Multilingualism in Africa (original) (raw)
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Multilingualism in Rural Africa
[This article is currently under review for publication in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Linguistics, http://linguistics.oxfordre.com/\] The pervasiveness of multilingualism throughout the African continent has led it to be viewed as Africa's " lingua franca ". Nevertheless, sociolinguistic research on this topic has concentrated mostly on urbanized areas, even though the majority of Africans still live in rural regions, and rural multilingualism is clearly of much older provenance than its urban counterpart. In urban domains, individual language repertoires are dominated by the interplay between European ex-colonial languages, African lingua francas, and local languages, and language ideologies emphasize the ordering of languages in a hierarchy that is tied to social status. The situation in rural areas is clearly distinct, though it has yet to be thoroughly investigated, and the goal of this review is to summarize what is currently understood about rural multilingualism in Africa, highlighting, in particular, the ways in which it varies from better-known urban multilingualism. This survey begins by examining how early work on rural language use in Africa tended to background the presence of multilingualism in these societies. It then explores rural
Patterns in Language, Culture, and Society: Sub-Saharan Africa
Language, 1978
Huddleston's stated purpose is 'to give the reader an understanding of as much as possible of the earlier work so that he will have the necessary background to go on to the more advanced studies dealing with these current issues of controversy' (260). I feel that H has, by and large, achieved his goal. The text is concise, comprehensive, unbiased, and as accurate as any other currently available introductory text. Linguists, of course, will find minor points of disagreement on the analysis of specific sentences; e.g., what I like least is the way H generates sentential complements: NP-(Det) N S, where N-^ it. This rule produces a Patterns in language, culture, and society: Sub-Saharan Africa. Ed. by ROBERT K. HERBERT. Proceedings of the Symposium on African Language, Culture, and Society, held at the Ohio State University, Columbus, April 11, 1975. (Working papers in linguistics, 19.) Columbus: Ohio State University, 1975. Pp. vi, 215. Most of the papers in this volume were given at a Symposium held in connection with the 6th Conference on African Linguistics at the Ohio State University. At least two of them, however, were given at the Conference rather than the Symposium (Creider & Denny, DeBose), and two that were not given are represented by abstracts. The first six papers ' deal with related issues of language reform and language planning, including such aspects as the choice of national and official languages': J. A. Fishman, 'What do we know about language planning?' (1-2; a brief statement on the state of the art); I. Fodor, 'Language reforms of the past and in the developing countries' (3-17; language reform is largely a lexical problem); P. A. Kotey, 'The official language controversy: indigenous versus colonial' (18-26); J. A. Okezie, 'Language planning and literacy development: an African example' (27-36; highlights the Igbo situation); C. J. Emeka Okonkwo,' A function-oriented model of initial language planning in sub-Saharan Africa' (37-52); and M. Tadadjeu, 'Language planning in Cameroon: toward a trilingual education system' (53-75). The remaining papers deal with diverse topics: C. M. Scotton, 'Multilingualism in Lagos-what it means to the social scientist' (78-90; about linguistic data as a base for social-science hypothesis formulation and theory building); B. C. Johnson, 'Stable triglossia at Larteh, Ghana' (93-102; Larteh is said to represent future developments elsewhere in Africa); E. Wolff, 'The conceptual framework of Humboldtian ethnolinguistics in German for teachers, scholars, and graduate students who want their memories refreshed, or who would like to see the pieces of transformational theory put together in a straightforward and intelligent manner. [MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA, UCLA.] Patterns in language, culture, and society: Sub-Saharan Africa. Ed. by ROBERT K. HERBERT. Proceedings of the Symposium on African Language, Culture, and Society, held at the Ohio State University, Columbus, April 11, 1975. (Working papers in linguistics, 19.) Columbus: Ohio State University, 1975. Pp. vi, 215. Most of the papers in this volume were given at a Symposium held in connection with the 6th Conference on African Linguistics at the Ohio State University. At least two of them, however, were given at the Conference rather than the Symposium (Creider & Denny, DeBose), and two that were not given are represented by abstracts. The first six papers ' deal with related issues of language reform and language planning, including such aspects as the choice of national and official languages': J. A. Fishman, 'What do we know about language planning?' (1-2; a brief statement on the state of the art); I. Fodor, 'Language reforms of the past and in the developing countries' (3-17; language reform is largely a lexical problem); P. A. Kotey, 'The official language controversy: indigenous versus colonial' (18-26); J. A. Okezie, 'Language planning and literacy development: an African example' (27-36; highlights the Igbo situation); C. J. Emeka Okonkwo,' A function-oriented model of initial language planning in sub-Saharan Africa' (37-52); and M. Tadadjeu, 'Language planning in Cameroon: toward a trilingual education system' (53-75). The remaining papers deal with diverse topics: C. M. Scotton, 'Multilingualism in Lagos-what it means to the social scientist' (78-90; about linguistic data as a base for social-science hypothesis formulation and theory building); B. C. Johnson, 'Stable triglossia at Larteh, Ghana' (93-102; Larteh is said to represent future developments elsewhere in Africa); E. Wolff, 'The conceptual framework of Humboldtian ethnolinguistics in German for teachers, scholars, and graduate students who want their memories refreshed, or who would like to see the pieces of transformational theory put together in a straightforward and intelligent manner. [MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA, UCLA.] Patterns in language, culture, and society: Sub-Saharan Africa. Ed. by ROBERT K. HERBERT. Proceedings of the Symposium on African Language, Culture, and Society, held at the Ohio State University, Columbus, April 11, 1975. (Working papers in linguistics, 19.) Columbus: Ohio State University, 1975. Pp. vi, 215. Most of the papers in this volume were given at a Symposium held in connection with the 6th Conference on African Linguistics at the Ohio State University. At least two of them, however, were given at the Conference rather than the Symposium (Creider & Denny, DeBose), and two that were not given are represented by abstracts. The first six papers ' deal with related issues of language reform and language planning, including such aspects as the choice of national and official languages': J. A. Fishman, 'What do we know about language planning?' (1-2; a brief statement on the state of the art); I. Fodor, 'Language reforms of the past and in the developing countries' (3-17; language reform is largely a lexical problem); P. A. Kotey, 'The official language controversy: indigenous versus colonial' (18-26); J. A. Okezie, 'Language planning and literacy development: an African example' (27-36; highlights the Igbo situation); C. J. Emeka Okonkwo,' A function-oriented model of initial language planning in sub-Saharan Africa' (37-52); and M. Tadadjeu, 'Language planning in Cameroon: toward a trilingual education system' (53-75). The remaining papers deal with diverse topics: C. M. Scotton, 'Multilingualism in Lagos-what it means to the social scientist' (78-90; about linguistic data as a base for social-science hypothesis formulation and theory building); B. C. Johnson, 'Stable triglossia at Larteh, Ghana' (93-102; Larteh is said to represent future developments elsewhere in Africa); E. Wolff, 'The conceptual framework of Humboldtian ethnolinguistics in German for teachers, scholars, and graduate students who want their memories refreshed, or who would like to see the pieces of transformational theory put together in a straightforward and intelligent manner. [MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA, UCLA.] Patterns in language, culture, and society: Sub-Saharan Africa. Ed. by ROBERT K. HERBERT. Proceedings of the Symposium on African Language, Culture, and Society, held at the Ohio State University, Columbus, April 11, 1975. (Working papers in linguistics, 19.) Columbus: Ohio State University, 1975. Pp. vi, 215. Most of the papers in this volume were given at a Symposium held in connection with the 6th Conference on African Linguistics at the Ohio State University. At least two of them, however, were given at the Conference rather than the Symposium (Creider & Denny, DeBose), and two that were not given are represented by abstracts. The first six papers ' deal with related issues of language reform and language planning, including such aspects as the choice of national and official languages': J. A. Fishman, 'What do we know about language planning?' (1-2; a brief statement on the state of the art); I. Fodor, 'Language reforms of the past and in the developing countries' (3-17; language reform is largely a lexical problem); P. A. Kotey, 'The official language controversy: indigenous versus colonial' (18-26); J. A. Okezie, 'Language planning and literacy development: an African example' (27-36; highlights the Igbo situation); C. J. Emeka Okonkwo,' A function-oriented model of initial language planning in sub-Saharan Africa' (37-52); and M. Tadadjeu, 'Language planning in Cameroon: toward a trilingual education system' (53-75). The remaining papers deal with diverse topics: C. M. Scotton, 'Multilingualism in Lagos-what it means to the social scientist' (78-90; about linguistic data as a base for social-science hypothesis formulation and theory building); B. C. Johnson, 'Stable triglossia at Larteh, Ghana' (93-102; Larteh is said to represent future developments elsewhere in Africa); E. Wolff, 'The conceptual framework of Humboldtian ethnolinguistics in German for teachers, scholars, and graduate students who want their memories refreshed, or who would like to see the pieces of transformational theory put together in a straightforward and intelligent manner. [MARIANNE CELCE-MURCIA, UCLA.] Patterns in language, culture, and society: Sub-Saharan Africa. Ed. by ROBERT K. HERBERT. Proceedings of the Symposium on African Language, Culture, and Society, held at the Ohio State University, Columbus, April 11, 1975. (Working papers in linguistics, 19.) Columbus: Ohio State University, 1975. Pp. vi, 215. Most of the papers in this volume were given at a Symposium held in connection with the 6th Conference on African Linguistics at the Ohio State University. At least two of them, however, were given at the Conference rather than the Symposium (Creider & Denny, DeBose), and two that were not given are represented by abstracts. The first six papers ' deal with related issues of language reform and language planning, including such aspects as the choice of national and official languages': J. A. Fishman, 'What do we know about language planning?' (1-2; a brief...
International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 2018
In a globalised sociolinguistics “[d]ifferent types of societies must give rise to different types of sociolinguistic study”, as Dick Smakman and Patrick Heinrich argue in the concluding remarks of their (Smakman, Dick. 2015. The westernising mechanisms in sociolinguistics. In Dick Smakman & Patrick Heinrich (eds.), Globalising sociolinguistics. Challenging and expanding theory, 16–35. London: Routledge) book Globalising sociolinguistics. Challenging and expanding theory. To this end, a basic condition must be met: both target languages and societies must be well known. This is not the case in much of Central and West Africa: with only few exceptions, here local languages and societies are generally under-researched and sociolinguistic studies have focused mainly on urban contexts, in most cases targeting the interaction between local and colonial languages. With regard to individual multilingual- ism, this urban-centered perspective risks to limit scholarly attention on pro- cesses that, while valid in cities, may not apply everywhere. For one thing, there might still be areas where one can find instances of endogenous multilingual- ism, where speakers’ language repertoires and ideologies are largely localised. The case in point is offered by the sociolinguistic situation found in Lower Fungom, a rural, marginal, and linguistically highly diverse area of North West Cameroon. The analyses proposed, stemming from a strongly ethnographic approach, lead to reconsider basic notions in mainstream sociolinguistics – such as that of the target of an index – crucially adding spiritual anxieties among the factors conditioning the development of individual multilingual repertoires in local languages.
African multilingualism viewed from another angle: Challenging the Casamance exception
International Journal of Bilingualism, 2021
• Aims and Objectives/Purpose/Research Questions The former region of southern Senegal, the Casamance, has been portrayed throughout the literature on African multilingualism in a singular light, for example, as an area where monolingualism does not exist. The purpose of this paper is to stress the previously unacknowledged importance of monolingual settings and practices by discussing data that have yet to be presented in the literature. • Design/Methodology/Approach We investigate rural multilingualism and monolingualism across the Casamance by carrying out the following four studies: a) we conduct a survey on 62 villages with a questionnaire and our newly created "blindfold test", classifying them into two main types, b) we study the role of exogamy in multilingual language acquisition in one of the villages with 34 women, c) we analyse child language production data and child directed speech to examine the existence of monolingual language acquisition, d) we examine the sociolinguistic profiles of 101 speakers of one language community to investigate inter-generational multilingualism. • Data and Analysis Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics in the form of frequency counts. Additionally, we couch our results on multilingualism in the theory of canonical typology. • Findings/Conclusions We propose a distinction between multilingual settings, e.g. communities where speakers are mostly likely to accommodate, and who live among villages largely located on national roads and around cities, and monolingual settings, which constitute most of the villages of the Casamance and where language acquisition is monolingual and where migration, rather than exogamy, accounts for the development of individual multilingualism. • Originality This paper contributes unprecedented research methodology for the study of complex multilingual situations such as those found in African multilingual contexts. • Significance/Implications Our study adds to the growing understanding of small-scale multilingualism and the emergence of multilingualism in monolingual contexts.
Considering heteroglossia in language and development in Sub-Saharan Africa
Countries throughout the Sub-Saharan (SSA) region have a complex linguistic heritage having their origins in opportunistic boundary changes effected by Western colonial powers at the Berlin Conference 1884–1885. Postcolonial language-in-education policies valorizing ex-colonial languages have contributed at least in part to underachievement in education and thus the underdevelop-ment of human resources in SSA countries. This situation is not likely to improve whilst unresolved questions concerning the choice of language(s) that would best support social and economic development remain. Whilst policy attempts to develop local languages have been discussed within the framework of the African Union, and some countries have experimented with models of multilingual education during the past decade, the goalposts have already changed as a result of migration and trade. This article argues that language policy makers need to be cognizant of changing language ecologies and their relationship with emerging linguistic and economic markets. The concept of language, within such a framework , has to be viewed in relation to the multiplicity of language markets within the shifting landscapes of people, culture, economics and the geo-politics of the 21st century. Whilst, on the one hand, this refers to the hegemony of dominant powerful languages and the social relations of disempowerment, on the other hand, it also refers to existing and evolving social spaces and local language capabilities and choices. Within this framework the article argues that socially constructed dominant macro language markets need to be viewed also in relation to other, self-defined, community meso-and individual micro-language markets and their possibilities for social, economic and political development. It is through pursuing this argument that this article assesses the validity of Omoniyi's argument in this issue, for the need to focus on the concept of language capital within multilingual contexts in the SSA region as compared to Bourdieu's concept of linguistic capital.
Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics Plus, 2012
This paper draws on the notion of multilingualism as social practice to critique postcolonial language planning and policies in Africa. Drawing on illustrations from Ethnologue's (2009) languages of Africa, studies on language planning and policy in Africa, and recent developments in harmonisation of cross-border language research (Prah 1998; Banda 2008), the paper argues that there are distortions in the conceptualisation of multilingualism and what it entails in Africa's socio-cultural contexts. In turn, the paper faults monolingual biases in the notions and models used to describe and promote multilingualism in Africa, which mirror descriptions of the language situation in Western socio-cultural contexts. The paper argues for cross-linguistic and cross-border status and corpus planning to take advantage of multilingualism as a linguistic resource for socioeconomic development in Africa. The paper concludes by highlighting the prospects for linguistic repertoire-based multilingual models for language planning and policy in Africa.
Literacy and Multilingualism in Africa
Literacies and Language Education, 2016
A sufficient review of literacy and multilingualism in their full complexity in a continent as immensely and densely diverse as Africa is simply unachievable within the scope of an encyclopedic article if it were not for the relative marginality of Africa in global scholarship. With the exception of South Africa, Africa is not at the forefront of discussions in socio-and educational linguistics. This marginality, however, is greatly undeserved: African sociolinguistic realities are among the world's most complex and there is much to gain if it could inform literacy and multilingualism research more generally. In fact, this peripherality has recently been a productive source for a radical revision of some of the metropolitan epistemologies about multilingualism and literacy. Literacy and multilingualism in Africa does not form a unified field of research and is approached here rather as a field of practice. As such this field presents a K. Juffermans (*) Faculté des Lettres, des Sciences Humaines, des Arts et des Sciences de l'Education,
Discourse on linguistic diversity in Africa
The prevailing linguistic literature typically depicts the African linguistic landscape as the most heterogeneous in the world. Surely linguistic diversity of the African continent cannot be denied, however, it can be noted that the mere evocation of this natural manifestation of language change is on the agenda, sounds excessive compared to actual facts. The discourse on the African linguistic diversity has steadily stemmed from a biased Eurocentric ideology. Explorers have first invented the ethnic group; then the colonial administration has striven to partition functionally homogeneous communities into countless ethnic groups, and missionaries, using questionable linguistic methods, have encouraged linguistic distinctiveness so further emphasizing the sentiment of linguistic fragmentation. Keywords: Linguistic diversity, ethnic group, missionary, explorers, linguistic landscape, writing.
2016
frican urban centres are viewed as “laboratories of multilingualism” or “lieu de brassage des langues” (Calvet, 1994, p. 99-103). This is the result of a permanent and massive rural exodus of the youth to urban areas. Furthermore, the context of conflicts in some countries today is continuously rendering this situation more complex because of migratory movements from conflict zones to safer urban areas. In fact, when people from many different linguistic backgrounds meet in an environment where they are compelled to live together, to interact and to share their daily linguistic values, there is either linguistic conflict or harmony depending on how the plurality is managed both by the participants and the local authorities. Yet, so far, linguistic pluralism in African urban centres has never been an open source of conflict. A ARTICLE HISTORY:
Towards a practical approach to the challenges of multilingualism in Africa
This paper reviews the issue of multilingualism in Africa, and the language planning responses of Governments. The paper argues that the general objective of empowering African languages and ensuring their equality has failed so far. Indeed, African multilingual contexts are today characterized by the increasing dominance of international languages at the expense of African languages, and the increasing dominance of major African languages at the expense of smaller ones. It appears that practical sociolinguistic realities are overwhelming most language policy objectives. A sentiment-free approach to language policy which emphasizes the functionality of languages is therefore suggested.