/profiles/literacy_all_challenge_australian_schools.htm
ß5.3 Indigenous Students: http://www.dest.gov.au/archive/schools/literacy&numeracy/publications/lit4all.htm#5.3

Language and Literacy: Australia's Fundamental Resource, prepared by Language Australia. Authors: Joseph Lo Bianco, Pauline Bryant, Richard B. Baldauf. National Board of Employment, Education and Training, Australian Research Council, Discipline Research Strategies. June 1997. ISBN 0642236550

McKay, Graham R. 1996. The land still speaks: review of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander language maintenance and development needs and activities. Canberra: Australian Govt. Pub. Service. xxvii+290pp. Commissioned Report No. 44. (Australia. National Board of Employment, Education and Training). ISBN 064445945X xxvii+290pp. http://www.dest.gov.au/nbeet/publications/pdf/96_10.pdf

Culture and Heritage: Indigenous Languages by John Henderson and David Nash. State of the Environment Technical Paper Series (Natural and Cultural Heritage), Series 1, Department of the Environment and Heritage. To January 1995.
http://www.environment.gov.au/soe/techpapers/series1/indigeno.html

Ozolins, Uldis. 1993. The politics of language in Australia. Cambridge University Press. * reviewed by Mari Rhydwen, Oceania 64.3(March 1994), 274 *  'The National Language Policy issued in Australia'. Pacific Linguistics (1985) Series C-92; pp. 281-9.

Government response to the recommendations of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs inquiry into Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander language maintenance report, "A matter of survival", June 1992.

Language and culture : a matter of survival : report of the inquiry into Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander language maintenance June 1992. Parliament - House of Representatives. Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs (HRSCATSIA). Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/index.html

Appendix 7: Recommendations from the National Aboriginal Languages Workshop "Our Language, Our Future", 12th & 13th December 1991, Adelaide SA. http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/83.html

White Paper response - PALC.  Wangka Maya. 14pp.  Text posted to peg:aust.languages 2:28 pm  Oct 25, 1991.  Archived in file '16 Wangka Maya response' in ASEDA item 0380.

ALLP: Australia's Language: The Australian Language and Literacy Policy, by John Dawkins, Minister for Employment Education and Training. Announced 2 September 1991. Canberra: AGPS, 1993. * "The White Paper was released in early September 1991 and announced a national policy and a national strategy to promote language and literacy in Australia through the Australian Language and Literacy Policy (ALLP)." http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/70.html

Dept. of Employment, Education and Training. The language of Australia; discussion paper on an Australian literacy and language policy for the 1990s. Canberra : Australian Government Publishing Service, December 1990, 2 v. in 1 * "The Green Paper on a draft Australian Language and Literacy Policy was released in December 1990" http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/70.html

Riley-Mundine, Lynette, and Bryn Roberts (Pitman Roberts and Partners). 1990. Review of National Aboriginal Languages Program. AACLAME Occasional Paper Number 5. Australian Advisory Council on Languages and Multicultural Education, Canberra. Scanned as 2.6MB PDF available as ERIC #:ED355757 at http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/Home.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=RecordDetails&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED355757&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=eric_accno&objectId=0900000b8013bfae * National Aboriginal Languages Project 1988-90, became National Aboriginal Languages Program (DEET)

NPL: Lo Bianco, Joseph. 1987. National Policy on Languages. Commonwealth Department of Education. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ISBN-13 978-0644061186 * extracted highlights: http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/doc/lobianco_2.pdf * Ministerial announcement of policy, 15 December 1987 http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/doc/youngholding_1.pdf * comment: "Australia's education and training system has also responded to the changing ethnic composition of our population. A system of language training was put in place to provide migrants with access. Community languages were integrated into school curricula and became an important national resource. In 1987 the Federal Government adopted a National Policy on Languages, becoming the first English speaking country to have such a policy and the first in the world to have a multilingual languages policy" p.29 of CFAC. 1994. 2001: A Report from Australia: a report to the Council of Australian Governments by the Centenary of Federation Advisory Committee. Canberra: AGPS. [quoted http://www.immi.gov.au/media/publications/multicultural/confer/04/speech18b.htm ]

Parliament - Senate Standing Committee on Education and the Arts ; Malcolm Arthur Colston, Chairman. October 1984. Report on a national language policy. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. Cat. No. 8505820 * Recommendations http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/82.html

Fesl, Eve D. 1983. Submission to the Senate Standing Committee on Education and the Arts on a National Language Policy. iii+178pp. AIATSIS Library MS 4156.

Bell, Jeanie (ed.) 1982. Language planning for Australian Aboriginal languages: papers presented at the Workshop to Develop Aboriginal Leadership in Language Planning, Alice Springs, 16-20 February, 1981. Alice Springs, NT; Institute for Aboriginal Development.

A useful glossary of acronyms (at 1992): http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/special/rsjproject/rsjlibrary/parliamentary/language/5.html

Language Australia has closed, the former National Languages and Literacy Institute of Australia Ltd. (NLLIA); some of the operations of its Melbourne Office are now run through CAE (Centre for Adult Education) in Melbourne.

Literacy: A Chronology of Selected Research and Commonwealth Policy Initiatives Since 1975. Canberra, Department of the Parliamentary Library, Social Policy Group. 7 December 1999. http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/chron/1999-2000/2000chr02.htm

Australian Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights (site dormant in recent years)

international (newer to older)

Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights, adopted by the 1996 World Conference on Linguistic rights, communicated to UNESCO
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0010/001042/104267e.pdf

other countries

New Zealand's Maori Language Act 1987, which refers in places to Welsh Language Act 1967 (U.K.)

Linguistic Rights - National Constitutions, Management of Social Transformations (MOST) Programme Clearing House, UNESCO
http://www.unesco.org/most/ln2nat.htm

Acknowledgements: incorporating suggestions from (newest to earliest) Adriano Truscott, Melanie Gillbank, Christina Eira <ceira AT vaclang.org.au>, Mary-Anne Gale, Rob Amery, Jane Simpson, and David Nathan's Language rights & policy links in his World Wide Web Virtual Library; also from some of the sources listed in my links and resources on Endangered Languages and language documentation (to 2005)