Page 75 - Languages Victoria December 2019

Languages Victoria
Are the African languages sufficiently developed to be used at universities?
Absolutely yes! Some languages can be used immediately, others can be fixed with a little bit of time and money. Experts can “upgrade” any language over a period of — I would say — two years to the extent that it can be used as a language of basic instruction in elementary schools. For secondary and university level teaching it takes longer, but it‘s feasible, no doubt about that.
And by the way, shifting the educational system from monolingual to multilingual strategies will cost less than one might think: only an extra of one to two percent of the national education budget!
You have also used the term "translanguaging". What's that about?
You know, in Africa so many languages are spoken side by side, especially in the cities, where people sometimes speak three, four, five or even six local languages. In recent decades and especially among young people, a language-mixing habit has developed, parallel to originally secret languages among juvenile street gangs. Experts call this mixing “translanguage”. Such hybrid speech forms are copied by kids in schools and students and staff in universities; it is becoming very popular among young mainly urban people all over the continent as expression of their lifestyle. As a result, people in the streets today use all their language resources they’ve got to communicate, it is like speaking several languages at the same time. But there is also a political issue involved: Young people deliberately try to Africanise the European languages – and thereby attempt to decolonise themselves.
You propose a Reformation model for Africa based on Martin Luther.
I do see historical parallels. Luther’s Reformation is considered to mark the transition from the Middle Ages to the Modern Era in Europe, which was accompanied by three “revolutions”.
Firstly, the hegemonic dominance of universally accepted powers was challenged by emerging local powers. In Luther’s time this was the hitherto unquestioned authority of the Pope in Rome; in Africa, postcolonial societies challenge the hegemonic dominance of the former colonial masters. Eventually and in the long run, Luther’s Reformation also opened the way towards democratisation from below, like it is happening in Africa right now. In 2015, African students and staff of the University of Cape Town were tired of looking at the monument of Cecil Rhodes on campus, a British imperialist and former Prime Minister of the Cape Colony. This resulted in the hashtag #Rhodesmustfall, and at the end of it there also was the hashtag #Zumamustfall, an in the end successful attempt to get rid of their autocratic president Jacob Zuma.
Volume 23 Number 1 Page 75