On 16 Apr, 2007, at 1:48 AM, Patrick Bond wrote:
ravi wrote:
further excuse for such phrases as "the language of the colonialist".
Yikes, Ravi, you don't mean that scorn I hope.
<...>
Ngugi's critique centred on the deterioration of mother-tongue
languages
as the ideological legacy of colonialism.
Colonial policy meant that the language of the colonising nation was
forced on to local people, often with a systematic prohibition of
indigenous languages.
In colonial Kenya, English was used as the sole means of instruction in
the public school system. He sketched a portrait of language as a tool
of colonialism, and vividly described being humiliated and shamed for
speaking his native tongue as part of his colonial schooling.
<...>
As the linear tongue of the colonial enterprise, it has become
synonymous with racial cruelties and injustice, and the denigration of
local cultures. More so, as representative of something specifically
Anglo-American and Western, it has become a world language to the
extent
that Anglo-American Western culture has become hegemonic in the world.
But then to others, while English may not be their mother tongue, it is
nevertheless their language and an expression of their lived identity.
In this view English has become a world language to the extent that it
has become divested of any association with colonialism and its
adjunct,
Western culture.
As Chinua Achebe, another major literary figure, said: "Is it right
that
a man should abandon his mother tongue for someone else's? It looks
like
a dreadful betrayal and produces a guilty feeling.
"But for me there is no other choice. I have been given the language
and
I intend to use it."
[Above I have quoted those parts of Patrick's post that are of
importance to my response].
I should have been more careful to point where the scorn (if any) was
directed: it was at the usage of the term "language of colonialism" to
dismiss an Indian's opinion about events in India, and that by an Ivy
League academic writing in the very language! India is a land of
multiple languages and cultures, and if language is seen as a tool of
oppression then English pales in significance, when compared to
internal language wars.
I am not certain, especially after speaking with my mother (a teacher
for 40 years in a native language medium school) and her sister (who
worked as an state level educational officer for many decades) over the
phone last night, that English is introduced in such a manner as to
require the abandoning of one's mother tongue (it is neither the sole
medium of instruction, nor is it thrust down the throats of the public
as Hindi is). Certainly less so than the imposition of Hindi, arguably
a more foreign language for Tamilians, with its strange lack of a
neutral gender.
It is true that there is both stratification and shame around the
knowledge (or lack) of English in Indian society. But the opposing view
presented above (lived identity/world language) is also true where
applicable. English is/was inculcated into local usage as native words
(e.g: "catamaran") are introduced into the world language. Someone in
Madras once gave me an interesting anecdote of a legitimate question to
the staff of a restaurant as to whether the establishment is open on
Sundays: Hotel Sunday open-ah? The answer: Ahmaam, open sir. The debate
is alive on whether such "corruption" constitutes a loss of the
mother-tongue.
--ravi
