[Xmca-l] Re: Joshua Fishman, R.I.P.

[Robert Lake]

Thanks for this Ari.
His conclusion (copied below) is spot on in this age of much ado about
posthumanism.
With all of the advantages of technology that we all enjoy and use
constantly,
reminders like this are more valuable for their rarity.
*Robert*

In conclusion I want to tell you something about my grandchildren. My wife
engages in laptop publishing. She publishes in the Yiddish language for our
grandchildren. But let me tell you, *the true lap top *here is my lap and
her lap and the laps of the children’s mother and father. That is a bond
with the language that will stay with them after we are long gone. That is
the lap top of language. And if you want that language revived, you have to
use your lap also with your children or your grandchildren or somebody
else’s children or grandchildren. Adopt a grandchild. Adopt the
grandparents. It is your lap that is part of the link to sanctity, the link
to kinship, and the link to purpose. Now, in our affluent American society
it turns out that one of my grandchildren already has an e-mail account. He
writes messages to me to give to one of his cousins on the other coast. I
go from coast to coast throughout the year because I have grandchildren on
each coast. I have got to be sure that they sit on my lap during the year.
So he writes to his cousin on the other coast on e-mail. He has to
transliterate the Yiddish language into Roman characters because e-mail
only works in Roman characters, and he makes a lot of mistakes in that. But
it is recognizable. He is only seven, and the last e-mail I received was a
little note saying, “I have got a little mechanical bird. It speaks
Yiddish. Ha, ha. That’s a joke.” So there are family building, there are
culture building, and there are intimacy building prerequisites for
language fostering, things that you have to do because no school is going
to do them. However, the school can put that on the agenda of what has to
be done. The school has intellectuals in it. The school has a building, a
budget, a time, and a place. Now it has to put the life of the language,
not just the literacy of the language, not just the grammar of the
language, not just the lexicon of the language, but the life of the
language in the home and the community on its agenda if the language is
going to be passed along. Reversing language shift is a research field, it
is an applied field, it is a cultural values field, it has new horizons,
there are new things to do, things that are, if you like, differently
focused than the ordinary school has been. And reversing language shift
asks, “What happens with the mother tongue before school, in school, out of
school, and after school?” so that it can be passed on from one generation
to another. I started with a good question and I am ending with a good
question and that is the question. “What are you going to do with the
mother tongue before school, in school, out of school, and after school?”
Because that determines its fate, whether it is going to become
self-renewing. That is my question for you, no joke!


On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Aria Razfar <arazfar@uic.edu> wrote:

> http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/jar/SIL/Fishman1.pdf
>
>
> Aria Razfar, Ph.D.
> Associate Professor of Literacy, Language, and Culture
> Director of Graduate Studies, Curriculum and Instruction
> University of Illinois at Chicago
> 1040 W. Harrison St. M/C 147
> Chicago, IL, 60607
>
> Director of English Learning through Mathematics, Science and Action
> Research (ELMSA)
> www.elmsa.org
>
> Webpage: http://education.uic.edu/personnel/faculty/aria-razfar-phd
> Tel: 312-413-8373
> Fax: 312-996-8134
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:
> xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Robert Lake
> Sent: Monday, March 02, 2015 11:25 AM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Joshua Fishman, R.I.P.
>
> Thanks for sharing this Peter. Does anyone have an article of his to share
> with us?
> Robert L.
>
> On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 11:37 AM, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu> wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > From: Rosalind Horowitz [mailto:Rosalind.Horowitz@utsa.edu]
> > Sent: Monday, March 02, 2015 11:34 AM
> > To: Peter Smagorinsky
> > Subject: Distribute to Listserv
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > 2 March 2015
> >
> > Dear Colleagues.
> >
> > Language, Culture, and Social Science experts across the world mourn
> > the loss of Joshua Fishman, Professor Emeritus, Yeshiva University,
> > New York.
> > He was at the forefront of Bilingualism, Multilingualism, Language
> > Preservation, Minorities and Language Shift and an advocate of
> > Languages and Culture as a mark of Human Values.
> > The history of Professor Fishman’s life is a history of the Sociology
> > and Psychology of Language and human preservation of tradition and
> culture.
> >
> > Rosalind Horowitz
> > Professor, The University of Texas—San Antonio
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > From: Ofelia Garcia [ogarcia@gc.cuny.edu<mailto:ogarcia@gc.cuny.edu>]
> >
> >
> > Joshua A. Fishman (1926-2015)
> >
> > A beloved teacher and influential scholar, Joshua A. Fishman passed
> > away peacefully in his Bronx home, on Monday evening, March 1, 2015.
> > He was 88 years old. Joshua A. Fishman leaves behind his devoted wife
> > of over 60 years, Gella Schweid Fishman, three sons and
> > daughters-in-law, nine grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. But
> > he also leaves behind thousands of students throughout the world who
> > have learned much from him about sociology of language, the field he
> > founded, and also about the possibility of being a generous and
> > committed scholar to language minority communities. As he once said,
> > his life was his work and his work was his life.
> >
> > Joshua A. Fishman, nicknamed Shikl, was born in Philadelphia PA on
> > July 18, 1926. Yiddish was the language of his childhood home, and his
> > father regularly asked his sister, Rukhl, and him: “What did you do
> > for Yiddish today?” The struggle for Yiddish in Jewish life was the
> > impetus for his scholarly work. After graduating from the University
> > of Pennsylvania with a Masters degree in 1947, he collaborated with
> > his good friend, Max Weinreich, the doyen of Yiddish linguistics, on a
> > translation of Weinreich’s history of Yiddish. And it was through
> > Yiddish that he came to another one of his interests ––that of
> > bilingualism. In 1948 he received a prize from the YIVO Institute for
> > Yiddish Research for a monograph on bilingualism. Yiddish and
> > bilingualism were interests he developed throughout his scholarly life.
> >
> > After earning a PhD in social psychology from Columbia University in
> > 1953, Joshua Fishman worked as a researcher for the College Entrance
> > Examination Board. This experience focused his interest on educational
> > pursuits, which eventually led to another strand of his scholarly work
> > –– that on bilingual education. It was around this time that he taught
> > what came to be the first sociology of language course at The City
> > College of New York. In 1958, he was appointed associate professor of
> > human relations and psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, and
> > two years later, moved to Yeshiva University. At Yeshiva University he
> > was professor of psychology and sociology, Dean of the Ferkauf
> > Graduate School of Social Science and Humanities, Academic Vice
> > President, and Distinguished University Research Professor of Social
> > sciences. In 1988, he became Professor Emeritus and began to divide
> > the year between New York and California where he became visiting
> > professor of education and linguistics at Stanford University. In the
> > course of his career, Fishman held visiting appointments at over a
> > dozen universities in the USA, Israel, and the Philippines, and
> > fellowships at the Center for Advanced study (Stanford), the East West
> > Center (Hawai’i) the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, the
> Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, and the Israel Institute for
> Advanced Study.
> >
> > Throughout his long career Joshua A. Fishman has published close to
> > one hundred books and over a thousand articles. He has not only been
> > prolific, but his original and complex ideas have been very
> > influential in the academy, as well as extremely useful to language
> > minorities through the world. His first major study of sociology of
> > language, Language Loyalty in the United States, was published in
> > 1964. A year later, he published Yiddish in America. In 1968, he
> > published the earliest major collection dealing with language policy
> > and management, Language problems of developing nations. In the same
> > year, he edited and published Readings in the sociology of language, a
> first attempt to define the new field.
> >
> > By the 1970s Joshua Fishman’s scholarship was recognized throughout
> > the world for its importance and its relevance about the language
> > issues prevalent in society. In 1973, he founded, and has since
> > edited, The International Journal of the Sociology of Language, a
> > journal of excellent international reputation. Joshua Fishman has also
> > edited a related book series published by Mouton, Contributions to the
> > Sociology of Language (CSL), with over 200 titles. In both of these
> > endeavors Fishman has encouraged young scholars to research, write and
> > publish, supporting and contributing to the academic careers of many
> > throughout the world, especially in developing countries. For years he
> > replied daily to letters and e-mails from students from all over the
> > world. His greatest motivation has been dialoguing with many about the
> > use of language in society and answering student questions. The world
> was his classroom.
> >
> > While conducting an impressive body of research, and being responsive
> > to the many who asked for advice, Fishman traveled extensively,
> > encouraging the activities of those seeking to preserve endangered
> > languages. He will be remembered by the Māoris of New Zealand, the
> > Catalans and Basques of Spain, the Navajo and other Native Americans,
> > the speakers of Quechua and Aymara in South America, and many other
> > minority language groups for his warmth and encouragement. For a
> > quarter-century, he wrote a column on Yiddish sociolinguistics in
> > every issue of the quarterly Afn Shvel. He also wrote regularly on
> > Yiddish and general sociolinguistic topics for the weekly Forverts.
> > Together with his wife Gella Fishman, he established the extensive
> > five-generational "Fishman Family Archives" at Stanford University
> > library. In 2004 he received the prestigious UNESCO Linguapax Award in
> Barcelona, Spain.
> >
> > Joshua Fishman’s prolific record of research and publication has
> > continued until today, defining modern scholarship in bilingualism and
> > multilingualism, bilingual and minority education, the relation of
> > language and thought, the sociology and the social history of Yiddish,
> > language policy and planning, language spread, language shift and
> > maintenance, language and nationalism, language and ethnicity,
> > post-imperial English, languages in New York, and ethnic, and national
> > efforts to reverse language shift.
> >
> > His scholarly work with minority groups and with others engaged in the
> > struggle to preserve their languages, cultures, and traditions has
> > been inspired by a deep and heartfelt compassion that is always
> > sustained by the markedly human tone of his most objective scholarly
> writing.
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Edling mailing list
> > Edling@bunner.geol.lu.se<mailto:Edling@bunner.geol.lu.se>
> > http://bunner.geol.lu.se/mailman/listinfo/edling
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Myrna Goldstein, B.S.J., MATESL
> > Founder, Director
> > Are You in Your English File?®
> > Second Language Learning Research Center Eilat, Israel, formerly of
> > Milan, Italy
> > e:  myrnaenglishfile@gmail.com<mailto:myrnaenglishfile@gmail.com>
> > Skype:  myinmi
> > t: 00972 (0)53 5255360
> >
>
>
>
> --
>
> *Robert Lake  Ed.D.*Associate Professor
> Social Foundations of Education
> Dept. of Curriculum, Foundations, and Reading Georgia Southern University
> Secretary/Treasurer-AERA- Paulo Freire Special Interest Group P. O. Box
> 8144
> Phone: (912) 478-0355
> Fax: (912) 478-5382
> Statesboro, GA  30460
>
>
>


-- 

*Robert Lake  Ed.D.*Associate Professor
Social Foundations of Education
Dept. of Curriculum, Foundations, and Reading
Georgia Southern University
Secretary/Treasurer-AERA- Paulo Freire Special Interest Group
P. O. Box 8144
Phone: (912) 478-0355
Fax: (912) 478-5382
Statesboro, GA  30460