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<p style="margin:0.5em 0px 1.5em 0em;font-size:12px;border-bottom:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);border-top:1px solid rgb(204,204,204)">Posted: Caamsaa/May 28, 2015 · Finfinne Tribune | Gadaa.com | <strong><a href="http://www.finfinnetribune.com/Gadaa/2015/05/gezahegn-lemma-fituma-oromo-language-afaan-oromoo-and-the-ethiopian-government-discouragement/#respond">Comments</a></strong></p>
<p><strong>By Gezahegn Lemma Fituma*</strong></p>
<p>There have been times in history when a few languages had been
considered culturally superior; and some other languages had been banned
or discouraged. This is happening everywhere today as well; take
Ethiopia as an example. The Oromo people constitute the single largest
ethno-national group in Ethiopia, where the Oromia Region contains a
half of Ethiopia’s land area and population. The Oromo language, also
known as <em>Afan Oromo</em>, is spoken by some 40 million people in
Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, and it is the 3rd most spoken African language
(about 40 million in Ethiopia; and another half a million in Kenya and
Somalia combined). Many others (as yet not quantified) speak <em>Afan Oromo</em>
as a second language. It is the most spoken language in the Cushitic
family, which also includes Somali, Sidama and Afar languages. Cushitic
peoples were present on the central Ethiopian plateau of today as early
as 5000 B.C.</p>
<p>In recent history, between 1974 and 1991, under the Mengistu regime (also called the <em>Derg</em>), the writing of <em>Afan Oromo</em> in any script was forbidden. Upon the fall of the <em>Derg</em> regime in 1991, the Latin alphabet based <em>Qubee</em> was adopted as the script for <em>Afan Oromo</em>.
However, the TPLF regime (the regime which took power in Ethiopia in
1991) has continued to advocate for the superiority of one language over
the other languages in Ethiopia. Today, under the TPLF regime, the uses
of <em>Afan Oromo</em> and <em>Qubee</em> are completely banned in
federal offices. For instance, Finfinne, which is the capital of Oromia,
uses the government-sponsored single language as an official language.</p>
<p>The choice of only one language to dominate the most spoken language in Ethiopia, i.e. <em>Afan Oromo</em>,
has brought about direct impacts on the socio-linguistic,
psycho-linguistic, econo-linguistic aspects of the Oromo people,
especially Oromo students who attend higher-education institutions and
Oromo workers who work at federal institutions, where a language, that
is a second-language of the majority, is spoken as a primary language;
in short, the government’s language policy promotes institutional
marginalization of Oromo students and workers. It is strongly argued
that using the native language of students as a medium of instruction is
a decisive factor for effective learning. However, in this situation,
failing to give the primary role to the native language, and largely
depending on a secondary language as the official working language in
Ethiopia, bring about various difficulties to Oromo students and
workers. The students and workers are expected to disentangle, not only
the subject matters and work projects, but also the working-language
itself. It also creates difficulty to students and workers in expressing
themselves, and as a result, it limits their classroom and work
participation as there is fear of making mistakes and shortages of
vocabulary of the secondary language. In addition, it is a barrier to
smooth classroom and workplace communication. It is also argued that use
of a secondary language in education and workplace negatively affects
the ability and the ease with which knowledge is acquired by students,
and projects are completed by workers. It also affects the performance
of students and workers, and creates difficulties in developing their
cognitive skills and careers, respectively. Moreover, giving low status
to native languages of students in educational and workplace settings
leads to the marginalization of the majority of citizens from active
engagements in the development arena.</p>
<p>Nowadays, there are many voices advocating for the government to adopt bilingualism so as to add <em>Afan Oromo</em>
as the federal working language. Such voices should be encouraged to
relentlessly continue their advocacy for bilingualism to get rid of the
institutional marginalization of the majority in Ethiopia.</p>
<p><em>* <a href="http://finfinnetribune.com/Gadaa/category/articles/gezahegn-lemma-fituma">Gezahegn Lemma Fituma</a> can be reached at <a href="mailto:gfituma12a@yahoo.com">gfituma12a@yahoo.com</a></em></p><p><em><a href="http://gadaa.com/oduu/27952/2015/05/28/gezahegn-lemma-fituma-oromo-language-afaan-oromoo-and-the-ethiopian-government-discouragement/">http://gadaa.com/oduu/27952/2015/05/28/gezahegn-lemma-fituma-oromo-language-afaan-oromoo-and-the-ethiopian-government-discouragement/</a><br></em></p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">**************************************<br>N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its members<br>and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write directly to the original sender of any offensive message. A copy of this may be forwarded to this list as well. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)<br><br>For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to <a href="https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/" target="_blank">https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/</a><br>listinfo/lgpolicy-list<br>*******************************************</div>
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