Welsh Journals

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of the most tangible ways of producing a Welsh-speaking generation able to use their language as a matter of course in a wide range of social and occupational domains. However, within this general debate there has emerged a specific critique concerning the tripartite relationship between the state, the community and cultural reproduction. It has been argued that post-war struggles over the extension of Welsh in education reflect, in part, a conflict primarily between factions of the bourgeoisie, and therefore concern economic and power relations mediated through education. Williams and Roberts (1981) posit the existence of a 'marginalised' and an 'enclave' sector of Welsh society located in crude terms in opposing class segments, and struggling for control over the community. Hence, we find that: "Within the marginalized sector, the community continues to serve its informal function which focusses on the agencies of Welsh cultural reproduction, and the process of proleterianization continues with the resultant displacement of the indigenous leadership. In the enclave, on the other hand, the bourgeoisie is fragmented into a new Welsh- speaking bourgeoisie involved in the public sector, and the English-speaking bourgeoisie associated with externally controlled capitalist development" (Williams and Roberts 1981 p. 162). These authors contend that bilingual education lies 'at the heart of this struggle' (p. 162) between factions of the bourgeoisie. The English-speaking bourgeoisie are portrayed as class representatives of creeping Anglicisation. Given their spiralist career prospects, their norms are conducive to British state-wide interests, and they are little concerned with localised community interests within Wales. Further they claim their right as a majority to a comprehensive English-medium education for their children and resist local attempts to induce Welsh primacy in most aspects of para-public service provision. There ensues a conflict over language and group rights, between the individual state-wide rights of the incomer and the natural tradition of groups rights to promote the cultural solidarity of the indigenous community (Williams 1982). This has been most evident in the field of employment and education, particularly in Gwynedd. The newer Welsh-speaking bourgeoisie seeks to promote bilingual education and the wider defence of the local community because therein lies the power base of the entrenched bourgeoisie and the opportunities for overturning the cultural division of labour (Hechter 1975; Williams and Roberts 1981, p. 159) thereby promoting their own class interests. In the marginalised sector Welsh fluency is seen less as an economic-career advantage, more as an instrument of risk minimisation. Williams (1980) conceives the language operating as the natural medium for voluntary community organisations and