Moving out of linguistic boxes

I have made an argument elsewhere that the boundaries between languages have no space any longer in our modern classrooms. Linguistic boxing derives from the idea of nation states from the European Enlightenment period- a period that responded to the 'dark' ages or medieval period which was ruled by anarchy, which was largely caused by foreign invasions (Those of us who are students of English will remember this fact). Italy became the last to be freed from foreign lords. The ideology of one-ness (one language, one nation) was hatched out of this brutal historical past where a foreigner was perceived with scepticism and with a natural reaction for one to protect oneself by creating a boundary between the locals and foreigners. Because language is who we are, it became a yardstick to determine 'foreign-ness' and a tool to rally around for unity against the foreigner. Hence the development of sovereign states. To be fair, nation statism was effective in bringing Europe to light and to evolve into civilization/modernization phase. As linguists, we understand that the idea of development/civilization meant necessarily monolingualism as a norm or catalyst.

When official colonisation was started in 1848, monolingualism was a twin ideological strategy to 'civilize' the new colonies. One of the moves was thus to provide monolingualism in highly multilingual spaces (multilingualism/culturalism was perceived as backwardness). Necessarily, the European languages were used as tools for civilizing the natives. This move became clearer in the Berlin Convention of 1884 where most African countries were formally balkanized to avoid potential conflict between the colonizers. However monolingualism and nation statism did not work for Europe beyond the 20th century. I attribute the first world war and the second world war to extreme forms of nation statism. Indeed after the second world war, the colonies were freed so that the colonizing countries could not potentially fight again over the colonized land. It was also a freedom of movement from the point of view of the colonizing countries.  

What are the effects of decolonisation? Movement is possible and foreigners matter; especially with the US coming into power on the basis of immigration. Learning a foreign/second language became so important that approaches such as audio-lingual method (1950's) and Communicative approach (1970's) were entrenched.

We are now in the post-modern (nation-statism) era; globalization and movement have taken a toll to the extent that knowledge of more than one language is more prestigious than having the highest proficiency in one. Multilingualism is no longer an option, but a 21st century regime that all students and teachers should uphold for survival. Yet, our orthodox classrooms are still trapped in the one-ness ideology of one nation, one language, one classroom, one language under the false pretext that using more than one language creates mental confusion.  My research proves the contrary that using more than one language enhances epistemic access and provides a safe space for identity development. It is fuelled by an ancient African value system of Ubuntu: one language is incomplete without the other. One can download my latest article on ubuntu translanguaging at the following link:

http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/7XgE8VzNys3TdwePvcZG/full



Abstract:

This paper reports on an investigation into the efficacy of a teacher preparation

programme that introduced the teaching of African languages to speakers of other

African languages in order to produce multi-competent and multi-vocal teachers. A

mixed method approach was used to elicit from a pool of 60 (30 experimental;

30 control group) multilingual pre-service teachers the participants’ storied reflections

and their reading and vocabulary achievement scores. The results of the study show

that translanguaging techniques used in the experimental class afforded the

participants affective and social advantages as well as a deep understanding of the

 

content. Similarly, a paired t-test has shown a statistically significant differential

 

 

performance in favour of the experimental group after three months of a

translanguaging intervention programme. Using the translanguaging approach, and

comparing it to an ‘ubuntu’ lens of viewing the world from an amorphous and

continuous cultural space, I argue for development of a multilingual teaching

pedagogy that is premised on this worldview to advance theory and practices of

translanguaging as a teachable strategy. Future research possibilities are highlighted

and pedagogical implications for multilingual classrooms are considered for

adaptations in comparable contexts.