To launch our new series on sociolinguistics, David Karlander examines what happens when concepts developed by scholars of language circulate and become embedded in policies and law. In exploring how the distinction between a “language” and a “dialect” became encoded in the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML), Karlander examines the consequences when applied to the status and state support of minority languages in Sweden. What counts as a language, he demonstrates, is not simply an “academic” matter. When sociolinguistics enters the public arena, it has the potential to affect the political and social standing of real communities.