Choosing an outgroup’s language is perceived as ethnic betrayal

Evidence

Speech accommodation, or language switching, refers to the sometimes subtle and unspoken negotiation by which a language is selected for communication between bilinguals from two ethnolinguistic groups. Often, the selection of the language of one’s ingroup, and the corresponding rejection of the language of the outgroup, represents a unique linguistic form of ingroup bias (e.g., Giles, Taylor, & Bourhis, 1973). For example, in the Gaeltacht (Gaelic-speaking) west coast of Ireland where speaking in Gaelic was a criminal offense for generations, a sign common in many inns and taverns reads, “Irish spoken. English understood.” Hogg, D’Agata, and Abrams (1989) documented that Italian immigrants to Australia responded negatively to fellow Italian immigrants who engaged in an “ethnolinguistic betrayal” by speaking the dominant (English) language of the host receiving nation. Once again, this linguistic facet of intergroup hostility is obviously of particular importance in bior multi-lingual environments. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1292

Categorization

• SHARE: The ‘Irish spoken. English understood.’ sign from the Gaeltacht is the kind of concrete anecdote a linguist or Irish-studies person would treasure.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1292
• XREF: connects to: A betrayal discourse is a low-cost outbidding strategy leveraging shared communal narratives — Cathy Gormley-Heenan and Roger Macginty, Ethnic Outbidding and Party…, 48; Proficiency in the rival language becomes the shield that cancels ethnic stigma — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 113