Reflections on the International Mother Tongue Day

United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 2019 as 'International Year of Indigenous Languages'. Everyone grows up speaking a language, the mother tongue, and a good proportion of people the world over speak more than one language. But the idea that someone would regularly have to be taught in a language that wasn’t native to them throw up challenges.

“I never made serious attempts at acquiring fluency in another language. The closest I had ever come was a “working proficiency” in Spanish during my junior years in high school. My parents, their accents never bothered me because I had just always been so used to them”, said one of my students at Washington University in St. Louis, USA. A large number of people actually do not pick up sufficient proficiency in a second language.

International Mother Tongue Day is celebrated every year on February 21 since 1990, after the declaration by the United Nations to recognise the sacrifices of people who lost their lives for the sake of their mother-tongue in Bangladesh.

Language is one of the most precious gifts that we have in our lives. Each and every language spoken represents a unique and distinct cultural heritage through melodious songs, colourful descriptions of the environment and food and a range of idioms and proverbs for people to express their feelings and emotions.

“Fifty percent of the world’s out-of-school children live in communities where the language of schooling is rarely, if ever, used at home”. This is perhaps one of the most astounding figures about second language education.

Schools have tried to tackle the problem by going to the families of these children for help in having students gain a certain comfort level with a second language for their own learning. They ask the parents of students to use the second language at home so they are more comfortable with it in school. This often does more harm than good.

A second language is much harder to learn and requires significant efforts. In developing areas where this is poses a major problem, there frequently aren’t the resources to prepare students on a mass scale. They also cause a rift between families and their native languages in unforeseen ways. Families feel alienated, even ashamed of their mother tongue because schools and teachers make them feel inferior. By promoting this attitude, the school systems are essentially destroying the diverse culture and background of human nature that makes our species so great.

Leanne Hinton, a professor of linguistics at University of California at Berkeley, USA, in Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education wrote: “More broadly, the loss of language is part of the loss of whole cultures and knowledge systems, including philosophical systems, oral, literary and music traditions, environmental knowledge systems, medical knowledge, and important cultural practices and artistic skills. The world stands to lose an important part of the sum of human knowledge whenever a language stops being used. Just as the human species is putting itself in danger through the destruction of species diversity, so might we be in danger from the destruction of the diversity of knowledge systems”.

Students, by speaking their mother tongue on campus, include everyone else into their conversation. This attitude of speaking their mother tongue when they have the choice to speak in this universal language may be beneficial from not just the teaching standpoint but also from social and cultural points of view. Language is the essence and identity of culture, and is a major tool for communication. It is a major tool for exchanging ideas, emotions and feelings. To stifle it makes no sense.

It’s clear we must strive to reform systems of education and not target families that speak a different language at home. Maintaining and retaining the languages of ethnic and cultural groups is critical for the preservation of cultural heritage and identity. Using one’s mother tongue at home will make it easier for speakers to be more comfortable with their own linguistic and cultural identity.

The author is a linguist, author and columnist