3.3 Early encounters with school leadership: the first two years
3.3.1 The second impossible thing: contesting language as a barrier
One of the first obstacles that I faced at the school was the language barrier. On arrival at the school on the first day, I was shown the staff register of names by the principal as a means of orientating me to the different staff structures at the school. Two things surprised me: I saw a large staff component (there were more than eighty names); and I noticed that the majority were Zulu names, indicating that most of the staff members belonged to the largest ethnic group in the province, the Zulu people, who are part of the Nguni sub-group. I did not recognise any of the Zulu names and had no clue as to how to pronounce them. I had come from a historically Indian school, and this was my first contextual trial.
Within the first week I experienced marginalisation that had its roots in language difference. I had accompanied the principal to a meeting with hostel staff. These staff members were caregivers of the learners outside school hours in their hostels. The entire meeting was conducted in isiZulu. As I sat in the meeting in silence I felt frustrated, close to tears, bewildered
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and intimidated. I felt a lack of belonging, acceptance and recognition. Was this kind of exclusion and marginalisation intentional? Was it just harmless oversight? Did I not belong in this context? Am I the ‘Other’?
Almost in answer to my silent questions, the pencil case of a colleague got my attention.
Inscribed on it was “The will of God won’t lead you where His grace can’t keep you.” I felt comforted almost immediately. Having had a strong Christian upbringing and being a devout Christian, these words had an immediate impact on me. My Christian identity came to the fore and I interpreted the inscription and the involvement of Archbishop Hurley in the school as a sign from God. The inscription confirmed for me that my being at Hilltop School was indeed by Divine appointment. I was there through the plan of God. It was this belief that encouraged me to realise that the Grace of God would sustain me to survive in my new environment. I remain convinced that my Christian identity strengthened and shaped many of the subject positions I was to take in the months that followed.
My third experience of language as a barrier occurred during the first few weeks in a school management meeting. The business language of the school is English. Despite the fact that all academic management meetings were conducted in English, management staff, all of whom were isiZulu first-language speakers, often reverted to isiZulu. On many occasions I found that I was the only person in the meeting who could not follow the discussion in its entirety. I often missed the innuendos and underlying meanings in dialogues and debates, and as a consequence all sorts of negative thoughts would run through my mind: Was this a way to constrain my
‘power’ and authority as deputy principal? Was this a strategy to exclude me? Should I accept the situation passively or should I act to address the issue?
After much thought and a few sleepless nights, I resolved to act to address the situation and to make my voice heard. Firstly, I took the staff register home and familiarised myself with the names of members of staff. I requested a member of staff to assist me with pronunciation. I practised doggedly. Through sheer determination, after two weeks I was familiar with most of the names and was pronouncing them correctly. In the interactions that followed, my observation was that my effort pleased staff members, who often complimented me on my pronunciation of names or corrected me in a supportive manner.
With regard to the language spoken in non-academic staff meetings, I discovered that most hostel staff were able to communicate in English but felt more comfortable using isiZulu. I resolved the problem by using an interpreter at meetings. The issue of communication at
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management meetings was a little more complex to resolve. After the first two management meetings, I expressed my concern to the principal. She reassured me that she would address the matter at the next management meeting. When she raised the issue with members of the team, it was received with mixed reactions. One member of the management team alluded to the fact that the previous deputy principal had been English-speaking and had raised no objections to management members communicating in isiZulu. I was insistent, however, that the use of isiZulu hindered my participation at meetings. On reflection, I could see that in the face of structural barriers my agency came to the fore. I questioned these social processes that were playing out, where they were located historically, and the underlying discourses that informed the ways of thinking?
I took the position that I would not allow myself to be complicit and subjected to the dominant discourse of exclusion and marginalisation on the basis of language, its meanings, power and regulation. I chose to resist. I saw this kind of exclusion as a violation of my social rights as a member of the management team. St Pierre (2000) explains that
resistance to domination is practiced by self-contained, autonomous individuals in response to an oppressive force from the outside, a force that challenges both the natural and political liberty of the individual (p. 489).
My thinking was that resistance counters the infringement of an individual’s social rights. The result was that a decision was taken that English would be the sole medium of communication in management meetings. Further determined to overcome the language barrier to effective leadership, I enrolled for an introductory isiZulu course at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
This proved to be most beneficial to me as I soon began to acquire a basic knowledge of isiZulu.
SASL was the medium of instruction for learners at Hilltop School. I knew that in many schools for the Deaf one of the key barriers to learning for learners is the language of instruction. Often teachers are not proficient in Sign Language, as articulated by learners in a study in KwaZulu- Natal (Muthukrishna, 2006). To me, this was about the right to equitable and quality education for all learners, an imperative enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (RSA, 19966b). At the outset I was committed to becoming proficient in Sign Language. To this end I enrolled for a Sign Language course at the Sign Language Academy in KwaZulu-Natal and attended all ‘in house’ Sign Language training conducted at Hilltop School for staff. I realised that I had to be able to communicate with learners, and affirm their language and culture in every
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way possible. As I write my story now I believe that I am a fluent Sign Language user. I still, however, have great difficulty with communicating in isiZulu.