Language Heightens the Political Salience of Ethnic Divisions

Efrén O. Pérez and Margit Tavits

Journal of Experimental Political Science, 2019, vol. 6, issue 2, 131-140

Abstract: What makes people take ethnic divisions into account when judging politics? We consider here the possible effect of language. We hypothesize that speaking a minority tongue primes ethnic divisions, leading people to interpret politics more heavily through this prism. In two survey experiments with bilingual adults, we demonstrate that subjects assigned to interview in a minority language are indeed more likely to evaluate politics based on ethnic considerations: they rank ethnic relations as a more important political issue and they are more likely to correctly identify the anti-minority party in their political system. These results suggest that people may think about politics differently depending on the language they use.

Date: 2019
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