Language and Revolution in Egypt
Excerpt
I. Introduction The politicizing of language that took place in Egypt before and after the January 25th revolution provides a rich environment
for linguistic analysis on many levels. It is no exaggeration to say that discussion of language always feeds into politics
through identity construction. As Paul Gee contends, language is in essence political:
Politics is not just about contending political parties. At a much deeper level it is about how to distribute social goods
in a society: who gets what in terms of money, status, power, and acceptance on a variety of…