List of language regulators

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This is a list of bodies that consider themselves to be authorities on standard languages, often called language academies. Language academies are motivated by, or closely associated with, linguistic purism and prestige, and typically publish prescriptive dictionaries,^[1] which purport to officiate and prescribe the meaning of words and pronunciations. A language regulator may also have a more descriptive approach, however, while maintaining and promoting (but not imposing) a standard spelling. Many language academies are private institutions, although some are governmental bodies in different states, or enjoy some form of government-sanctioned status in one or more countries. There may also be multiple language academies attempting to regulate and codify the same language, sometimes based in different countries and sometimes influenced by political factors.

Many world languages have one or more language academies or official language bodies. However, the degree of control that the academies exert over these languages does not render the latter controlled natural languages in the sense that the various kinds of "simple English" (e.g. Basic English, Simplified Technical English) or George Orwell's fictional Newspeak are. They instead remain natural languages to a considerable extent and are thus not formal languages such as Attempto Controlled English. They have a degree of standardization that allows them to function as standard languages (e.g. standard French). The English language has never had a formal regulator anywhere, outside of private productions such as the Oxford English Dictionary.

^ Thomas, George (1991) Linguistic purism p.108, quotation:
Whereas a number of the puristically motivated language societies have assumed de facto responsibility for language cultivation, the decisions of the academies have often had the force of law. ... Since academies are so closely associated with the notion of purism, a brief word on their history may not be out of place. The first academy to deal expressly and exclusively with language matters was the Accademia della Crusca ... Its orientation was essentially conservative, favouring a return to the Tuscan language as cultivated in the fourteenth century over the innovations of contemporary renaissance poets such as Torquato Tasso. ... One of its first tasks -- as with so many academies to follow -- was to produce a large-scale prescriptive dictionary of Italian

[1] Thomas, George (1991) Linguistic purism p.108, quotation:
Whereas a number of the puristically motivated language societies have assumed de facto responsibility for language cultivation, the decisions of the academies have often had the force of law. ... Since academies are so closely associated with the notion of purism, a brief word on their history may not be out of place. The first academy to deal expressly and exclusively with language matters was the Accademia della Crusca ... Its orientation was essentially conservative, favouring a return to the Tuscan language as cultivated in the fourteenth century over the innovations of contemporary renaissance poets such as Torquato Tasso. ... One of its first tasks -- as with so many academies to follow -- was to produce a large-scale prescriptive dictionary of Italian

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