National language, identity formation and broadcasting - Flanders, the Netherlands and German-speaking Switzerland

This article presents part of the findings that came out of a two-year research conducted within the frame of a FKFO project.1 The purpose of this project was to show how the study of the evolving language policies of public service broadcasting (PSB),2 can give a good insight into the (self-) ascribed role of PSB in the nation-building project and wider identity formation within communities. In other words, it showed how the evolving language policies of PSB can be explained by looking at their wider socioeconomic, political, cultural and sociolinguistic context.3 The study was comparative in the sense that the language policy of the Flemish, German-Swiss and Dutch PSB were taken as case studies. As we show, their seemingly different language policies must be understood as the result of different 'accents' in the process of nation-building and in the position of language in this process. The study was also diachronic. Throughout time, the PSB services have modified their language policies considerably. These changes must be understood as a symptom of sociocultural transformations and consequent changes in identity formation within these communities. As such, the language policies of PSB can be situated within the shift from a modern to a postmodern or postmaterialist society.