Indonesian Languages and Literatures provides both an overview and in-depth studies of the multifaceted linguistic landscape of Indonesia as it informs the study of complex multilingual societies. Indonesia is home to about 700 languages, roughly ten percent of the global total, including Indonesian – an emergent major world language spoken as a first or second language by some 280 million people. The instantiation and development of Standard Indonesian as a national language, the increasing number of Indonesians reporting use of Indonesian as a primary language, the language contact scenarios between Indonesian and hundreds of other languages of Indonesia (Austronesian, non-Austronesian and colonial), and the implications of the shift toward Indonesian and other regional linga franca in the endangerment of hundreds of languages are all part of the dynamic linguistic situation in Indonesia. The essays assembled in this volume address these issues focusing on documentation, description, and analysis; language endangerment and language vitality; and language use in multilingual contexts.
