“English is like the dollar”: hard currency ideology and the status of English in Peru

This paper presents observations from an agro–pastoral village in the Andes, at the periphery of Lima and from an upper–class shopping area, and discusses attitudes toward the state–driven promotion of English. In these communities, a nearly universal ideology in Peru manifests itself in the belief that “hard currency” cultural capital in the form of English competence is needed for technological advancement, employment opportunities, national progress and international travel. In education, there are increasing but ineffectual investments in public schools and a mushrooming private school industry. The struggle for linguistic distinction generates a low level language war, where colonially rooted anxieties about race and class come into conflict with popular aspirations for social mobility.