[lg policy] South Africa: Language Policy Stellenbosch: Fail

[Harold Schiffman]

 Language Policy Stellenbosch: Fail 04 September 2015, 13:08
There is simply no way of looking at Stellenbosch University’s language
policy without coming to the conclusion that it is deliberately excluding
non-white South Africans from seeking an education there. By insisting that
the university keeps educating in Afrikaans, you are insisting on its
whiteness. I am an alum of SU. I am also white and Afrikaans. I have
delighted in sharing my long and established history with Stellenbosch
since the day I graduated in 2012. I spent nine years in that town with a
familial legacy that stretches much further beyond that.

The *#OpenStellenbosch* movement obtained critical mass over the past week.
My history there means that mysocial media feeds have been vibrating with
thinly-veiled racist opinions – posted in English – about the validity of
the movement’s claims. What I have come to understand from these posts is
this: we don’t want you here.

1)      Stellenbosch University currently employs a T-Language Policy.  It
has been controversial since its inception. The reason that everyone has a
hot take on it: it does not work. Lecturers spend an unreasonable amount of
time flip-flopping between English and Afrikaans, with so much being lost
in between. It doesn’t help to promote Afrikaans and it certainly does not
help the academic experience.
2)      Afrikaans is not, and will never be, recognized as an international
academic language.

      To pretend otherwise is foolish. Any university, and especially those
who view themselves as exceptional, should put the communication of
knowledge via critical thought as its absolute highest priority.

3)      Educating the masses is incredibly difficult and right now South
Africa is failing. To demand that a teenager seeking an education should
learn another language to do so is cruel and unnecessary.

4)      The argument that is most popularly used is that ‘they can go
somewhere else’. Ignoring the wildly racist othering of such rhetoric, this
conveniently ignores what those of us who were lucky enough to attend SU
implicitly understand: Stellenbosch is special. It is unmatched by anything
else. If the privilege of attending is conditional on being fluent in
Afrikaans, admittance is conditional on being white. Or at the very least,
conditional on being the kind of non-white who doesn’t make swathes of the
student body uncomfortable.

Stellenbosch is a special place. Its natural beauty is unparalleled. The
cultural and academic opportunities that it affords its students are
unmatched. Are we really going to convince ourselves that those virtues are
afforded simply by the grace of overwhelming whiteness? Surely, we cannot
support those who underestimate Stellenbosch so offensively. Are we really
that committed to pretending we don’t live in Africa?

Stellenbosch University Management has two options: continue pretending
that the T-Option works and that claims of racism are ‘unique’. This would
break my heart and prove the university is stagnant in its insistence of
protecting the feelings of deceased Afrikaans men and the comfort zone of
their privileged youth.

The other option is to make English the primary language of instruction and
transform the university into the benchmark of comprehensive and inclusive
African tertiary education. To help foster and nurture an environment where
we can come to find the Tolstoy of the Zulu’s or the Twain of the
IsiXhosa’s.


What a magical thought.

http://www.news24.com/MyNews24/Language-Policy-Stellenbosch-Fail-20150904


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