A brief comment on: Bill Bowring, “Law in a Linguistic Battlefield” (Language & Law, vol. 1, 2012)

Abstract

In his interesting article in Language and Law (vol. 1, 2012) Bill Bowring, a Professor of Law from Birkbeck College at the University of London and one of the leading experts on Ukrainian language legislation, presented several theses, particularly with regard to the Ukrainian “Law of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic on Languages in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic” from 1989. Although this law has recently been replaced with the “Law On Principles of the State Language Policy”, Professor Bowring’s article requires some comments. On the one hand, some of his statements are very strong, and their implications extend far beyond the language law from 1989. On the other hand, his claims, most of which have in fact been put forward before, do not seem to be quite correct.

Cite as: Moser, JLL 2 (2013), 19–22, DOI: 10.14762/jll.2013.019