Critique of article: “Universal English Way to Go” by J.C Rance

J.C Rance claims that and I quote in verbatim, “To Educate in an indigenous language will likely restrict the ability of African to compete in global economy”. I find this observation very strange and not well thought of. I will explain by pointing out two factors that are linked to this issue of African languages being intellectualized or not.

The first factor is the factor of why have we now got to a point that we have “A” universal language that dictates social institutions like governance, economy and education. It is obvious that through the malicious advent of colonialism brought numerous of languages to Africa. Now, culture informs language therefore European culture was brought to Africa and imposed on inhabitants as means of humanizing the heathen. It is these languages that remain in Africa today commanding communicative and social channels (Portuguese, French, English Dutch etc…). These languages inspire a culture of local African looking at themselves through the lenses of global standards and cultures. This surely is a dehumanizing situation, especially if it is reproduced over a couple of centuries.

Secondly, the other factor I want to dwell on is the issue of intellectualization of our languages. Rance suggests that no African language based global scientific paper has come out of Africa. That not true. In fact, that is a terrible assumption. Africa has had thriving cosmopolitan civilizations with institutions of higher learning long before any European colonial sate ever has. The Ancient Library of Alexandria, in Alexandria, Egypt is the most significant great library of the ancient world. It flourished under the patronage of the Ptolemaic dynasty and functioned as a major center of scholarship from its construction in the third century B.C. until the Roman conquest of Egypt in 48 B.C. Now surely these Africans were writing globally scientific academic papers, and not in English or any other foreign dialect. Rance claims that African languages have not been written until comparatively recently. This does not make logical sense as I have just proven that through the library of Alexandria. Our Government (South Africa) is currently engaged in a project to preserve the writings and Manuscripts from the institution of Timbuktu. This is part of Honorable Thabo Mbeki’s African renaissance initiative that seeks to actually re-intellectualize our languages. Timbuktu is one other society that centered scholarship and literacy of African languages and knowledge. According to Alexandra Huddleston in the publication “Divine Learning: The Traditional Islamic Scholarship of Timbuktu”, in the 15th century already, Timbuktu served in this process as a distribution center of scholars and scholarship. Its reliance on trade meant intensive movement of scholars between the city and its extensive network of trade partners. Clearly Rances’ claims are unfounded.

In closing, Rance further claims that we should teach universal languages like English from an early age, while promoting indigenous languages. Well, as reasonable as that is, we should emphasize and invest in educational policies that drive towards intellectualizing our indigenous dialects. A good example is a country like the Philippines which has successfully gone through this process. They are now creating conditions for the use of their indigenous dialect through their own teaching, research and communication and provide role models for others in using the language. Before we look to Europe to deal with African situations, lets us create our own knowledge bases and stop being manufactured products to be consumed by the global market, let us stop being baskets of wealth for Europe.

Original article published in the daily dispatch on the 17th of November 2010.