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L O W L A N D S - L - 29 November 2010 - Volume 01<br>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Ron/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtml1/01/clip_image001.gif" name="upi" width="1" border="0" height="1"><span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Mark Dreyer</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:mrdreyer@lantic.net">mrdreyer@lantic.net</a>></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L
"Language politics" 2010.11.28 (01) [AF-EN]</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span class="gi"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Beste <img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Ron/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtml1/01/clip_image001.gif" name="upi" width="1" border="0" height="1"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Marcus,</span><span style="color: navy;"> <img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Ron/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtml1/01/clip_image001.gif" name="upi" width="1" border="0" height="1">Roger, All</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 102); margin-left: 40px;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: LL-L
Language Politics</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 102); margin-left: 40px;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 102); margin-left: 40px;" class="MsoNormal">Re: Gautengse
Afrikaanse skole geteiken</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 102); margin-left: 40px;" class="MsoNormal">En: Volgens
Mokhosi is die probleem dat daar tans 44 skole in dié gebiede ter sprake is.
Daarvan is 14 hoër- en 30 laerskole. Van hulle is 14 Engels, 24 Afrikaans en 6
parallel medium-skole.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">Well, Marcus, I
wouldn't say you are off-topic.</span></p>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">Though I
couldn't answer your question without a little research, I might point out ab
initio that it is not relevant to Mokhosi's concerns. To impute benign
motivation to his policy we should consider that when the Black schools of
every language-group were politicised, with the Soweto Riots, the Black
education infrastructure was destroyed. It made no difference whether the
schools were isiZulu, sePedi, seTswana, or whatever.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">True, the
buildings remain & there are staff drawing salaries, but with salutary
exceptions the 'Black' schools, which are 'free', do not provide an education
worth squat; in fact they don't provide an education period. Teacher
qualifications are low & poor (often fake), morale is lower &
discipline is non-existant. <strong>Staff </strong>absenteeism,
drunkness & sexual abuse, up to & including rape, is more than common,
it is commonplace. This is merely the backdrop to a general situation of theft,
vandalism & gratuitious violence involving the entire body, administration,
teachers, pupils. The horrendiously complicated Outcomes Based Syllabus is
being patched & repatched, but the pupils are lucky if the printed
work-books are delivered even three months into the school year. As for writing
exams, some have been waiting years for their results. True, there are good people
studying & qualifying as teachers, but they quickly snapped up by the
Private Sector. That is pull, & push is provided by the horrible
teaching-environment the New
South African
State has engendered.
They just can't hold decent, motivated & educated staff.</span></p>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">So any parents
with the least bit of concern for their children pay in the extra that is
allowed by Law to support what used to be the 'White' schools, & send their
kids there. But there is a problem. The only community that still holds
teaching in some respect is white & Afrikaans. So the teachers available
are mostly Afrikaans, with a sprinkling of (good) Blacks & fewer English.
With the best will in the World, if a teacher is English, that had better be
the medium of instruction, or in all likelihood there will be no instruction.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">More than this,
the pupils have a surprising degree of initiative in the selection of their
primary & secondary language (which must be African) of instruction. They
don't want isiZulu, or sePedi, or whatever, even if it is their mother-tongue:
They want English, because it is Kool, & International, & their choice
of a second language is Afrikaans, because it is African, & easy. So
serious has this problem become that it is now a profitable business to set up
as a mother-tongue teacher for supplementry lessons in the student's parent's
language.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">Lastly, if we
may impute malign motivations, Afrikaans schools & indeed everything
Afrikaans is being targeted for exclusion, marginalisation & absorbtion. It
matters little that when this is done the teachers leave & the standard of
education collapses. That is a different problem & somebody else's
department.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">Yrs,</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">Mark</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black;">P.S. I am
watching this country being run right back into the Old Stone Age, & this
is being done in the classroom. The children who started school on the eve of
'Liberation' are starting families now, some are already well on their way.
'Official' unemployment stands at 40%. Most of these are simply unemployable. A
large minority of long-term unemployed were never employed. A critical mass of
the present generation is incapable of operating a technical culture even up to
the Biblical level, to say nothing of the Industrial Revolution. In fact, their
forefathers that Moffat met in the dark & savage Interior & brought to
Salvation knew more than these. Pray for my land.</span></p>
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