EXPLORING THE TERRAIN: SCHOOL LANGUAGE CHANGE, CHANGE AGENTRY AND SUSTAINING CHANGE
2.2 Part A: Literature Review
2.2.2 The International Context
2.2.2.1 Africa
The review of language in education research in the African context focuses on the four policy approaches adopted in African education which reveal a renewed interest in the use of African languages in education but which is still being hampered by lack of genuine state support for such policy reform and by the persistence of negative attitudes to African languages. The review also considers initiatives to empower African languages and increase their usage as languages of learning and teaching.
2.2.2.1.1 The Four Policy Approaches in Africa
Schmied‟s (1991) analysis of language in education policies in Africa reveals the existence of four approaches.
The “straight-for-English” approach is practised especially in ethnically mixed areas in some primary schools in Zambia, Kenya, Liberia, Sierra Leon, Gambia and Namibia
amongst other African countries. The failure of this approach is highlighted by Macdonald (2001) who chooses Zambia to make her point. According to Macdonald (2001), research in Zambian schools has shown that the children in the third year of school cannot read at all because they are required to become literate in a language (English) that is not at all related to the language which they know (Bemba). The learners, educated in English, cannot explain in Bemba what they have learnt in English.
This means that they do not understand what they are taught in English, contends Macdonald (2001). In her analysis of language policy in Zambia, Heugh (2003) observed that in Zambia, after independence, many languages were seen as a source of potential conflict, hence the choice of English was meant to encourage integration, but she contends that the Zambian language policy resulted in assimilation into the dominant anglocentric neo-colonial elite. Heugh (2003) asserts further that the language policy was based on the premise that multilingualism is a problem rather than treating language as a right (Ruiz 1984) and quotes another African country, viz Mozambique which chose Portuguese as the official medium of government and education at independence for assimilation much like English in Zambia.
The second approach according to Schmied (1991) is to teach English as a subject in lower primary education and to use it as a medium in upper primary education with a changeover usually between grade 6 and 8. The advantage of this approach according to Schmied (1991) is that all learners acquire a reasonable level of English before it supports the content of other subjects. This approach is practised generally in Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Botswana. In reflecting on the Nigerian language policy, Heugh (2003) commented on the three-tier language policy in education i.e.
firstly, English is the official language of government and ultimate medium of instruction in schools, secondly, Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba are the three national languages of which one is compulsory for all pupils to learn, and, thirdly, the mother tongue or the language of the immediate community is the first medium of instruction in school and it is maintained through to junior secondary level. Heugh (2003) observed that Nigeria‟s language policy is influencing the realisation of a more egalitarian social and political structure. Heugh‟s (2003) argument is that Nigeria‟s overt integrationist and multicultural
philosophy is assisted by the implementation of processes which accord high status to indigenous Nigerian languages and fix valuable functions for these. However, Heugh (2003) concedes that the hierarchical arrangement of the status of languages and a transitional language in education policy in Nigeria (where there is a shift from local language medium of instruction to English) are overtly assimilationist and therefore block greater success.
Research on the central role of language in education in Ghana (Dei & Asgharzadeh 2003) has revealed the persistently dominant status of English and the neglect of indigenous Ghanaian languages. Two of the key research questions are: How do schools seek out and integrate African languages and knowledge systems in the classroom’s instructional, curricular, pedagogical and communicative practices? and How do schools deal with linguistic differences among their student population? (Dei & Asgharzadeh 2003). Ghana‟s population of over 19 million speak about 70 different languages with nine government-sponsored indigenous languages that are encouraged in schools and universities and are generally used by the media and press. However, English is the official language, imposed on Ghanaians since colonial times, and is commonly used in schools, universities, state apparatuses and business circles (Dei & Asgharzadeh 2003).
According to Dei (1993), since the 1970s Ghana has undertaken educational reforms addressing the relevance of education to local and global needs but these well-intentioned reforms have fallen short of their desired goals either for lack of political commitment or the difficulty of sustaining (physically and materially) the dictates of educational reforms.
Evidence from Ghanaian interviewees in the research conducted by Dei & Asgharzadeh (2003) reveal the following. Most of the teachers interviewed on the subject of language and culture take the position of the reciprocal role of language and culture and the significance of local languages in transmitting cultural norms and social values. Such a recognition of the importance of local language has not been easily translated into the school curriculum as is evidenced by the responses of a student interviewee who talks about the reasons for English dominating as medium of instruction as being one of pragmatism (English acts as a lingua franca to facilitate communication among Ghanaians who speak different languages) and the official sanctioning that the language
has (Dei & Asgharzadeh 2003). The view is that if there is a conscious attempt to promote the teaching of local languages, students would find a common way of communicating in the local vernacular than English. However, teachers who were interviewed attested to learners being forced to speak English and being punished for speaking their local languages in schools. According to Dei & Asgharzadeh (2003), there are historical dimensions to the language problem and the bind that teachers find themselves in. An education district official interviewee noted that Ghana has a language policy for education which states that the medium of instruction should be a Ghanaian language for the first three years with a shift to English thereafter but because there are 60 different languages in the country, in most cases, English is used as the medium of instruction from the first year. Coupled to this is the economic and social currency attached to English that came with colonialism and educators find it difficult to break that mentality (Dei & Asgharzadeh 2003).
The third approach quoted by Schmied (1991) is to use not English but the local African languages, especially the national language(s), throughout primary education. These national languages are sufficiently developed, extensively used and supported by national language policies. However, English remains an important subject because it is used as a medium in secondary schools or used only in natural science subjects with an African language used in arts (Schmied 1991). This approach is followed by Tanzania, Somalia, Ethiopia and Southern Sudan.
Tanzania, Somalia and Ethiopia are currently the only countries on the continent to use national languages rather than colonial languages throughout the primary school system (Alidou 2004, Rubagumya 1990). After Tanzania‟s independence in 1961, Nyerere as its first leader adopted an aggressive nation-building campaign that included promoting Swahili as the language of public life (Miguel 2004). According to Eleuthera (2007) Nyerere‟s vision was of a country united under ujamaa or “familyhood”, a political philosophy of socialism and self-reliance, and the establishment of Swahili as a national language was instrumental in the move towards self-reliance in general. In 1982 the Presidential Commission on Education, appointed by Nyerere, recommended that a
change from English to Swahili in secondary classrooms be effected starting in 1985 (Lwaitama & Rugemalira 1990). However, this did not materialize and English persists as a medium of instruction in secondary schools in Tanzania.
Despite the value of this third approach, contemporary African scholars, like Kwesi Kwaa Prah (2002), in noting the falling standards of colonial languages in many African countries, are opposed to what is viewed as a latter-day version of colonial language policy of African learners working in their own languages in the first few years of education and then branching out into English for their late primary, secondary and tertiary education. The view that Prah (2002:15) advances is that “Africans should work in their languages from the beginning to the end of their educational process, as all other developed societies do.”
Prah‟s (2002) view is shared by Rubagumya (1990) who is critical of the persistence of English as a medium of instruction in secondary and higher education in Tanzania. While Rubagumya (1990) concedes that Tanzania has made a lot of progress in cultivating Swahili as a viable national language which is now used in almost all spheres of national life, he feels that in the education field Tanzania‟s success is usually exaggerated by outsiders. He claims that Tanzania, like most African countries, still considers the language of the former colonial rulers (in this case English) as the most suitable as a medium of instruction above the primary school level. Rubagumya (1990) argues that there are two reasons for Tanzanian authorities back-tracking on stated intentions of changing the medium of instruction from English to Swahili in secondary schools. He states that firstly, English, like other former colonial languages in Africa, is seen as a prerequisite for scientific and technological development and secondly, the elitist nature of education in Africa means that use of a former colonial language shows that one has reached a level of linguistic competence which entitles one to a legitimate claim to power and eventually to mystify. Rubagumya (1990) notes that education for self reliance as propagated by Nyerere is inconsistent with education that uses English as medium of instruction. In the wake of the current debate in Tanzania as to which language should be used as medium of instruction in secondary schools, Eleuthera (2007), while conceding
the benefits of having competence in English, concludes that if the quality of education is higher when conducted in Swahili, children should be learning in Swahili rather than English. Presently in Tanzania the failure and attrition rate of learners in secondary schools are very high because of the difficulty of learners to adjust to the change in medium of instruction in secondary schools and the poor quality of tuition in English (Eleuthera 2007).
The fourth language policy approach in Africa is to use English more or less as a language for international communication, which is why English is taught extensively at secondary school level, but to use other languages (not indigenous African languages) as languages of instruction like Arabic, French or Portuguese (Schmied 1991). Schmied (1991) quotes the case of Francophone West African states where all secondary school students have to learn English, because their nations are closely interrelated with their Anglophone neighbours.
An examination of the four language policy approaches adopted in Africa reveals that language choice particularly in the domain of education is largely determined by language attitudes; this was evident in the literature on the South African situation as well. Ankama (2008), in alluding to De Klerk‟s (2002) study of Xhosa-speaking parents knowingly encouraging language shift, relates it to parental language attitudes that is manifested in the notion described by Adegbija (2001) that being educated is synonymous with knowing and being able to use English. Adegbija (2001:285) contends:
“The official dominance of ex-colonial languages as a potent language-shifting trigger is constantly pulled by the desire of every individual to rise on the vertical and horizontal social and economic ladder”. In examining the socio-historical foundations of language attitudes in sub-Saharan Africa, Adegbija (1994) concluded that particularly Africa‟s colonial past has forged language attitudes that continue to perpetuate the dominance of ex-colonial languages, notably English, critically in the education sector. In researching the attitudinal perspectives of language use in education, Adegbija (1994) examined attitudes underlying the decision to limit indigenous African languages as medium of instruction only to the lower classes of the primary school for most African countries.
Such attitudes, he found, relate to arguments concerning the presumed inability of indigenous languages to function at higher levels of education, the need to prevent isolation of sub-Saharan African countries from the rest of the western world and the need to progress in science and technology, which have European languages as their principal medium.
Adegbija‟s (2001:307) advice for reversing the language shift in Africa is summed up thus:
For the language to remain alive, its speakers both within the village and in urban centres must have a higher effective stake and deep emotional inventory in its survival, promotion and plight. As long as speakers of a language have a deep stake in its survival and a high emotional involvement and commitment to its existence, all the language shift agents and triggers in this world will not be able to kill their resolve.
While the literature on the African context seems to suggest overwhelmingly that the hegemonic status of English is being maintained at the expense of indigenous languages largely because of language attitudes that favour and elevate English over African languages, there is the flipside to this language coin. The flipside is the existence of several initiatives to empower African languages and increase their use as LOLTs, which is reviewed in the next part of this section.
2.2.2.1.2 The Flipside – Empowerment of African Languages
Orwino (2002) presents a different picture of the position of English and indigenous languages in Africa when he contends that the empowerment of the African languages casts a shadow over English in Africa. Orwino (2002) argues that each year a large population of African youth fall out of educational institutions where the use of English is demanded and live the rest of their lives using African languages and some form of indigenised English. A similar position was observed by Heine (1992) who argues that European languages in Africa continue to occupy minority status despite their dominance in official situations.
Orwino (2002) traces the empowerment wave of African languages in various African countries in the last decade where African scholars, he claims, have grappled with a spirited campaign to reintroduce the use of African languages in education. Orwino (2002) provides the following review of language in education change in various African countries. In Botswana, Setswana, which was once a mere symbolic language but now with increased roles in the country, it is one of the key subjects studied at university level.
In Ethiopia, the government has legalised the use of regional languages as media in primary education in Grades 1 to 8 and a subject from grade 9 onwards. In Kenya the establishment of the African Languages Department at Maseno University has invigorated interest in the indigenous languages with curricula in four languages already developed. In Malawi it is reported that the current political climate regards multilingualism not as a threat to peace and unity, but as a reality, which has to be positively appreciated and recognised. In Mozambique, Eduardo Mondlane University in Maputo has embarked on its aim of developing a standard orthography for fifteen indigenous languages. Namibia is said to give tangible provision to the indigenous languages and at the Okahandja Conference3, a clear message was sounded that all educational sectors are working towards the enhanced use of African languages in all domains. In Nigeria nearly 100 000 primary school students in Oyo are being taught mostly in Yoruba. In addition the federal government has embarked upon an intensive effort to translate school textbooks now written in English into Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Nupe and other Nigerian languages. In Somalia, Somali, declared an official language in 1972 was so quickly developed that by 1978 the language was being used as a medium of instruction from Grade 1 to 12. In Tanzania the status of Swahili in the country‟s governance has eclipsed that of English. In Uganda, the government‟s white paper on education spells out the need to develop all languages in Uganda. In Zambia, by 1998, the Curriculum Development Centre had designed and developed syllabuses, textbooks, supplementary readers and grammatical terminology lists in the seven African languages that were being taught up to the end of primary education.
3 A regional conference on language and development titled Making the Right Choices held in Okahandja, Namibia, 11-13 April 2000.
Other initiatives to promote African languages are the ACALAN (African Academy of Languages) initiative and AFRILA (Upgrading African Languages Project). In reporting on AFRILA, Tjaronda (2008) for New Era reveals that approximately 750 000 teaching and learning textbooks from Grades 1 to 3 have been distributed to schools since the start of the Basic Education Programme (BEP) Upgrading African Languages Project (AFRILA) in October 2000, which has improved the textbook learner ratio. The project aimed at improving literacy and numeracy in learners in the mother tongue and also to promote the acquisition of English as a second language before English becomes the medium of instruction from Grade 4 onwards. AFRILA is informed by additive bi- and multilingualism research findings that demonstrate that learners learnt most effectively through their mother tongues in the formative years of schooling and would master English if they have mastered their mother tongue first. The project has developed new teaching and learning materials in six target languages, namely, Kukwangali, Rumanyo, Thimbukushu, Otjiherero, Silozi and Khoekhoegowab, but also in Oshindonga and Oshikwanyama for grades 1 to 3.
The ACALAN initiative involves empowering African languages and their speakers through increased usage in the African school systems. In delivering a talk at the session of “21st Century Dialogues” held at UNESCO on 13 September 2007 on the topic “How to make education fairer?”, the president of ACALAN, Adama Samassekou, former Minister of Education of Mali (1993-2000), spoke of the role of ACALAN in empowering African languages and their speakers. Fiorente (2007) for UNESCO captures Samassekou‟s summation of the mission of ACALAN:
Introducing African languages in the African school systems – as a vector of learning and as a subject of study – is one of the goals of the African Academy of Languages, which I head. We decided to undertake a genuine rehabilitation process for education at continent level, by re-establishing the link between education and culture and by including our languages and our history in school curricula.
South Africa‟s contribution to ACALAN is through PRAESA‟s involvement in the ACALAN project. PRAESA‟s involvement is captured in the following vision articulated by Alexander and Bloch (2004:10):
Our vision is to regain a balance where meaning and creativity for all children are the fulcrum of education. Africa is a continent of stories, and we have to ensure that these regain their prominence and influence in various ways, not least as educational bridges between oral and written language in early childhood.
PRAESA, through ACALAN, has embarked on a continent-wide project called Stories across Africa involving the collection and writing of stories in African languages which can become a core body of children‟s literature across the continent. Working in collaboration with publishers, PRAESA is helping to stimulate and promote cultures of reading and writing in African languages by initiating programmes for developing new children‟s literature through writers‟ and illustrators‟ workshops and developing translation skills for children‟s literature among professionals working in indigenous South African languages.
A selective review of the literature on language policy in education and language policy reforms in Africa reveals that there is a resurgence of interest in the African languages with their use as a medium of instruction at least up to the end of the primary school phase and through various initiatives to empower African languages and their speakers.
However, the hegemonic status of English is still apparent in most African countries.
More significantly the sustainability of educational reforms, as in the case of the Ghanaian educational reform, is difficult to maintain as a result of economic factors, negative attitudes towards indigenous African languages and the lack of political commitment to these reforms. The parallels with the South African situation are very apparent and the implications for this study are obvious, viz. cognizance must be taken of the powerful forces of language attitudes and state support in realizing sustainable change in language in education policies and practices that affirm the use of African languages as subjects and LOLTs alongside English.