Every so often, the lack of language education in Australian high schools becomes a topic of acute but peripheral political debate, before quickly submerging again. At the moment we’re right in the middle of a trough of that cycle, but a couple of weeks ago, Julie Bishop announced her personal ambition to have Asian languages compulsorily taught in school. If all goes well for her (and that’s a huge if), this will be a Coalition policy by the next election.
Having at least some Asian languages on offer in high school education makes complete sense from a geopolitical perspective. Making Asian language lessons mandatory however, might be a bit more sticky with the electorate, particularly more conservative voters. Although having said that, it’s currently compulsory for primary school children to learn a foreign language, and neither the kids nor their parents have any say over what language it is. Perhaps it’s because it’s often French or Italian as opposed to, say, Korean or Hmong, that we don’t mind so much.
The story was covered only by News.com.au it would appear, although there are 260 comments on the article. So clearly this kind of suggestion generates a lot of discussion. The comments, not that I could be bothered reading each one of course, seem to group into a few categories.
Firstly there’s the “great idea” camp — not exactly a majority; then there’s the “mandatory anything is indefensible”, there are plenty of those; and finally, the very large and very broad category which believes that:
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a) Australia is an English speaking country, therefore
b) we should speak English, as should everyone who comes here (and even everyone else as well), and
c) we should make sure our kids speak English better, because they’re clearly failing miserably at that these days.
A couple of the choicest cuts:
“what happened to other nationalities learning our language? LAST TIME I LOOKED WE LIVED IN AUSTRALIA NOT AUSTRAL ASIA – Lorr of Campsie“
“Me speak no good English. Me speak chop chop english. Me naibor speak pidgin english. Good to learn propel Ozie english first. Learn other langage no good, if you not now you mother langage good. Also very good to read and rite propel english first. Western alfabet easy than chinees or japanees or korea karaktes. me say, learn good you mother langage first, then think to learn other langage in high school. – ‘chop chop English’ of Melbourne“
Australians generally are monolingual, in fact the English speaking world, with some exceptions, is generally monolingual. This has engendered what is now often referred to as “the monolingual mindset”, which is roughly the belief that monolingualism is the norm and that we should therefore concentrate on teaching English and not waste resources teaching other languages.
The assumption that monolingualism is the norm is erroneous because the majority of people in the world are bilingual at the very least, and very often speak a plurality of languages. Monolingualism, globally speaking, is the exception not the rule. The monolingual mindset moreover, and everything that goes with it, has solidified further in the English-speaking world; we expect people who come here, be they travellers, tourists or immigrants, to speak English, yet we rarely return the favour when we travel to other countries.
This is, in essence, linguistic imperialism and judging by the vast majority of the comments on Bishop’s plan, most of us are happy to be linguistic imperialists as long as it is our language that’s winning.
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The old Labor Party members of the Northcote Council in Victoria in the 1950s were opposed to its library offering books in foreign languages. That is, books in languages other than English. The councillors were generally uneducated and ignorant. One councillor, at an ALP meeting, is even credited with saying that “only dagos, commos and pofters read books.” That incident is even referred to in a peer reviewed academic journal (and that doesn’t mean very much, as much good writing is not peer reviewed, but that’s a different issue).
The present ALP government, pandering to MPs in the Northern Territory’s parliament with similar views to those of 1950s Northcote, have downgraded the teaching of Aboriginal languages, a policy that is nonsensical and goes against all good educational practice.
Aborigines before European occupation could often speak about five or six languages, for there were about 200 or so distinct Aboriginal languages and many more dialects. Only Papua New Guinea probably has more languages spoken. It is sad that our education system in Australia has been dominated in the past, and in some cases still is, by narrow minded bullies. Aboriginal Australians could teach Australians of European ancestry a lot.
The assumption behind the monolingual mindset is that you learn better English by concentrating on it. Utter rubbish. At school I studied Latin, terribly unfashionable, but it taught me all the English grammar I know. How can you understand a language and its strengths and weaknesses till you step outside it? Monolingualism is a form of sublingualism, trying to cover its obvious inadequacies. Fortunately monolingualism is cureable.
Bilingualism has never been proven to be detrimental, on the contrary – it has been proven to be highly beneficial in developing language skills (in both languages), and delaying the onset of senility (a tad too late for conservative linguistic xenophobes, I fear).
That being said, I am not a fan of not being able to choose the language your kids learn. Not at all. Compulsory language classes I am fine with, but /I/ am choosing the language being learnt by my kids. It’s things like this which make me think that were I ever to have kids, I would have to move abroad to guarantee they get a decent education.
Students who speak a second language do better in other subjects than those who don’t. The teaching of asian languages was on the rise when Keating was PM but fell drastically under Howard. It’s a pity Julie Bishop didn’t say something then.
I agree with the other commenters that, from the purely instrumental view of students learning good english, a foreign language can only help. I also have a lot of sympathy for the argument that modern english instruction is inadequate, so any assistance has to be welcome. And then there is the adult joy – I think children in a determinedly monolingual society resent time spent on foreign languages (I did) – of being at least basically capable in a worldly way, in different contexts. Such as the capability a foreign language gives you when you’re traveling.