Which Language for Teaching? The Cultural Messages Transmitted by the Languages Used in Education

Abstract

This paper addresses the question of mother-tongue education of children, especially in francophone countries of Africa. It seeks to contribute to the debate on the integration of local languages into educational systems in multilingual settings by stressing the opposing cultural messages carried by official and indigenous languages. Schooling in Western languages has been a divisive failure, creating two social classes; a French-speaking intellectual elite, unable to convey its imported knowledge to the masses, and a rural underclass. The paper examines and evaluates the PROPELCA language-teaching experiment initiated in Cameroon during the 1980s, based on the principle of 'extensive trilingualism'. Mother-tongue education was preferred by the children, their intellectual development improved and they acquired knowledge more relevant to their daily lives. Examples of the discrepancies produced by Western schooling at both social and scientific levels are discussed and the linguistic creativity of the unschooled is highlighted. Local language as a means of communication is examined and confirmed as the best vehicle both for cultural heritage and for comprehension on a personal level. The paper concludes that the use of local languages within bilingual education enhances local culture and educational opportunities.