The Colonial Image Reversed: Language Preferences and Policy Outcomes in African Education

Abstract

Once viewing African languages as competitors to French, policymakers in France now welcome these languages openly in African schools. This is a dramatic policy reversal, and it contradicts expectations of path dependency and policy inertia. The policymakers’ conversion can be traced to the writing and advocacy of a strategic scholarly community, which began exercising influence over the leadership of France and la Francophonie in the 1990s. Their influence changed the perception of French leaders regarding the utility of local languages in education and caused them to include this element consistently in their education strategy for Africa. In contrast, a lack of comparable agreement within the intellectual communities of the Anglophone world has led to ambivalence in support for mother tongue education emanating from dominant English‐speaking states. Unlike traditional accounts of epistemic communities, this study highlights the strategic political activity of scholars. The major focus is on the process of idea change among policy makers in France. I suggest that this idea change altered the field of permissible options for African leaders, revealing a continued ideational dependency between metropole and periphery.

Climate policy innovation in the South – Domestic and international determinants of renewable energy policies in developing and emerging countries

“…the US) may have coercive power (Dobbin et al, 2007). In the context of developing countries, the influence of former colonizers may be particularly relevant, as strong economic and political ties have remained after independence (Albaugh, 2009;Neumayer, 2003;Neumayer and Perkins, 2005). Therefore, we stipulate that the adoption of RE policies is more likely the more former colonizers have already adopted them.…”

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“…Though it is clearly stated that native languages deserve promotion and protection, there were very few efforts before the late 1990s to standardize and implement these languages in schools (Albaugh 2009). This can be chalked up to a lack of political will or human and financial resources; whatever the case may be, however, the overwhelming claim in literature on language-in-education policy states that native languages are not only preferable but vital to success.…”

“…Though the pedagogical theory may seem simple, the onset of the program arrived under much more complicated circumstances. Albaugh (2009) talks of the increase in native-language programs in Francophone Africa springing up due to both a "push" and a "pull" factor. Language organizations', academics', and missionary groups' long-held belief in mother-tongue education provided the push, while the pull came from a sudden ideological change from La Francophonie.…”

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“…The researcher is a white woman, and the participants might have seen her as the colonizer and be intimidated and/or resistant to trust and share because their colonial experience was traumatic in many ways (Albaugh, 2009;Johnson, 2008;Kasuya, 2001;Ki-Zerbo, 1990;Trudell, 2005). Also, she was a doctoral student; as a result participants may have seen her as having the answers for them and relied on her to give the answers to them, although they are the experts in their context and she has always learned from their interactions.…”