Attitudes from above: how Ausbau-centric approaches hinder the maintenance of linguistic diversity and why we must rediscover the role of structural relations.

Modern linguistics tends to perpetuate an Ausbau bias by reserving the term ‘language’ for highly standardised varieties while classifying other varieties as ‘dialects’ and often leading to language contestation. This paper outlines some properties of the Ausbau bias, discussing its negative effects across ostensibly dissimilar communities. We will see how the Ausbau bias has attitudinal consequences, feeding a vicious circle of contestation and endangerment. The paper concludes with some suggestions on how contestation can be mitigated by moving away from the ‘Ausbau-centric’ tendency that views languages as mainly socio-political objects.