Gao Hongna in her paper analyzes the
importance of protecting minority languages, and the problems minor languages
face during China’s social transition. She states that language is an important
component of identity and culture for many groups. Maintaining their distinct
identity and culture is usually important to minority group member’s self
esteem and this will affect the degree of success achieved in the society.
Without active language maintenance, language shift is almost inevitable in
many contexts, and without conscious maintenance, minority languages can and
probably will disappear in as few as three generations. Nothing benefits a
country more than to treasure the language and cultures of its various peoples
because in doing so, it fosters intergroup understanding and realizes greater
dividends in the form of originality, creativity, and versatility.
Over half the world’s population is
bilingual and many people are multilingual. They acquire a number of languages
because they need them for different purposes in their everyday interactions.
The investigation of the individual and societal phenomena of bilingual is one
of the most interesting of all those areas of study that fall within the
general area of language and society. The study of bilingual also gives us an
opportunity to relate our linguistic studies to other areas in a manner that is
geminately inter-disciplinary. All the multinational and multilingual countries
in the world have to face the problem of bilingualism. Bilingualism has a great
and profound significance in protecting minorities’ rights and maintaining
minorities’ cultures.
China is a multinational and
multilingual country. It has an area of about 9.6 million square kilometers
which comprises about 6.5 percent of the world total land area. Its population
of more than one billion accounts for 23 percent of the world human population.
There are 56 nationalities which use about 80 different languages in China.
In China there are 56 nationalities,
which use about 80 different languages. While there are many people who speak
many different languages, they will learn each other’s languages. So long as
minority people have a good command of their native language and Han language
as well, they can break through the language barriers and enlarge the fields of
study. Meanwhile, they can introduce their native legacy of excellent culture
to any other nationalities and absorb the essence of other national cultures.
Bilingual is favorable to communicate national feelings and strengthen national
unity.
Where language is considered an
important symbol of minority group’s identity, the language is likely to be
maintained longer.
Institutional support generally makes
the difference between success and failure in maintaining a minority group
language. Education, law and administration, religion and the media are crucial
domains from this point of view. The minority group which can mobilize these
institutions to support language maintenance has some chance of succeeding.
When the government of a country is committed to maintaining or reviving a
language, it is possible to legislate for its use in all these domains. There
are different kinds of institutional support for maintaining a minority
language. Examples of this kind of support are:
1) The use of the minority language in
education, e.g. bilingual education programs, using or teaching the minority
language in school;
2) Support by the law and
administration, e.g. the right to use the language in court, the House of
Assembly, in dealing with government officials, etc.;
3) The use of the language in places of
worship, e.g. TV programs, radio programs, newspapers, and magazines.
Education is one of the tools of
language planning. Bilingual education is concerned with the use of two or more
languages as mediums of instruction. There are different types of educational
policies. Joshua Fishman, a renowned American socialist, has identified three
models: enrichment bilingual education, transitional bilingual education and
language maintenance bilingual education.
An Mei in her article emphasized the
importance of the bilingual education, she said that the bilingual education
has been very profound in maintaining and developing a national language, and
further strengthening its group identity and cultural structure. Bilingual
education is also regarded as a means of minority language support. Effective
bilingual schooling has generally involved a process known as “immersion”.
Children are immersed in the language, and it is used to teach them science,
mathematics and social studies, for instance, they are not “taught” the
language. It is rather used as a medium of instruction to teach them the normal
school curriculum. This method has proved very successful in many different
countries as a means of learning a second language.
Though economic and political
imperatives tend to eliminate minority languages, it is important to remember
examples like welsh which demonstrate that languages can be maintained, and
even revived, when a group values their distinct identity highly and regards
language as an important symbol of that identity. Finally, it is also important
to realize that pressures towards language shift occur mainly in countries
where monolingual is regarded as normal, and bilingualism is considered
unusual. For most of the world it is bilingualism and multilingualism which is
normal. Therefore, it seems to be extremely urgent and necessary to protect the
minority language and culture. Lingual education is considered one of the most
important measures taken to maintain languages and cultures.
Article
by Tingting Fang from Shanghai Maritime University, China.
Full access: http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=74853&utm_campaign=blogger&utm_medium=ljw |
| Image by Taylor B,from Flickr-cc |
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