In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

- 172 FRENCH OR NATIONAL LANGUAGES AS MEANS OF INSTRUCTION? REFLECTIONS ON FRENCH DOMINATION AND POSSIBLE FUTURE CHANGES By Ingse Skattum Introduction There are 17 countries south of the Sahara which have French as official language,50 the francophone countries representing around 20 percent of the continent’s population51 . In six of the so-called francophone countries, French shares its official position with one or two other languages.52 The term francophone is useful on the international scene to distinguish these countries from those who have English, Portuguese, or Arabic as official languages. For colonial powers have left their traces on administration, politics, jurisdiction, education, literature and other domains. However, the continent is not English-, French- or Portuguese-speaking.53 The European languages are very seldom anybody’s mother tongue or first language (L1). Africans speak one or several of their around 2000 African languages, very often a local and a regional language, plus a European language if they have been to school or have been in touch with Western people. This sociolinguistic situation, where the language of instruction is an imported language spoken by a minority of the people, is, in the so-called francophone Africa, essentially a result of French and Belgian colonisation. It is, however, impossible to generalise and include all these countries in a common description. Inthefollowing,Iwillthereforebrieflypresentsomesimilaritiesanddifferencesbetweenthe francophone countries, beginning with the difference between France and Belgium 50 These 17 countries are: 8 countries in West Africa: Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo; 8 countries in Central Africa: Burundi, Cameroun, Central African Republic, Congo (also called Congo-Brazzaville, after the capital), Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo, also called Congo-Kinshasa, ex-Zaïre), Gabon, Rwanda and Tchad); plus the small francophone state on the Horn of Africa, Djibouti. I’m confining myself to the African continent in this article and will not comment on the situation in the countries of the Indian Ocean. 51 Around 40 percent of Africans live in countries where English holds this role, 20 percent in countries with Arabic and 4 percent in countries with Portuguese as official languages (1995 figures, Manning 1998: 1). 52 Burundi (French and Kirundi), Cameroon (French and English), Central African Republic (French and Sango), Djibouti (French and Arabic), Rwanda (French, Kinyarwanda and English), Tchad (French and Arabic). 53 It is, however, Arabic-speaking, not only in North-Africa, but also in some Sub-Saharan countries. On the other hand, the language of instruction is classical Arabic, which is very different from the spoken dialects and consequently difficult for the children. - 173 as colonial powers with respect to their linguistic and educational policies. I go on to describe a common trait of today, diglossia, i.e. the difference in prestige and usage between French and the national languages, but also between the different African languages. I then look at differentiating factors today, ending by some reflections on the future roles for French and national languages as means of instruction. Linguistic and Educational Policies under French and Belgian Colonisation France and Belgium practised very different linguistic and educational policies in their colonies. The French advocated a policy of assimilation to the French civilisation and language. The Governor General of French West Africa thus wrote in 1897: Education is indeed the best way for a nation with a civilizing mission to ensure that they, as yet primitive peoples should acquire its ideas and be gradually elevated to itself. Education is, in one word, the foremost instrument of progress. It is also the Government’s surest means of propaganda for its cause and for the French language (cited in Skattum 2006:174, author’s translation). Belgium, on the other hand, more or less involuntarily found itself administering the immense Congo Free State after king Leopold II’s scandalous treatment of his private colony. After the First World War the country was also given the German colony of Ruanda – Urundi as a mandate. The burden of education may have seemed too much for the Belgians, who passed it on to the missionaries. As many of them preferred spreading God’s word in African languages, they contributed to the development of some important African languages. But they also installed a segregational educational system, as French instruction was given only to those who needed it to work for the colonial administration. At independence, the Belgian colonies found themselves practically without an educated francophone...

Share