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Summary
Notes for:
Societal
Multilingualism
by M Lynn
Landweer for
Intro Sociolx LG232, Univ of Essex
Instructor:
Peter L Patrick
Week 15: Feb 14
Safeguards for
Papua New Guinean Languages
Value placed on the
local vernacular
-
As a marker of social identity
-
Historically, and even to this day, one’s
choice of language marks one as family, friend, or enemy.
Value placed on
multilingualism
-
As a marker of individual distinction
-
One recognized evidence of leadership in
Papua New Guinea is fluency in languages other than one’s own vernacular.
No dominant people group
or language
-
Papua New Guinea is an aggregate of 822
distinct language and cultural groups,
-
none of which is sufficiently powerful
numerically, economically, or politically to dominate the others
-
whether linguistically or in any other manner
of domination.
Modern political recognition
and valuing of the local vernacular –
-
The 1994 National Information and Communication Policy states:
-
“The independent state of Papua New Guinea endorses the basic right of each
cultural community to receive fundamental information in their mother tongue.”
Allocation of personnel
and funding for
vernacular language
development projects
-
In response to Papua New Guinea’s constitutional recommendation for
Integral Human Development;
-
the 1986 Philosophy of Education; the 1991 Education Sector Review; the
National Executive Council decision number 183/91; and the 1995 Education
Amendment Bill
-
the Papua New Guinean education system has been restructured so that
the initial years of schooling will be in the language children already know,
i.e., the language of their home communities.
The documents and decisions
noted above have resulted in
-
the establishing of the Educational Research Unit (1985) and the
Literacy and Awareness Secretariat (1990)
-
with subsequent (and ongoing) development of vernacular alphabets,
primary level literature, identification and training of teachers,
-
and the establishing of elementary schools (grades “prep” 1 and 2) that
feed into established primary schools (grades 3-8).
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Last updated 14 February 2003