Language attitndes in educational contexts

LANGUAGE ATTITUDES, PREFERENCES AND USAGE

4.10 A possible model of language attitudes

4.9.3 Language attitndes in educational contexts

In educational contexts one of the areas thathas contributed to language loss and language retention is the consideration of factors that play such as a role (Baker, 1992). Gardner,et al (1985) observe that where learners have positive attitudes to a language, it is rarely the case that they lose their competence in that language.

Similar language characteristics were also found to be a major factor in the retention of second language skills. Itis perhaps the case that all learners would have a high motivation and positive attitude to learning through their own indigenous languages in early education. In Malawi a considerable number of learners have since 1968 been forced to be instructed through a local language that is not theirs and in which they have no proficiency. It would thus be interesting to explore if those who have been forcibly instructed through Chichewa have had a positive attitude to the language of instruction. The question of learning it for integrative reasons would equally be an interesting area worth exploring.

With regard to teachers, Edwards (1982) asserts that they will show that other languages and their varieties are less than favourable to their own regardless of overtly expressed attitudes. Trudgill (1985a) contends that teachers will usually condemn their learners' attitudes as 'careless' 'bad' 'wrong' and even "gibberish'.

His argument is that this is an influence of Bernstein's (1971) views on his conception of 'elaborated' and 'restricted' codes. What this refers to is the standard and non-standard varieties respectively, where the commonly held view is that the latter are inferior variants. InLabov's (1973) view non-standard forms' are not inferior, although in western eyes Bernstein's view still seems to hold. The question is whether this can be applied generally to African languages and their varieties.

Itis observable here that a stereotype is actually part of the cognitive component of an attitude that is formed by one's personal experience and emotional needs and also by what one learns from others. While. stereotypes are based on overgeneralised, or on false beliefs, they nonetheless have an influence on the way one decodes and interprets information about other linguistics groups.

Information that tends to be consistent with stereotypes tends to become more readily accepted than information which questions their validity. In education, and particularly in the choice of indigenous languages as media for instruction, stereotypes could become obstacles in language learning as learners might tend to become influenced by other groups. Sometimes people also tend to categorise persons according to their accent, pronunciation even before they have consciously associated them with certain ethnolinguistic groups.

We also observe here that teachers of second languages or other indigenous languages need to guard against the treatment of learning other languages as involving identification with one group only. If a student observes the learning of a target language as a threat to his ethnolinguistic or cultural identity, he could feel aversion toward the entire learning situation and thus toward the target language itself. The formal or 'standard' dialect that is taught could become a symbol of so'cial values that are diametrically opposed to the values of the learner.

The obvious result here would be to resist the social values that are associated with the target language, which would eventually lead to the impairment of learning the target language. Stereotypes therefore need to be avoided by teachers on this account.

Thus contact with mother tongue speakers in a relaxed, amicable, social and friendly atmosphere would lead to a positive change in language attitude and the diminished anxiety of one language group toward another. There is also the suggestion that much as attitudes and motivation influence learners in second or third language learning, the converse could also be true: that second or third

language learning could influence attitudes and motivation. Gardner, (1988:13) in Roos, (1990) suggests that,

individuals' attitudes toward the other language community and the language learning situation, and their level of motivation, among other things, will influence their relative degree of success in learning the other language. It is equally reasonable, however, that happy experiences in language learning situations and success in learning the language will foster positive attitudes and enhance motivation, while negative experiences and/or failure to do well could engender negative attitudes and loss of motivation.

(Gardner, 1988: 137, in Roos, 1990)

Krashen's ' Monitor Model' makes the suggestion that attitudes and motivation make up a learner's 'affective filter'. This could influence the extent to which the learning material given to the learner as exposure or 'comprehensible input' may contribute to the learner's learning process. Besides, both attitudes and motivation have influenced retention of second or third language material since they affect the extent to which learners make use of the given language after the learning process. It is important then to recognise the fact that second or third language learning is a dynamic process in which all the various causal variables need to be taken into account.

Brown (1987) notes that teachers would go a long way in dispelling what are invariably seen as myths with regard to other cultures. These myths then could be replaced by a more realistic understanding of other languages and their cultures in a given context. This understanding could be different from one's own, but it has to be respected and valued on equal footing. In this way, he suggests that.leamers could move through a 'hierarchy of affectivity' where they become aware, understand and appreciate other cultures and the multilingual nature of their communities.

Whatever Malawian teachers' views are, their evaluations may be inaccurate and influenced by the marker of power and dominance because of the imposition of the Chewa dialect or variety in Chichewa

Inessence, because of the power and dominance of an indigenous language and its dialect used in educational instruction, other varieties of Chichewa and other languages would obviously be viewed less favourably from the official perspective. This was to be expected. Varieties of Chinyanja, along with other indigenous languages, were declared non-standard, unusable and therefore diverging from Chichewa, which was the norm. On the other hand, regional dialects of Chichewa (particularly the Chinyanja dialects in the southern region) have always reflected more friendliness and warmth among its speakers including teachers who were forced to use Chichewa officially.

The issue here is that from a methodological perspective, language attitudes do not emerge in a sociocultural vacuum. This demonstrates that there are sociohistorical, demographic, and institutional support factors. In this study the symbolic role of Chichewa as the national language has tended to affect language attitudes in a range of communities. The sociocultural context will therefore inevitably have much influence on attitudes.

4.9.4 Observations onattitudes

As we have observed in the discussion this far, it is difficult to explain the conceptual differences between the various types of attitudes that people might hold toward a given language or its varieties. However, language stereotypes are more deep seated, subconscious and. affective (Schmied, 1991). Rational explanations for individuals' attitudes seem unclear and therefore based on idealised abstractions. Others still are based on sheer beliefs which are manifested in practical issues.

The other aspect of attitude is related to language varieties. This is also problematic as it relates to people's norms about the concept of 'language', which is further divided into levels of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. People can be prejudiced in favour of particular varieties on this basis. A further problem with regard to attitudes relates to the actual research on attitudes as they touch on what could be described as personal, sensitive and sometimes emotive issues. This might involve heightened political matters where there is usually a marked difference between what is said in public and utterances expressed privately or in interviews. There must be mutual understanding and shared knowledge of the intentions and goodwill between the interviewer and the interviewee, as well as the wider speech community if opinions are to be freely expressed.

While attitudes are personal, they do reflect the sociolinguistic phenomena of a given speech community and will vary with individuals' sociolinguistic backgrounds. For example, individuals attitudes will vary on EFL and ESL situations: in the former they may tend to be generally not accommodating except for visiting tourists or foreigners. Inthe ESL context, the language will largely be used as part ofthe daily discourse (Schmied, 1991).

There is also the question of stereotypes. Positive and negative attitudes reflect impressions of one's ease or difficulty in learning a target language. These impressions will also indicate the status of a language in the community. We would give the examples ofkiSwahili in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda, of Shona and isiNdebele in Zimbabwe, of isiZulu and isiXhosa in South Africa and of Chiturnbuka and Chinyanja in this study.

At times it is difficult to explain attitudes towards a language or languages rationally as they are largely subconscious. For example, English has been described as 'beautiful', 'rich', 'logical', 'precise', 'sophisticated', even 'pleasing to the ear' (Schmied, 1991:165). All languages are surely beautiful. We could argue

The other aspect of attitude is related to language varieties. This is also problematic as it relates to people's norms about the concept of 'language', which is further divided into levels of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. People can be prejudiced in favour of particular varieties on this basis. A further problem with regard to attitudes relates to the actual research on attitudes as they touch on what could be described as personal, sensitive and sometimes emotive issues. Thismight involve heightened political matters where there is usually a marked difference between what is said in public and utterances expressed privately or in interviews. There must be mutual understanding and shared knowledge of the intentions and goodwill between the interviewer and the interviewee, as well as the wider speech community if opinions are to be freely expressed.

While attitudes are personal, they do reflect the sociolinguistic phenomena of a given speech community and will vary with individuals' sociolinguistic backgrounds. For example, individuals attitudes will vary on EFL and ESL situations: in the former they may tend to be generally not accommodating except for visiting tourists or foreigners. In the ESL context, the language will largely be used as part of the daily discourse (Schmied, 1991).

There is also the question of stereotypes. Positive and negative attitudes reflect impressions of one's ease or difficulty in learning a target language. These impressions will also indicate the status of a language in the community. We would give the examples of kiSwahili in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda, of Shona and isiNdebele in Zimbabwe, of isiZulu and isiXhosa in South Africa and of Chitumbuka and Chinyanja in this study.

that English has earned all these epithets because it is an idealised world language which enjoys this international prestige. But beauty is an aesthetic quality, often quite subjective - and most people see their languages in the same light.

However, stereotyped notions could also be based on linguistic facts about a language with regard to its functional viability. Schmied (1991) claims that English is 'rich' in vocabulary, which could be true, as it has borrowed widely from languages whose speakers use it on practically every continent, and a majority of the world's countries. The notion of being 'precise' only refers largely to its lexicon, particularly in teaching, science and technological information.

Given the time, attention and dominance and power and equal development other languages would also be as precise.

Attitudes based on language beliefs seem to be supported by the communicative, rational, personal, educational and perhaps cognitive arguments. This is in the case of the use of languages of wider communication. Examples are indigenous languages used by governments with their people in Africa. Here, despite the dominance of English over African languages, it could be rendered less effective and inappropriate. The communicative aspect is also expressed by some elite as a result of developing a particular register in academic situations, for example in the use of concepts which are viewed as complex. This is particularly the case in the world of science and technology. .National arguments are used where people choose a language as symbol of national identity, as in the case of kiSwahili, in East Africa, the eleven official languages in South Africa, and the imposition of Chichewa in Malawi. Among different local ethnolinguistic groups, English has been used as a language of official national communication, particularly among the emerging elite.

Proponents of indigenous national languages advance arguments that ostensibly favour these languages. However, in practice, they favour English at the expense of non-development of indigenous languages and the aspect of national identity, on which they stress (Schmied, 1991:169). This is basically a cultural argument

which further argues that the use of English promotes the creation of class differences in the nation and therefore fails to allow the democratic participation of all social groups in the process. While this may be the case, others may argue that English does not create class; that it is only an indicator, and that the notion of an Africa identity can still be expressed in English. The argument that a decline in English standard results in a strengthened national unity would be disputed in countries such as Botswana and Kenya as simplistic. In typical multilingual states such as Zambia, South Africa and Malawi, the belief is that the concept of a nation-state would be achieved if all Africans would learn another indigenous language of wider communication, particularly in schools.

There seems to be largely a misconception of parental attitudes and views in Africa. The cognitive aspect of attitudes is the belief that knowing an African language only, for example, means being less educated. Some parents therefore widely argue that their children be taught English from early education because of its perceived career opportunities at the end of their children's education. They also believe those who do not know 'good' English generally lack cognitive concepts. This is possibly a remnant of the myth of relegating African languages to the category of 'primitive' languages.

This belief in language attitudes equates language choice with mental complexity.

The converse of the argument also is difficult to prove. Proponents of this view argue that since English is a foreign language, it is not suitable for the foreign mind. They further argue that English indoctrinates the African, and makes him English-minded or European-minded, which results in cultural imperialism (Ngugi, 1986). In this sense the acquisition of English is equated to 'thinking European'.

The most subscribed vision of most stakeholders in language policy matters in Africa is that English is not to replace African languages, and will most probably never do so in the foreseeable future. Itis only an additional language 'for the

wider domains beyond those for which the mother tongue is habitually used' (Schmied, 1991:171). Thus Chitumbuka, Chinyanja and other indigenous Malawian languages remain languages for essentially sociocultural activities, but are also to be used in a variety of situations including the workplace.

A reduced form of such 'extremist' attitudes is the consideration and recognition of nativised forms of English as pedagogical and particularly as sociolinguistic models. Whether these need to be institutionalised or not is a matter of choice for individual nation-states, but they do exist in practice as in the case of the South African Black English (SABE) (see Buthelezi, 1995). The adoption of such varieties as norms and their codification is still controversial. Some would believe that what is 'correct' is 'what the native speaker says'. The school of thought that advocates a strong attitude towards nativised forms of English argues that this form in a given countrywillhave the distinct phonetic, phonological, lexical and syntactic characteristics that are fairly stable. It further argues that these cannot, therefore,be regarded as deviations from a native norm and that users of this form may not aspire to achieve the native form in the use of their variety. However, a distinct variety of English has not emerged in Malawi or in other postcolonial African countries generally for groups of people to have particularly strong attitudes toward them, apart from pidgins and creoles in West Africa and to some extent the South African Black English (SABE). In sociocultural contexts the acceptability of nativised forms or variants needs to be welcomed.

An important aspect to recognise in attitudes are the changes in the sociopolitical matrix of a nation which can result in changes in the national and individual language choice. With the imposition of an indigenous language as a symbolic national language in Malawi, a considerable number of people were 'persuaded-to follow the lumping together of linguistic groups as we observed in chapter three and claimed that they were Chewa when in fact they were of Yao, Lomwe, Mang'anja and Nyanja ethnolinguistically. Their attitudes were thus inclined to favour Chichewa as their new language with a view to benefiting materially from

this choice or alignment. Inthe previous chapter we observed how this was used to draw demarcations between northerners, on the one hand, and those from the centre and southern regions as a single linguistic group. This was a way of marking difference so thatpeople would begin to think in terms of 'us' and 'them', the familiar and the stranger (Chirwa, 1994/5:60). The emphasis on regional identities based on sociocultural linguistic groupings has been used in Malawi as a product of the attempt to mark the difference and inclusion or exclusion from some category. In the final analysis, people of entirely different socio-cultural origins and of different languages ended up aligning themselves and choosing Chichewa as their new-found language and haven.

Dalam dokumen a qualitative analysis of a resilient low-income (Halaman 104-113)