Empowering or endangering minorities? Facebook, language, and identity in Myanmar

ABSTRACT Language policies play a major role in ethnic conflict because they affect the right of speakers to choose and use their preferred language(s), and help determine courses of action to maintain, assert or defend such rights. There has been insufficient analysis on the role of social media, particularly Facebook, in strengthening or undermining the survival of minority languages and collective identity in multi-ethnic countries. This paper uses Myanmar as a case study to demonstrate the extent to which Facebook language policies influence language use practices of minorities in Myanmar. While Facebook’s selection of Burmese as a ‘Facebook language’ has privileged the use of Myanmar’s majority language at the expense of its minority languages, it has simultaneously provided opportunities for ethnic minorities to preserve and promote their languages and cultures.