CRITICAL ISSUES OF LANGUAGE POLICY IN MULTILINGUAL EDUCATIONAL CONTEXTS

1
CRITICAL ISSUES OF LANGUAGE POLICY IN
MULTILINGUAL EDUCATIONAL CONTEXTS
CRITICAL ISSUES OF LANGUAGE POLICY IN
MULTILINGUAL EDUCATIONAL CONTEXTS

• ANAS MUSA ISMAIL

ANAS MUSA ISMAIL
2
Sinhala Declaration, 1956

• The Sri Lanka in 1956 passed a law which made
  Sinhala the sole-official language of the
  country, despite the fact that quarter of the
  population were Tamil. This ignite huge public
  unrest where thousands lost their lives

3
Kiev, Ukraine, 2012

• In July 2012 thousands of people took to the
  streets of Kiev to protest a government decree
  that adopted Russian language in some Ukrainian
  institutions.

4
THE STRUCTURE

• Introduction
• The Role of Nation States
• Components of Language policy
• Language Practice
• Language Belief (Ideology) and
• Language Planning
• Typology and Models of Bilingual Education
• The Effectiveness of Bilingual Education
• Standard Languages vs. Standardization
• Epilogue/Conclusion

5
INTRODUCTIONthe indispensability of
bilingualism/multilingualism

• How many languages are there in the world?
• There are estimated 6800 languages in the world
• How many countries?
• Roughly between 193 and 250
• The languages are more than thirty times the
  number of the world countries
• So, bilingualism/multilingualism is present in
  practically every country
• IMPLICATION Multilingual/bilingual educational
  practice is present in every country of the world
• It is simply INDISPENSABLE!

6
THE ROLE OF NATION STATES

• State nations as the most vital units of analysis
• Minority/Majority status is assigned using
  national boundaries
• The case of Mandarin
• 900,000,000 speakers in Chinamajority
• Yet minority in other countries like Malaysia

7
COMPONENTS OF LANGUAGE POLICY

1. Language Practice
2. Language Belief (Ideology) and
3. Language Planning

8
LANGUAGE PRACTICE

• This concerns the attitude the members of a
  community show toward the available varieties of
  a particular language.
• Example Haitians who migrated to Miami may use
  English in varying degrees
• People naturally show little enthusiasm for the
  language of immigrant minorities even when the
  language is a world language.
• Example Spanish (in the US), Arabic (the
  language of many immigrants in France and
  Netherlands).

9
Language Policy includes any conscious effort to
change peoples practice by a means of management
or intervention.
10
LANGUAGE IDEOLOGY AND BELEIF

• The belief of language community about the
  appropriacy or otherwise of certain language
  elements
• Assigning values and prestige to certain aspects
  of it
• These beliefs can be a basis for language policies

11
Language Ideology or belief, therefore, designate
a speech communitys consensus on what value to
apply to each of the language variables or named
language varieties that makes up its repertoire.
12
Language Loyalty

• This refers to efforts by a speech community to
  maintain its own (first or home) language in the
  face of real or perceived threats to its status
  and continued use
• Bowerman (2006)

13
Why Some Languages Feel Threatened by Others?

• Depopulation or mass emigration (of its
  community)
• Mass immigration by other speech community
• Coercion (martial or economic)
• Voluntary language shift (often for economic
  reasons)

14
The Strength of Loyalty

• How conscious the speech community is and
• How conscious the mainstream society is about
  their otherness

15
The Case of Irish Efforts to maintain a
language eroded in its home territory

• Contact conflict with England for 800 years
• English only became the language of opportunity
  In 17th century
• Previous attempts failed
• The dominance of English has since been
  overwhelming (Irish L1 speakers under 3)
• After independence (1921), Irish was made the
  first official language
• Succession of revival campaigns
• Irish may not be the mainstream medium of
  communication in Ireland, butt its official
  status is becoming more overt

16
LANGUAGE PLANNING AND POLICY

• Language Planning (used in 1950s and 1960s)
  refers to sweeping intervention and control of
  language behavior, therefore, determining the
  exactly the language(s) that people will know in
  a given nation.
• Language planning does not leave anything to the
  individual to decide the governing body
  determines not just what the person will know,
  but also how to arrive there.

17
LANGUAGE POLICY

• On the other hand, Language policy attempts to be
  less interventionists
• Refers mostly to principles with regard to
  language use
• Example A number of languages should be learned
  in a given country or that minority languages
  have the right to maintain their languages
• It DOES NOT go into which group or which
  language or HOW this should be implemented

18
TYPES OF BILINGUAL EDUCATION

1. Null form of bilingual education
2. Weak form of bilingual education
3. Strong form of Bilingual education

19
Null Form of Bilingual Education

• Brings together bilingual children with the aim
  of monolingualism in the majority language.
• Submersion
• Technically, this is not form of bilingual
  education

20
Weak forms of bilingual education

• Allow children to use their home language
  temporarily
• Weak forms include
• Structured immersion
• Withdrawal classes
• (various forms of) Sheltered English
• Transitional Bilingual education

21
Strong Forms of Bilingual Education

• Aim for each child to achieve bilingualism,
  bi-literacy and cultural pluralism. Examples
• U.S dual language schools
• Heritage Language programs
• Canadian immersions, and
• European Schools movement

22
BilingualEducationModels

1. Transitional Models
2. Maintenance Model
3. Enrichment Model

23
Transitional Models

• Teach the target language as quick as possible
• The students are exited or mainstreamed into
  regular classes
• The model includes
• Early exit
• Late exit
• ESL pull out
• One year structured immersion

24
Maintenance Models

• Instructions in academic subjects are designed in
  students native language
• But they also learn English (target language)
  during the school day
• Is otherwise called Developmental programs
  (long-term and no limit)

25
Enrichment Models

• Promote cross-cultural understanding among
  bilingual students
• Unique natives of the target language are in the
  class
• Enrichment models have time limit (some times
  part of transitional)

26
The Effectiveness of Bilingual Education

• The strongest research support come from the
  success of Canadian immersion programs since
  1960s
• Complex equation between academic success and
  other factors like
• Devotion and dedication of teachers
• The childrens feeling towards the acceptance of
  their minority lang. and,
• Positive development between bilingual education
  and cognitive development
• It cannot be assumed that bilingual education,
  per se, results in higher attainment across the
  syllabus. There are interacting variables that
  underlie such assumptions.

27
Standard Languages vs. Standardization

• Standard languages pass through the following
  processes
• Selection
• Codification
• Elaboration (of function)
• Acceptance (by the relevant community)

28

• Standards exist to avoid the dangers of
  variability
• Standard could evolve as a result of
• its association with a religious or literary
  writing
• Creation of official body which
  institutionalizes it
• It can emerge overnight

29
Epilog/Conclusion

• Educational institutions as the primary
  mechanisms for promoting ideological power
• Language policy and power are inseparable
• Linguicide as important factor in language
  policy (Russia, Turkey and Syria in regards with
  Kurdish and Kiswahili)

30
Language policy is about choice. It may be the
choice of a specific sound, or expression, or of
a specific variety of a language. It may be a
choice regularly made by an individual, or
socially defined group of individuals, or a body
with authority over a defined group of
individuals. It may be discovered in the
linguistic behavior language practices) of
individual or group. It may also be discovered in
the ideology or beliefs about the language of the
individual or group
31
THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION