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United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Original

Intergovernmental Conference on Language Policies in Africa

Working document

Harare 25-29 November 1996

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Page Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Language contexts and situations in Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Language policies and practices in Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3.

Languages in political, economic and administrative affairs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3.1 Survey of the situation in individual countries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3.2 Problems encountered in and created by the current language policies . . . . . .

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National and local languages in education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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African languages in the cultural sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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African languages and the mass media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Introduction At its twenty-eighth session the General Conference requested the Director-General to organize an intergovernmental conference on language policies in Africa. This decision stemmed from the widely held view that recourse to African languages is the best means of ensuring the participation of African peoples in national affairs and, in particular, in the process of democratization now under way in most countries. In addition, the work carried out by UNESCO over a period of more than 20 years, the research undertaken and the experiments tried in various countries can have no real impact unless they form part of a specific, coherent and realistic language policy. This decision is also borne out by other facts. Receding frontiers and the increased mobility of African people are and will be making it more and more necessary for each individual to know the languages of other countries. Nowadays, even in societies regarded as monolingual, voices are being raised in support of ‘multilingualism for all’. This new openness to multilingualism can be explained by the international context, with the need to face up to the challenges of managing globalization and the growth of large subregional, regional or even continental entities. Multilingualism is set to play a crucial role in the management of interpersonal and intercultural relations. Above all, it is both an instrument and an indicator of participation and assimilation, serving as a means of helping individuals and communities to enjoy their autonomy to the full and to control and manage the processes of democratization and decentralization in which they are involved. Such mobility is not new. Nor is it purely international or transnational: it is also intranational. In the multilingual countries of Africa most societies are perfectly at ease with a number of different languages. They institute and accommodate collective and individual forms of behaviour that give expression to their need to communicate, usually according to a long-standing functional distribution of the languages in contact. Such multilingualism in society is a basic factor in the management, maintenance and promotion of the ‘culture of peace’. While not preventing social conflicts, it helps in reconciling differences between people and even in making a virtue of them. There is no conflict in the history of Africa with a linguistic origin. There have even been conquerors (the Fulbe) who have taken over the language of their enemies (the Hausa, in Nigeria), The language policies introduced since independence have generally favoured the colonial languages by setting up language structures that give special status to the languages of the former colonial powers. Not only have the largely monolingual countries (Botswana, Burundi, Lesotho, Madagascar, Rwanda and Swaziland) followed this policy, but even such countries as Ethiopia, Namibia and the Republic of South Africa, which have not inherited any of the major colonial languages, have resorted to such languages for their international relations and also in an attempt to cement their national unity. It is, therefore, the overall effect of this policy that needs to be re-examined. The first step will be to draw up a general inventory of the languages on the continent, using this as a basis for an overall typology, which will be evaluated in the light of the policies declared or practised during the last three decades, with particular emphasis on the period from 1985 up to the present. In the linguistic field, as in all other areas, Africa is characterized by its diversity, and this makes it difficult to present an overall picture. Instead, it seems better to draw up a series of charts so as to give a truer picture of the variety of situations and cases.

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-2The practices that have resulted from these policies, the difficulties inherent in such policies and also the lack of prospects for the local African languages will reexamined. In line with this approach, the basic policy documents in different countries will be identified and analysed and their implementation studied. As well as acting as a forum for an exchange of experiences, the conference will draw up a profile of each country. Without attempting any comparisons, it will show each country its own situation and also that of other countries. The following approach is accordingly suggested: The conference will provide a forum for exchanging views and information on the basis of a presentation of data derived from actual experience in the countries and illustrative of their policies: constitutional documents, legislative texts, samples of textbooks and other teaching material, texts and documents produced as part of a language planning programme, programmes and organizational structure of institutions responsible for the implementation of language policies, videos, films, etc. All this material will be put on display and will be presented by each country. Stands and an interactive area will be set up where decision-makers, specialists and practitioners will be able to meet one another. Targeted question and answer sessions and mini-debates will be organized. While encouraging efforts to present languages in their written form, the potential and scope for creativity afforded by multimedia and other modern technologies, which may speed up or slow down this process, will also be given due attention, as will sound-recording libraries and other means of recording oral culture. This forum and the specifically targeted or general exchanges to which it gives rise will form part of the programme of the conference. It will draw up a typology of the ways in which the local languages are used in different contexts and in different fields, such as the administration, the justice system, political affairs, the media and education. It will make a critical evaluation of language policies and practices. This analysis will lay particular emphasis on education, highlighting the use of languages as tools or as subject-matter and their place in the various types and levels of education. It will analyse the impact of policies on actual practice, on the evolution of African languages and the increasing introduction of technical terms, but above all on the general process of standardization. It will carry out an in-depth study of even partial measures taken towards implementing alternative policies based on the promotion of local languages and to report on the experiences of several multilingual countries from other continents. It will conduct a wide-ranging debate on the question of African languages within the development process. It will identify overall objectives for the Africa region and strategies for attaining them, targeting countries either individually or grouped together according to their specific characteristics, their past experience, etc. It is with the intention of helping participants to focus the debates on the theme of the conference, taking account of the particular situation in each country, of the successes or failures that have occurred, of emerging needs and of intra- and translational co-operation,

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-3that the Secretariat has specially prepared and circulated the basic documents, together with some reference documents. 1.

Language contexts and situations in Africa

According to the definition of languages and dialects there are between 1,250 and 2,100 languages in Africa, concentrated in an area between Senegal in the West and Ethiopia in the East around what is now called the ‘Fragmentation Belt’. It is a trivial statement to say monolingual countries are more the exception than the rule if we are to adhere to strict criteria. Even in an apparently monolingual setting, the geographical distance (dialects), the social distance (sociolects), the historical distance and other codes and registers will make the situation more complex. Homogeneity is a fiction in the linguistic field more than in any other. Taking an arbitrary threshold of 90 per cent as the defining landmark of a monolingual country, only a handful of countries meet this criterion in Africa. The ones generally cited are Botswana (language: Setswana), Burundi (Kirundi), Lesotho (Sesotho), Madagascar (Malagasy), Mauritius (Creole), Rwanda (Kinyarwanda), Seychelles (Creole), Somalia (Somali), Swaziland (Seswati). The degree of multi lingualism varies greatly. About 105 million people speak around 410 languages in Nigeria, 30 million people in Zaire use 206 languages and Ethiopia has 97 languages for a population of about 45 million. Diversity is not the characteristic of giants alone. In Cameroon 185 languages are used by 8 million people, giving an average of 50,000 persons per language, 3 million inhabitants of Benin are spread over 58 languages while 2 million Congolese have at their disposal 31 languages, On the other hand, Mauritania has four languages, Niger ten. To be significant for policy formulation, these figures need to be scrutinized further, and they yield interesting and useful information. With a population of about 28 million Tanzania has 120 languages, among them Kiswahili which as a lingua franca is used by the vast majority of the population. Mali has 12 languages and 90 per cent of the population use four of them and 60 to 65 per cent use only one language, Bamanan, as first (L1 ) or second (L2) language. Twenty years ago this percentage was around 40 per cent; the increase is due more to the growing number of users of Bamanan as L2 rather than the demographic increase of the ethnic Bamanan. Burkina Faso has about 60 languages for a population of 9 million, half of which is morephone (speaker of More language). The numbers also conceal facts which need to be brought to light for a better understanding of the context and the challenge of multilingualism as a problem. In Nigeria 397 languages out of 410 are ‘minority’ languages, but the total number of their speakers account for 60 per cent of the population. Among them are several languages with more than 1 million speakers, with a few of them having a number of speakers close to 10 million. Similar phenomena are observed elsewhere and compel a departure from ‘numerical muscle’ as a decisive criterion in language planning. For the more multilingual countries, the adoption of language promotion schemes based on such criteria will inevitably exclude many of them. Even in world terms, a mother tongue or another language with some 200,000 or so speakers is by no means a small language, given the fact that the overall population of the country of its usage may be much greater. Where, as in much of Africa, speakers of a certain language are not dispersed but tend to be restricted to well-defined geographical areas, even languages of some 50,000 speakers become significant for the purposes of development and

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-4use in national life. By the time one gets down to this level of languages with 50,000 speakers, one has taken into account well over 90 per cent of the population of almost any African country. The naturally constituted and functioning multilingualism is not taken into account although it has been empirically researched. In a survey related to the case of Nigeria, the number of languages spoken by each of the subjects of the speech communities studied ranged from two to five as follows: 60 per cent of the subjects spoke two languages; 30 per cent three; and 10 per cent over four languages. A similar observation could be made regarding many if not all the African countries, where there is a widespread tradition of handling multilingualism. Often there is a complementary distribution of this multilingualism across languages by sectors of activities. This multilingualism is not only functional or commercial, it cuts across the whole social fabric. It forms a socio-political and socio-linguistic characteristic of most speech communities. In a multilingual situation, not only are different languages used in defined domains, but selected variations of each language may be used for specific purposes. One variation of a language may be used functionally whereas another variation of the same language or another language may be used as a marker of institutional identity. In such cases the functional language often rules whereas the institutional language governs. The language question touches on several other problems and is, ultimately, a development question. However, the failure to fully understand this role has led to it being superseded by immediate needs, which have turned out to be short-lived. Emphasis has all too often been placed on just some aspects, and even these have sometimes conflicted with one another. In addition to the opposition between culture and education there are several other areas of conflict within each of these categories. The most typical is the continuous debate and dissension between linguists and educationists. Apart from these conflicts between different disciplines there are also academic disputes of an epistemological nature, which lead linguists or teachers and other specialists in the educational sciences to disagree among themselves, and also disputes between partisans of national solutions and those advocating subregional or even regional solutions. 2.

Language policies and practices in Africa A language policy must as a matter of course: give each of the languages at hand a precise status and functions, specifying the use of the language both in the exercise of State functions and in relations between the State and its citizens; lay down a strategy on the basis of the linguistic landscape of the country and region. Such a strategy should define, firstly, the mechanisms to be established and the methods to be employed in order to attain the objectives set and, secondly, the material and human resources required.

It is now generally accepted that these two aspects form the basis for devising any language policy. In other words, in addition to the decisions themselves, it should as a matter of course include provisions for their implementation and ways of managing the new situations thus deliberately created. The status of a language can be judged from its use in all fields of everyday life, but also from the extent to which it is used by those for whom it is not the first means of communication. In any event, communication and use are crucial to the very

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-5existence of any language and thus constitute its raison d’être. It is therefore legitimate for linguistic communities to assert this aspiration and call for its realization. At independence, African leaders came face to face with the problems of nationbuilding in these multilingual situations. These raised the question of the promotion of African cultural and linguistic institutions, and the issue of the legitimacy of the nation-State. What languages were to be promoted as national and official languages? What languages were to be used in the education system as media of instruction and as subjects? In their examination of this question it is also suggested that participants should consider the problems relating not only to national policies and their regional and local implications, but also the implementation of these policies and their effect on actual practice. We need to know what political and institutional measures have been adopted and what their impact has been in terms of territorial coverage, socio-cultural change and educational reform. First of all, we need to review the overall position by drawing up a typology of cases on the basis of an analysis of the current situations in the different countries. A historical survey is required, indicating the most recent changes that have occurred and the circumstances that produced them. The dynamics operating in this field have produced changes in the sphere of communication and given rise to new relationships between languages, which in turn has had consequences not only at the local/national levels, but also at the subregional level. The political and territorial changes that have taken place in Ethiopia have had a considerable impact on the relationships between languages and led to the collapse of the former empire and to a new equality between the local languages, It has even given rise to a new role for English, which has been called in here as an impartial means of arbitrating between, or rather suppressing, latent conflicts which are regarded as having an ethno-linguistic origin. Likewise, by adopting English, Namibia and South Africa have immediately been faced with a new question of sovereignty, since they have had to legislate so as to regulate the new relations between the different languages and correct imbalances or even injustices and forms of discrimination enshrined in the law and embodied in the languages. In some countries, for example, 30 years of independence and coexistence among languages have created a new dynamic and new linguo-ethnic relations. Linguistic identification with a particular ethno-tribal group has weakened, while there has been a corresponding increase in the use of vehicular community languages. At the same time there has been a reverse trend towards a more assertive claim for identity which is even to be found within the same linguistic group. Elsewhere, the demographic-linguistic structure is the decisive factor in language policies. The demographic impact of language is reflected in Nigeria in the use of three major languages (Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo), whereas in Burkina Faso a single (More) is spoken by approximately 65 to 70 per cent of the inhabitants, of whom 50 per cent belong to this same ethnic group. Discussions on policies and actual practice should focus on the most recent changes which have occurred in different countries, drawing attention to significant developments and to typical cases in the major linguistic areas. Emphasis should be placed here on the evolution of the major vehicular languages and the relations between them. Attention should also be given to all the other languages, especially those regarded as ‘minority’ languages. This in turn gives rise to various questions. Does such a label affect the existence or even the survival of such languages? Are some languages dying out? There is no denying the loss that that represents for the human, cognitive and epistemological heritage of the world. Is there any

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-6way of building up an ‘immune system’ for preserving and reinvigorating such languages? If so, what are its basic features and main aspects? How do countries actually deal with a number of different languages? How are contacts between languages officially regulated? The political measures taken by States will be examined in the light of the justifications put forward, the underlying principles and the objectives pursued. What are they ultimately seeking to achieve? All action taken to bring about changes in the status of languages and regulate their use in various areas of activity, including politics, administration, the media/communication and education, will be reported. As education is the main context in which the status of a language is consolidated and the advantages gained are clearly perceptible, it will receive special attention. It acts as a barometer for assessing the status acquired by a language and also provides the ideal setting for promoting a language and adapting it for use in technical fields. Measures taken to help languages to achieve a status commensurate with the new areas of application and enabling them to perform these new functions will be studied and analysed in the light not only of national decisions and resolutions, but also of decisions emanating from other bodies. In particular, we shall review the decisions and resolutions adopted by UNESCO and indicate the major milestones in their implementation by African Member States. In examining language planning programmes, the policies, practices and structures established will be discussed as they affect not only the individual languages in the various countries concerned, but also the separate language groups. Measures of subregional and, especially, continental scope will receive particular attention in this survey. The ‘technicalization’ of languages and other general language development measures will be considered in particular from the point of view of their role in setting standards and general rules for languages. The difficulties encountered and the problems inherent in the process of standardization will be discussed, as will the obstacles of various kinds confronting language policies. The experts should also analyse and make their views known on the tendency to base policies on research findings. A prevailing trend in language planning in Africa is recourse to experimentation to prove and substantiate the usefulness of local languages in education. Most governments are demanding research-supported proof to engage in a policy which they feel can be damaging to national cohesion and the learners’ own emancipation. The researchers (the linguists, educationists and sociologists of development mainly) are confronted with the challenge of refuting scientifically the arguments against mother tongue education in multilingual settings. 3.

Languages in political, economic and administrative affairs

3.1 Survey of the situation in individual countries Governmental experts invited to the conference will be able to give an outline of the linguistic situation in their respective countries. However, on the basis of the information already available we can draw up a typology of situations and policies.

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-7Typology of language situations (1) Nations having one African language spoken by the vast majority of the population: (a) as a mother tongue: Somalia (Somali), Lesotho (Sesotho), Rwanda (Kenyarwanda), Swaziland (Seswati), Burundi (Kirundi), Botswana (Setswana); (b) as a lingua franca: Kenya, Tanzania (Kiswahili), Central African Republic (Sango), Mali (Bambara), Senegal (Wolof), Sudan (Arabic -54 per cent native speakers), Ethiopia (Amharic). Nations in group (a) would seem to have a very favorable situation for developing an African national official language. (2) Nations having a predominant African language: Ghana (Akan-Twi), Burkina Faso (Mosi/More), Niger (Hausa), Zimbabwe (Shona), Togo (Ewe), Benin (Ge), Malawi (Chichewa/Cinyanja). (3) Nations having several dominant African languages in competition: Nigeria (Hausa, Yoruba, Igbo - Nigeria has a number of nationally recognized state languages), Sierra Leone (Temme, Mende), Zaire (Kikongo, Lingala, Chiluba, Kiswahili/Kingwana). Nations in groups (2) and (3) have a good situation for developing one or more indigenous languages as national/official, but there is the problem of rivalry between linguistic groups. (4) Nations having no predominant African language: Cameroon (though Bulu and Ewondo are dominant in the South and Fulani in the North), Côte d’Ivoire and Mozambique. Typology of language policies (1) Countries which consciously promote one language: (a) exoglossic: Francophone countries (excluding Zaire); Mozambique, Angola, Guinea-Bissau (Portuguese), Liberia (English); (b) endoglossic: Tanzania (Kiswahili), Ethiopia (Amharic), Somalia (Somali), Central African Republic (Sango). Generally, in these countries, the metropolitan languages are promoted to the same status as the African languages selected. (2) (a) Countries having an exoglossic language, but with developing endoglossic tendencies. Kenya (here the endoglossic movement is gaining momentum and the country may become endoglossic with Kiswahili), Uganda, Malawi, Burundi, Rwanda, Lesotho, Botswana, Swaziland, Central African Republic. All these countries except Uganda have one African language being promoted at national level; (b) exoglossic with more than one African language promoted: Nigeria, Guinea, Ghana, Zaire. (3) Countries with an exoglossic language policy, but using indigenous languages in some areas (e.g. first years of primary education, limited local language press, use in courts, etc.): Zambia, Zimbabwe and Sierra Leone. Language categorization for purposes of development The basic approach to the language problem has been that of functionality - which languages are the most useful for promoting overall development and how can they be most effectively used? For Africa, five categories of languages have been identified as follows: mother tongue languages; community languages, defined as the dominant languages over a wide area of a country;

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-8a national language or national languages, which may be either a lingua franca or one or more languages decreed for nationwide usage throughout a country. In eastern and southern Africa, the concept is mostly that of only one national language per country, but in western and much of central Africa the concept is that of two or more national languages in any single state; a language of African intercommunication, such languages as Kiswahili in eastern/southern Africa, or Pulsar and Mandinka over much of the central equatorial belt from west to east; international languages, particularly English, French and Portuguese. 3.2 Problems encountered in and created by the current language policies What are the points to be noted about all these categorizations? Beyond these attempts why is there such a gap, a hiatus between theory and practice? The theory on mother tongues and national languages is often clouded. Apparently simple terms such as mother tongue (MT), national language (NL), official language (OL) are subjected to such a broad and conflicting range of interpretation that it creates confusion and raises contradictions. There are also missing links and mixed categories. Among the first type are languages of wider communication (LWC), as well as languages for interregional communication. In spite of much publicity by the OAU and to some extent by UNESCO and the Member States themselves over the years, these categories are not met, not because African countries do not believe in the usefulness or importance of such languages but because no one has yet found a way of fitting them into the school curriculum or using them for any kind of meaningful literacy. The categories of mother tongue and community languages have been very often combined for practical purposes. The guiding principles here and the justifications for such a policy step are those of cost reduction and effectiveness. Language development is expensive and therefore it is widely thought that catering for all the languages and especially those with only a few thousand speakers is impracticable in a multilingual situation; according to the same line of argument, even people in rural communities above the subsistence farming level, which are monolingual, are said to need the community language (CL) more than the mother tongue if only for running their daily business. The adoption of the community language facilitates class teaching, especially in mixed urban or semi-urban areas where there may be a wide variety of mother tongue languages represented in any single classroom. But the term ‘language of the immediate community’ is left undefined in most policy documents. Searching for it and finding it in reality is a continuous challenge. How do we determine the dominant language of a village, town, city or state or the dominant language within the neighbourhood in which a school is located? Another major issue trivialized by these categorizations is the dilution of dialects and minority ethno-linguistic groups into a homogeneous language and speech community. Such groupings are also clouding such issues as identity formation, ethnicity and factors generating them. In operational terms these difficulties are mirrored in the problems raised by the standardization processes as reflected in the application of linguistic research, in finding a common alphabet system for various languages within the same country and, sometimes, finding common alphabets and forms for even the same languages in cross-border situations.

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-9The first two problems are comparatively easy to solve; the third is more difficult, because where cross-border languages exist there may be one or more historico-colonial, linguistic and other traditions and patterns of dealing with them. But another, more difficult fact is that cross-border languages as vehicles of communication tend to vary widely in importance and political significance among the countries using them, so that there is never the same degree of enthusiasm for their cross-border standardization. This has been a major impediment over the years to the efforts spearheaded by UNESCO towards the common development of crossborder languages and language materials for use in education. The case of the Ewe language in Ghana, Benin and Togo is a case in point, where the orthographical and similar problems were solved at meetings of experts but the mechanism for the common use of the language could not be set up because of different attitudes to the language in each of the three countries concerned. There are also more promising attempts to solve the war of orthographies peacefully through regional co-operative projects such as the Mandingo-Fulfulde Promotion project (MAPE) in which these broad regional languages were analysed and standardized and technicalized across borders and across colonial languages of the countries concerned. Similar efforts were undertaken in Central Africa to conceive and produce a Socio-Linguistic Atlas. Not only the functionality but other criteria often used are problematic. Function-statususage are put in various combinations to arrive at topologies of language utilization which are then proposed as possible policy options. The practicality of such topologies is questioned if not strongly refuted. Furthermore, the problems raised by such criteria for policy formation are evident. It is assumed that the value, the prestige and esteem acquired by a given language are proportional to their utility in various domains. In fact, it is a conjunction of a series of socioeconomic and linguo-ecological factors that determine language functions. It is also known that in a multilingual situation, in a context of languages in contact and/or in conflict, any change in the function of one language will have consequences for the individual languages and for their interrelation. 4.

National and local languages in education

As has already been pointed out on several occasions, if we were to go by strict criteria of definition, there would be virtually no purely monolingual countries, given the internal linguistic and cultural diversity of most countries of the world. In multilingual countries several different situations are to be found, depending on the historical background, the socioeconomic circumstances, the system of values, the ethnic make-up of the population, etc. Consequently, it is on the basis of the actual languages in use, the relations between them, the functions that they perform, the additional tasks expected of them and the educational policy of the society concerned that language plans are defined and implemented. Models for integrating mother-tongue languages into educational systems are influenced by political, economic, cultural and other factors and by the status and use of the various languages in the multilingual communities. For the purposes of formal education, the categories are applied as follows: mother tongue/community languages, for at least the first two, three or four years of basic education, as the medium of instruction; the adopted international language of the country, as the medium of instruction in upper primary or secondary level education; a national language, as a subject at upper primary and/or secondary level;

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-10a second international language as a subject, at secondary level; if there is more than one national language decreed for a country, then a second national language as a compulsory subject either at secondary or university level. For purposes of literacy and out-of-school education, the categories have been the following: the community language or the mother language, whichever is more effective for functional literacy purposes in a defined area of a country and not necessarily a wide zone; the adopted international language, for those who need it for business and similar purposes, the extent of teaching depending on the level of need. The integration of national languages into education and the choice of those languages are clearly political issues. The arguments ‘against’ These arguments, even if they may be formulated in very many different ways, come down to the following points: 1. The use of several mother-tongue languages in education is an obstacle to national unity. In other words, national unity requires official monolingualism and the use of several MTs accentuates interethnic conflicts. If such conflicts are to be prevented or suppressed, one single transethnic and atribal language needs to be used. The widespread and dominant use of the MT brings with it risks of isolation. This 2. may be an obstacle to the promotion of international languages, lead to an inadequate mastery of such languages and result in linguistic wastage, since all the time spent learning the MTs is at the cost of the languages of ‘wider communication’. Crossing over to bilingualism is even sometimes seen as a slowing-down factor and a stumbling-block to progress. 3. The psycho-linguistic benefits adduced in favour of learning in the mother tongue should be seen as a reflection of the lobbying tactics of multicultural minorities rather than as empirically verified facts. They may be challenged not only in social but also in cognitive terms. 4. It is a waste of time and resources to try to develop and ‘modernize’ African languages. The local languages are not equipped to act as a medium of instruction, even at the elementary level, let alone the tertiary level. Accordingly, they should not hinder a process of transference and transition towards the international languages. 5. An irreversible process of literacy in these MTs is also illusory in economic terms. The following arguments have been put forward: (a) increasing the number of languages used in teaching means an almost exponential increase in costs: (b) there is a chronic shortage of books and teaching materials, compounded by the problems arising from the production of new material, translation, publication and dissemination in these languages;

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-11(c) there is a critical shortage of teachers with a full mastery of the MTs; (d) the organization of fair and comparable examinations is difficult if many different languages are in use. The pragmatic and relentlessly practical attitude of parents and communities in 6. favour of languages that bring economic benefits leads them to shun ‘inferior’ MTs. People may, therefore, not favour the use of their own mother tongues and so it should not be assumed that such education ought to be compulsory. The arguments in favour of the national languages are based on the various benefits resulting from their use. In several respects the MT is the most appropriate means for effective teaching/learning. The child’s own language, which he or she knows well and can use to form sentences and express meanings, will be the most suitable for his or her education. Any attempt to express other people’s experiences which fails to take account of one’s own experience will lead to a complete lack of understanding. The MT has many merits. Being the language of private life and the prime means of communication of a community, it combines ease and effectiveness. The many virtues of the mother tongue are summarized as follows in a historic UNESCO document written in 1951: ‘Psychologically, [the mother tongue] is the system of meaningful signs that in [the child’s] mind works automatically for expression and understanding. Sociologically, it is a means of identification among the members of the community to which he belongs. Educationally, he learns more quickly through it than through an unfamiliar linguistic medium’. Monolingual identity extends from the idiolect to the language, while multilingual identity goes from the language of private life, via the language of the immediate community, to the languages of regional, national and international identification. The contexts in which the multilingual child moves are clearly different from those of the monolingual child. However, even in a multilingual society, in emulation of developed societies where monolingual models prevail, dominant artificial monolingual structures are created through the educational systems, thus leading to social disintegration. The spoken word is the representation of thought in action, while the written word is the representation of the spoken word. The fact that the spoken word precedes the written word and that informal learning comes before the formal acquisition of reading and writing skills prepares the ground for the teaching and learning of the second language. According to the theory of developmental interdependence, the proficiency acquired by the child in L2 depends on the level of performance achieved in L 1. The resulting theory of the transfer of linguistic skills from one language to another and the theory of the superimposition of linguistic forms confirm the hypothesis that the learning of the MT always facilitates the learning of a second language. In fact, there are several empirical studies on this topic which bear out the psycholinguistic and pedagogical importance of grounding and consolidating the learner’s skills in a known language before going on to the double task of learning and eventually becoming literate in a second language. There is ample justification for the political decision to introduce national languages into both formal and non-formal education, against which the technical arguments put forward

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-12do not hold up. Language-teaching experts and other educators are constantly being asked to provide scientific proof of both the viability and effectiveness of national languages. The debate has been going on for 30 years and experiments of all kinds have been carried out in different places, with varying degrees of success, but it is debatable whether they are really a necessary and indispensable prerequisite for a decision that ought to be an act of sovereignty. It is often maintained that language planning represents an attempt to control the future. Empirical research, however important and necessary it may be, should not be regarded as an essential prerequisite for any choice that has to be made. Looking at this overemphasis on scientific evidence and, particularly, the role of political filter that is sometimes assigned to it, we can see that studies, research work and experiments are sometimes used merely as tactical means of slowing down the promotion of languages and the extension of their use. Let us discuss some of the arguments against national languages: It is fundamentally wrong to believe that linguistic unity can by itself create or 1. promote national unity and become the symbol of such unity. It is clear, of course, that the mutual understanding arising from a common language may encourage national unity. This observation has given rise to the idea widely accepted among some ‘decision-makers’ that the promotion of several different languages will hinder national unity. Fears of accentuating divisions within the nation and of being left out of the great global exchange and flow of knowledge and information are specifically mentioned as reasons for choosing a single or very small number of national languages or a foreign language as the official language. The much emphasized connection between national unity and monolingualism is a reflection of the idea that monolingualism is one of the characteristics of a nation. In actual fact, what exacerbates divergences is not linguistic plurality but conflicts of interest expressed in conflicting messages. Relations of interdependence rather than of domination make a considerable contribution to national integration. The coexistence of several MTs is likely not only to promote more widely spoken languages and thus bring individuals closer together, but also to lead to greater understanding between different cultures, Several research studies have led to the conclusion that under certain conditions 2. bilingual persons enjoy some cognitive advantage. The supposed fragmentation affecting persons who are bi- or multilingual is theoretical rather than real. Integration is not necessarily achieved through substitution, but may be based on existing roots. The resulting process is thus federative and not assimilationist. The vision of a standard language is a fiction or a mental image, since any language is heteroglossic insofar as it is characterized by a complex stratification into genres, registers, styles, sociolects and dialects and by an interaction between these different categories. Since languages reflect social, professional and cultural differences, it is a fallacy to attempt to achieve equality through languages. It is consequently Utopian to believe that anything can be done to a language to avoid or solve language-related social and political problems. What needs to be done is to solve the problems that give rise to this situation. Not all forms of a language have the same prestige. In a dominant language class differences enjoy different degrees of prestige. Likewise, the extension of the areas of use of a minority language may bring it increased prestige, but this does not necessarily mean that this degree of prestige will be accessible to all speakers of this minority language. Numerous research studies have confirmed the intrinsic advantages of various 3. kinds afforded by MTs, not to mention the legitimate claims of ethnolinguistic groups for the preservation of their cultural identity. It is undeniable that a common language makes for a

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-13smoother transition from home to school, between the language of the family, of the heart and of the home and the language of the school, all of which are areas of learning that occupy a preponderant place in the continuum of lifelong education. The fact is that nowadays very many children throughout the world begin their education in a second language. It is also clear that at school all children acquire a linguistic code different from the one they use at home and that their familiarity with this code reflects the social distance of the pupil/learner from the means of instruction. However, contrary to a widely held belief this divergence is not only quantitative, but above all qualitative. Thus, the difference between one language and another, between one dialect and another or between one register and another should not be seen in purely quantitative terms. Even the latter is not merely quantitative, since the distance between the higher and lower variants of a particular language may be as great as the distance between two distinct languages. In many cases, it is more and more necessary to teach the standard form of language almost as if it were a foreign language. 4. No language is intrinsically developed. It is in and through usage that development occurs and that a language extends its technical scope. It is generally believed that the value,

prestige and importance attached to a language are proportional to its perceived usefulness in various areas of activity. The preponderant factor in choosing a language to be used in the most important areas of communication is therefore function. However, it is the combined effect of a variety of socio-economic factors and of its ‘linguistic ecology’ that conditions and shapes the functions performed by a language in multilingual contexts. Consequently, the link of causality between function and status and, in turn, between them and the use of a language is tautological, since a language that performs several functions inevitably acquires prestige and, once possessed of growing prestige, it gains access to new functions. Likewise, everyday use affects its status and the prestige attached to it and, in turn, the acquisition of prestige enlarges its area of application. To choose a language on grounds of its prestige and status and then to make its use contingent a priori on qualities that it can only attain through usage is an obvious contradiction. Wider use has been the key to the modernization of Hebrew, Bahasa Indonesia, Somali and Kiswahili. The advanced training of new literates in Mali and the Mandingo-Fulfulde Promotion Project (MAPE) have revealed the potentialities of local languages where they have access to scientific communication. These cases also show that creativity has no limits and that technicalization and terminological development are possible. However, progress towards the development of an original indigenous identity and an educational ideology consistent with and adaptable to multilingual contexts will be held up as long as the indigenous languages are confined to limited roles and occupy a minimal place in education. The development of such languages and their transformation into national languages will continue to be affected by their limited access and their restricted role and function in the educational field. The economic arguments are based on the same line of reasoning as the others as 5. far as their implications for the MTs are concerned. Fragmentation, diversity and proliferation of levels of intervention are all factors which are regarded as causing additional difficulties, pressures and costs. It has even been suggested that a high level of political and economic development requires a limited number of languages in a community and is incompatible with a high degree of linguistic fragmentation, although it has now been shown that there is no correlation between linguistic heterogeneity and local economic status and vice versa. However, even in the most radical analysis by economists there is growing recognition of the fact that economic and technological efficiency cannot be dissociated from the cultural

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-14context. Thus, technological development makes printing technology increasingly accessible and affordable by a greater number of linguistic communities. Whether it is easier and cheaper to produce a large number of textbooks in a single language or the same number in several smaller batches is irrelevant compared with the considerable non-economic gains derived from this greater diversity. The economic and, above all, social, cultural, psychological and personal costs caused by educational wastage are considerable and require attention. Such wastage also occurs in MT teaching, but compared to teaching in foreign languages it is relatively low. The shortage of staff and material is not an insoluble problem and can be remedied. It is the result of long-standing discrimination, which can be eliminated. The negative attitude towards MTs, which at the same time favours the 6. international languages, is based on obvious, superficial rationalizations in an attempt to justify imbalances born of injustices rooted in history and circumstances. 5.

African languages in the cultural sector

As a vehicle of culture, the African languages have always attracted the attention not only of researchers, but also of governments and the mass media. Special emphasis has been placed on oral traditions, including historical, theatrical, and musical traditions. Bilingual editions (African languages - European languages) have been extremely successful. However, modern African culture in African languages had very tentative beginnings and only really began to take off in the 1980s. The greatest success was achieved in music: Zairian music (during the Congolese period) of the 1960s was mainly in Lingala. The great majority of the leading performers of African music prefer to sing in African languages. The theatre, especially in the form of plays that seek to provide civic education, has also developed throughout the continent. Film directors are boldly exploring African cultures and tackling the complex problems facing African people today. Whereas in the past, films seemed to have been produced mainly for a non-African audience or the African élite and were consequently made in the widely spoken international languages, African filmmakers have now clearly turned their attention towards the general public in Africa whom they address in their own language. The creation of literary works (novels, poetry, children’s literature, etc.) has a long tradition in some countries. Literary competitions are held regularly. Associations of writers in African languages have been established. There are well-known writers who have committed themselves to promoting literature in their own languages. Such is the case of Ngugi Wa Thingo who, in his essay entitled ‘Decolonizing the mind’ published in 1987, declared that his works would no longer be written in English but in Kikuyu and Kiswahili instead. However, other writers choose to be published in the so-called international languages because, despite the considerable progress achieved, high-quality literature in African languages is still relatively undeveloped in the African States as a whole. Since an environment favorable to the use of the written language is a major factor in any language policy, it is important to strengthen literary production in the African languages, so as to enable African peoples to draw on their own heritage expressed in their own languages as well as gaining access to the cultural works of other peoples. 6.

African languages and the mass media

In all countries, the communication sector has, from the very beginning, been a sphere in which African languages are well represented. The written press, radio and, more recently,

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-15television have rightly given a major role to the local, regional, national or inter-State languages. The written press Since the 1960s the rural press has increasing y assumed a role of major importance. It has usually been associated with a literacy campaign, which has consequently determined its style, content, level, format, circulation and, naturally, the language used. The objectives of the rural press may be summarized as follows: (1)

to supplement the literacy campaign by providing lifelong education for the rural population;

(2)

to provide information for the rural population on local, regional and national affairs and sometimes on important events that have occurred in neighboring countries. International events are seldom covered;

(3)

to provide farmers with information on agricultural methods and health and, in general terms, on the problems of development in their particular environment. AIDS, democracy, decentralization, agricultural methods and farming technology are examples of topics that have received considerable coverage in the rural press in all African countries;

(4)

to facilitate contacts between the authorities and the rural world.

As far as equipment is concerned, the rural press, which started out with typewriters and photocopying machines, has now moved on from traditional printing technology to computerassisted publication. In Africa there are a good many institutions for training journalists and yet the fact is that the vast majority of rural newspapers were launched and are run by people who have no training in journalism. This shortcoming is now gradually being remedied as the rural press takes root in Africa. The overall picture of the rural press and of the press in African languages is impressive (a chart displaying for each country the name of the newspaper, the language used, its circulation and launch date will be shown at the beginning of the conference). Rural newspapers initially experienced financial and management problems, with the result that many of them did not survive. However, in more recent years, great progress has been made in this field as well. The trend towards decentralization, with a considerable measure of autonomy now given to local communities in each country, is opening up great opportunities for the local languages. Radio Although the term ‘rural press’ generally means the written press, radio has pursued very much the same goals vis-à-vis the rural world. It has had a particularly strong impact in areas where illiteracy is still prevalent. From the beginning the two systems have largely complemented one another. Thus, the rural press and, in recent years, the local radio stations, which have rapidly increased in number, have used African languages to disseminate news and information to the rural world.

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-16Local radio stations generally have the advantage of broadcasting in a single language or, as the case may be, a small number of languages, while national radio organizations have to contend with the problem of sharing broadcasting time between a number of competing languages: local languages, national languages, inter-African languages and international languages. It is worth pointing out here that some radio stations from other continents broadcast programmes in widely spoken African languages. Thus, as an example, Kiswahili is used by the BBC, Voice of America, All India Radio, Radio Moscow, Deutsche Welle, etc. Television Television has gradually conquered Africa and here, too, African languages have an important role to play. No study has so far been carried out covering the whole of the continent, but the papers presented by the governmental experts will probably afford further insights into the matter. The question which arises here and which the conference will need to consider is how the mass media in African languages and the new media technologies, which have developed spectacularly in recent years, will be able to meet the needs of African peoples in such diverse areas as education, justice, democracy and participation in all spheres of national public life.