ABSTRACT
Linguistic and cultural identity, language as a token and as a marker of cultural or national unity are themes which have grown in visibility inthe postcolonial era. This preoccupation is not a novelty: it had, forinstance, troubled nineteenth century Europe, where it inspired somee nergetic and far reaching policy making. In practice, the efficiency of language policy, for good or bad, can appear to be a foregone conclusion. The jacobine inspired reforms of the French Third Republic were a prime example of the potency of voluntarist language planning ruthlessly applied from the top, and in many ways, these methods directly influenced language and education policies in the Maghreb after independence. It should be noted at this juncture that the French republican pattern of cultural domination is quite different from the British approach, in that it constantly refers to a universalist message which is, amongst other things, a denial of ethnicity. This factseems to prove another point: it illustrates the effectiveness of associating the campaigning language with a collective ideal; itbecomes the language of national unity and authenticity, but it can alsobe the language of progress, of liberty, of civilisation itself. 1
