[lg policy] South Agrica: Students Protest Multilingual Instruction in South Africa

[Harold Schiffman]

Students Protest Multilingual Instruction in South Africa by admin34 | July
29th, 2015
<http://languagemagazine.com/?p=124202#>
<http://languagemagazine.com/?p=124202#>
<http://languagemagazine.com/?p=124202#>

[image: openstellenbosch]

Student protests disrupted classes and led to the cancellation of a career
fair at Stellenbosch University in Western Cape, South Africa over a
school-wide language policy that gives Afrikaans and English equal status
as languages of teaching and learning.

The university, a public research institution ranked in the top three of
South Africa’s colleges, traditionally taught white students using
Afrikaans as a medium of instruction. In post-Apartheid South Africa, the
university is now open to students of all races, but the language barrier
still poses a hurdle to non-speakers of Afrikaans, many of whom are black.
Stellenbosch’s language policy and plan illustrates an approach to
multilingual education that attempts to account for all students, some of
whom lack proficiency in Afrikaans and some of whom lack proficiency in
English. The so-called bilingual “T-option” provides for extra support for
classes that students take during their first two years of undergraduate
courses, including simultaneous interpreting services and parallel medium
teaching. In the last years of undergraduate study, courses may be
bilingual, in English only, or in Afrikaans only depending on the
instructor’s language abilities. Students can choose their better language
for university documents, exams, tests, papers, and other written
assignments. The university policy aims to protect the use of Afrikaans as
an academic language, and promotes the use of English as an important
international language. Supporters praise the T-option for offering
students the opportunity to be fully bilingual upon graduation, capable of
engaging in critical conversations, reading and writing in Afrikaans and
English.

The student group behind the protests, Open Stellenbosch, asserts that the
T-option perpetuates a privileging of white, Afrikaans culture placing
black students at an academic disadvantage.

“The interpretation devices non-Afrikaans-speaking students are forced to
use inhibit their ability to engage effectively with the lecturer as well
as the class material,” Open Stellenbosch said in a statement on their
Facebook page. “We are not against Afrikaans as a language but demand the
availability of all classes in English.”

The university responded to the student protests threatening disciplinary
action for disrupting the university.

The debate about language at Stellenbosch has been ongoing for decades. A
1996 article from Mail & Guardian reveals that the conversation has changed
very little: “Afrikaans is seen on the one hand as defining the university
culturally and academically, and on the other it is perceived as a
deliberate barrier to keep out black students, in a sly bid by the
authorities to keep the university wealthy, white and culturally
homogenous.”

#Afrikaans <http://languagemagazine.com/?tag=afrikaans> #English
<http://languagemagazine.com/?tag=english> #multilingualism
<http://languagemagazine.com/?tag=multilingualism> #university
<http://languagemagazine.com/?tag=university> #SouthAfrica
<http://languagemagazine.com/?tag=southafrica>

http://languagemagazine.com/?p=124202


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