Bislama in the educational system? Debate around the legitimacy of a creole at school in a post-colonial country

Abstract

Education policy always appears to be controversial, especially in post-colonial nations. In Vanuatu, the dual educative system inherited from the period of colonization has raised many debates. The government of Vanuatu is certainly aware of national educational issues in the school system such as the poor literacy rate and high school fees but finding solutions in a complex multilingual context is difficult. As a sovereign state Vanuatu not only has to articulate its own linguistic problems while dealing with a complex linguistic colonial heritage, but needs to pay specific attention to donors since the country is still economically dependent. As in many others states, Vanuatu has to simultaneously deal with local issues and global interests. Through the example of Vanuatu's national education policy, this article shows how global pressures and national linguistic ideologies can influence decisions made in a postcolonial state.

Vernacular and culturally based education in Oceania today: articulating global, national and local agendas

“…This represents serious logistical and economic difficulties that most of the countries of Pacific cannot meet because of lack of resources. This is particularly the case in Solomon Islands (Jourdan, 2013) and Vanuatu (Vandeputte-Tavo, 2013). Yet, this 'practical' difficulty should not hide the ideological tensions that exist within the communities themselves.…”

Grassroots talk back on social media: an analysis of public engagement in Vanuatu’s language-in-education policy

“…"Quality education" in Vanuatu must encompass unification of two different curricula and assessment systems, and the opportunity for all children to master both English and French, as well as the attainment of other goals such as raising literacy and numeracy rates. Attempts to prioritise the vernacular or Bislama in education have thus often been viewed as threats to the maintenance of English, and particularly French (Vandeputte-Tavo, 2013). In 2009, two different international consultants were recruited, who had to work within this complexity.…”

“…The second was engaged to lead the development of a new language-in-education policy in which the vernacular, Bislama, English and French could all have a place. Due to several disagreements, the curriculum team led by one consultant and language policy team led by the other failed to work together (interviews with both consultants, 2011), and the suggestions put forward by the latter for a double transitional policy from L1 to French to English by the end of primary school were completely unworkable (interview with Director of Educational Services, 2011; see also Vandeputte-Tavo, 2013;Willans, 2013). Although the new curriculum statement was launched in 2010, it contained only vague statements about language that were pending an outcome from the work of the language policy teamwhich did not materialise.…”

“…Recognition of the lexical similarities between English and Bislama but the lack of corresponding grammatical similarities leads, at best, to futile attempts to compare the complexity and utility of the two languages and, more problematically, to the false belief that Bislama simply has no grammar at all. Three negative attitudes held by the general public are well-documented in the literature from the 1990s (Crowley, 1996;Lynch, 1996;Siegel, 1997), and appear not to have changed a great deal since then (Vandeputte-Tavo, 2013;Willans, 2014). Firstly, the dominance of English vocabulary and the phenomenon of multi-functionality have led to the label "Broken English," despite the comprehensive development of Bislama vocabulary for use in new domains from Bible translation to climate change awareness, and despite the fact that English itself has borrowed so extensively from other languages.…”