TY - JOUR

T1 - Reconceptualising language tests for citizenship as raciolinguistic border regimes

AU - Khan, Kamran

PY - 2022

Y1 - 2022

N2 - This contribution to the Special Issues situates citizenship tests, which satisfy language requirements, as 'raciolinguistic borders'. This is because such tests cannot be confined to education but function as tools within a wider socio-political apparatus. They have an impact on racialising language so that those with the most proximity to the national linguistic community encounter the tests at lower stakes or closer to their own language(s). Thus, tests are bordering techniques which can be retracted to exclude or expanded to externalise legal and linguistic borders. They are both fluid in their remit and hard in their materiality in the lives of migrants. At the heart of the rationale behind these borders is the fundamental question about whether they are unjust or not.

AB - This contribution to the Special Issues situates citizenship tests, which satisfy language requirements, as 'raciolinguistic borders'. This is because such tests cannot be confined to education but function as tools within a wider socio-political apparatus. They have an impact on racialising language so that those with the most proximity to the national linguistic community encounter the tests at lower stakes or closer to their own language(s). Thus, tests are bordering techniques which can be retracted to exclude or expanded to externalise legal and linguistic borders. They are both fluid in their remit and hard in their materiality in the lives of migrants. At the heart of the rationale behind these borders is the fundamental question about whether they are unjust or not.

KW - Naturalisation

KW - citizenship tests

KW - language tests

KW - borders

KW - race

KW - IDEOLOGIES

U2 - 10.1080/13621025.2022.2091235

DO - 10.1080/13621025.2022.2091235

M3 - Journal article

VL - 26

SP - 525

EP - 529

JO - Citizenship Studies

JF - Citizenship Studies

SN - 1362-1025

IS - 4-5

ER -