Bilingual education in Sri Lanka - Part III
G H Asoka
The importance of English cannot be limited to
University education alone. At the same time, ‘English-only education’
or ‘English medium education’ from the primary level upto University
level does not facilitate the Sri Lankan learner with required
competencies in its optimum or maximum
‘English medium education is one cause of education failure. Children
do not learn English simply by being taught through English. A hasty
shift to English medium without appropriate teaching of the language
causes educational failure. Sustained education in, and development of,
the mother tongue (or L1) remains important’. (Graddol David, 2010,
p.14-15, English Next India by the British Council).
Graddol’s views, in Indrajit Basu’s (2006) words, read the possible
difficulties and disadvantages for native-speakers of English in future
due to their linguistic capacities only in English.
‘Here is an alert for all monolingual speakers of native English. If
you thought your ability to speak English would continue to give you a
leg-up in the world, where this language has been the primary language
for international communication for several decades, you are in trouble.
Primary education
‘Even as the English language continues its meteoric global rise,
native speakers such as North Americans, British and Australians will
soon become a rare breed because native speakers also face a bleak
economic future as qualified multilingual speakers from other countries
gain a competitive advantage in global companies and organizations
leaving native speakers not only with increasing difficulty in
employment, but also bewildered by many aspects of society and culture
around them... So the balance of power is changing...’.
Another myth in Dhammika’s article is the emphasis on the need for
using English as the only medium of instruction from primary education
onwards: this indeed violates human rights and child rights. The UNESCO
and the scholars like Dutcher (1994), who produced the report for the
World Bank on the use of first and second languages as media of
instruction in education mentions that the essential feature of a
learner to becomes successful in linguistic and cognitive demands in an
L2 is the strong competence in his/her L1. L1 competence is required
upto a threshold level to gain success in CALPS in an L2 (Cummins,
1994). Thus in bilingual education, L1 possesses high educational value
as an asset and a bridge to achieve cognitive demands in an L2 through
the process called language transfer; thus L1 is a must in anyone’s
education irrespective of its less political strength in the presence of
a language like, English.
Socialization process
Robert Philipson, supporting the possible imbalance created through
‘only-English practice’ in education, says as follows:
‘If learning English combined with a neglect of local languages, the
likely result is cultural rootlessness, blind acceptance of the dominant
world disorder and an uncritical endorsement of more English,
irrespective of the consequences for other languages’.
Importance of one’s L1 is obvious in any educational setting in its
contribution to his/ her socialization process, and its relationship
with learner’s tacit knowledge and tacit experience which are usually
brought by him/ her to any formal education environment. This is mainly
enriched in a learner’s L1 across his or her family, peers, kith and
kin, neighbours and others in his/ her immediate environment. Ignorance
of L1 through English medium education obstructs learners’ thinking
process regarding subject input doubling overcomprehensibility in terms
of language and making the learner deviate from his/ her environment.
This situation further paralyzes constructive, creative and critical
thinking of learners. Sociolinguistically, English-only education
generates linguistic trauma through confusions developed considering
English as the pandemic on one hand and the same as the panacea on the
other hand.
National identity
Linguistic capital of English aiming ‘the English’ as the language
under globalization should be balanced in education with the idea behind
internationalization which ensures ‘World Englishes’, through which any
person can sustain his/ her national identity accordingly to the central
value system of his or her society without becoming ‘blotting sheets of
the west’.
Bilingual education, due to its capability of addressing both local
linguistic capital and global linguistic capital unlike the English
medium education does, marginalization of L1 does not occur in its
developmental model by devalourizing local languages through using
hegamonically projected influence of an L2 like English. Consequently
this leads to minimize gaps between ‘Global Haves’ and ‘Never-to-Haves’.
In July 1906, F L Woodward, the then Principal of Mahinda College,
Galle, being a foreign educationist argued against the education totally
available in English in Sri Lanka: He had, through his far seen
capabilities, told that the need for national integrity through national
languages is further enriched by religion and culture:
Cultural treasure
‘.... If you cannot read the very language in which your nationality
is enshrined or speak the tongue which reflects its understanding life,
at once you become a pariah. You will not be acknowledged as belonging
to your adopted nationality.
You will be out of touch with your own people and then miserably fall
between two stools. You will be deprived of the advantages which may be
derived from one side or the other’. (Education Centenary Volume - ii,
p.575)
Language and culture are intimately related because the former is a
vector or carrier of the latter. Diamond (1993) says that ‘a language is
the culmination of thousands of years of a people’s experience and
wisdom’. One major responsibility of education in its essence is
transmitting culture including language and transforming wealth of its
knowledge including the linguistic wealth from generation to generation.
Dhammika’s article is totally blind in this regard.
According to research, ‘language is the means by which people who
belong to a common cultural community, express their belonging to that
community.
The loss of language (through using an L2 as the medium of
instruction from Grade 1 onwards and teaching all subjects in the
curriculum in an L2) leads to loss of cultural treasure’. (Beban Sammy
Chumbow, 2009)
Hegemonic influence of English in the world through English medium
education from the beginning (‘early start fallacy’ in Robert
Philipson’s words) creates two conflicting circumstances, cultural
assimilation and cultural pluralism, arisen with respect to linguistic
diversity and language maintenance through education.
In this ideological perspective, the former is used to counter
linguistic diversity and multilingualism while the latter complements
linguistic diversity and multilingualism. Nevertheless universal
justification in this regard is proved through research by the need for
pluri-lingualism, multilingualism and multi-culuralism in the place of
the instrumentality of ideological cultural assimilation and linguicide
or linguistic genocide.
The opposite of this is evident when study curricula in which English
medium education is used in Sri Lanka placing Sinhala and Tamil as a
‘link language’.
Thus alienation of the ‘Sri Lankanness’ occurs on the Sri Lankan soil
itself for Sri Lankan children violating their rights and harassing
their education.
Commencing English medium education from Grade 1 onwards would,
therefore, be a suicide of the Sri Lankan identity in Sri Lanka itself.
Foreign languages
When discussing language planning in education, developing positive
attitudes with relevant and correct understanding about the use of
languages in a given society at local and international level and how
education should support this situation with necessary modifications are
important by addressing attitudes of stakeholders that society because
the ‘most formidable obstacle in language planning in education is
negative attitude/s of citizens in a country towards their own local
languages or other languages used as second or foreign languages.
To be continued |