This volume considers the ways in which modernity challenges and informs the language policies of various Southeast Asians nations. Using case studies from Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand, the authors examine language policies that are explicitly articulated either in the form of State constitutions or in the public proclamations of political leaders.

Particular attention is paid to the ways in which English often seems as the language of globalization, impacts the status of indigenous Southeast Asian language.

Language Policy and Modernity in Southeast Asia will be of interest to researchers in both language policy and contemporary political theory.