SEMINAR
STATUS OF ENGLISH
ASSOCIATE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE AND THREE-LANGUAGE FORMULA
INTRODUCTION
English has status of associate language after Hindi, it is most commonly spoken language in India, the most read and written language. When British started ruling India, they searched for Indian mediators who could help them to administer India. British established in Indian universities based on British models with emphasis on English. Even after Independence English remained main language of India. It still remains as an important language.
Language Planning for school education in India can be seen more as a question of status planning rather than acquisition planning. The Three-Language formula which emerged as a political consensus on language in school education was a strategy to accommodate at least three- language within ten years of schooling. The Central Advisory Board on Education devised the Three-Language formula in 23rd meeting held in 1956 with a view to remove the inequalities among languages in India. It recommended that three- language should be taught in the Hindi as well as non-Hindi speaking areas of the country at the middle and High school stages.
ASSOCIATE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE
In 1835, British Government in India designated English as the medium of education for schools and universities. Many Nationalist leaders opposed educating English since it would deprive people of national respect. Nationalist motivations were of the opinion that an Indigenous language should be adopted as Official Language. Some people advocated the retention of English since English is the language of law and administration. Pt.Nehru said that English is the window to the outside world and its closure would spell peril for future. The Tara Chand Committee of 1948 recommended the regional language should be the medium of instruction. In 1950 the language controversy became more intense. With the commencement of our Constitution in 1950 it was decided that English should continue as the official language for 15 years. The controversies grew more intense among the Nationalists. Thus Article 343 of The Constitution designated Hindi as the Official Language. But there were continuous protests from the part of Dravidian language speakers from the South for making Hindi as the National language.. The National Integretion Council that led to the Language Act in 1963 finally declared Hindi as the Official Language and English as the Associate Official Language. In 1966, Kothari Commission observed that the adoption of Hindi as medium of education is not possible in non-Hindi areas. Thus English still continuos to be the medium of instruction in technical and scientific, education and public information. It has now become an essential tool of interaction between a foreigner and an Indian.
Dozens of distinctly different regional languages are spoken in India, which share many characteristics such as grammatical structures and vocabulary. Apart from these languages, Hindi is used for communication in India. The homeland for Hindi is mainly in the North of India, but it is mainly spoken and understood in all urban centers of India. In the Southern states of India, where people speak many different languages that are not much related to Hindi, there is more resistance to Hindi, which has allowed English to remain a lingua franca to a greater extent.
Since, the early 1600s, the English language has had a toehold on the Indian subcontinent, when the East India company established settlements in Chennai, Kolkata and Mumbai. The historical background of India is never far away from everyday usage of English. India has had a longer exposure to English than any other country which uses it as a second language, its distinctive words, idioms, grammar and rhetoric spreading gradually to affect all places, habits and culture.
English has a special national status in India. It has a special place in the Parliament, judiciary, broadcasting, journalism and in the education system. One can see a Hindi speaking teacher giving instructions to students in English. It is clear that language permeates daily life.
THREE-LANGUAGE FORMULA
The Three-Language Formula was devised by the Central Advisory Board of Education on 1950. They rejected the suggestions put forward by Secondary Education Commission. According to the Secondary Education Commission:
- The mother tongue or the regional language should be the medium of instruction
- During the middle school stage, every child should be taught at least two languages
- At the high and higher secondary stage, only two languages should be studied, one of which should be the mother tongue
ü Mother tongue or a regional language
ž One other languge to be choosen from :
- Hindi for non-Hindi speakers
- Elementary English for those who hadn’t studied English
- Advanced English for those who have studied English
The Three Language Formula suggested every student in a secondary school should study:
1. Mother tongue or
- A regional language or
- A composite course of mother tongue and regional language or
- A composite course of mother tongue and a classical language
- A composite course of a regional language and a classical language
2. English
3. Hindi
The formula was approved by the Chief Ministers’ Conference in 1961. It later led to the Language Act passed by the Indian Parliament in 1963
ž The Act provides:
Ø Hindi shall be the all-India Official Language
Ø English shall be the Associate Official Language
Ø The regional languages shall be the languages of administration in the states
Ø The UPSC examinations shall be conducted in all languages
Ø The Three-Language Formula should be adhered to in the educational system
The Formula accommodated the interests of group identity, national pride and unity and administrative efficiency and technological progress .It appeared theoretically sound but practically impossible. The major drawbacks are
Ø Heavily language loaded
Ø Non-Hindi areas resisted the imposition of Hindi
Ø Heavy financial burden
Ø Inadequate facilities and no proper planning
A modified version was later devised by the Kothari Commission. It proposed the compulsory teaching of
Ø The Mother tongue or the regional language
Ø The Official Language of the Union or the Associate Official Language
Ø A modern Indian or Foreign language not covered under 1 and 2
The implications of the Commission’s recommendations were:
- Compulsory study of one language at the lower primary stage (classes 1 to 4)
• Compulsory study of two languages at the Higher Primary stage(5 to 8The mother tongue or the regional language:
- The official or associate official language
q Obligatory study of three languages at the Lower Secondary Stage(Classes 8 to 10)
- The official or associate official language
- English as a library language
- One modern Indian language
q Compulsory study of two languages from the Higher Secondary Stage
- Modern Indian languages
- Modern Foreign languages
- Classical languages
q At the University stage, no language should be compulsory
Despite of all the revisions the Three- Language Formula remained as a goal for Indian multilingual situation but very impractical.
CONCLUSION
In India, English plays a basic role. The British Colonial administration employed it ad encouraged its use as it wanted to an elite “Indian in blood in colour, but English in taste, in opinion, in morals and intellect”.
In a country in which sixteen national languages and 1632 dialects co-exist, Hindi spoken by one-third population is the official language and English is defined as Associate Official language.
Since 1950, schools adopted the Three-Language formula which consists of providing education in the regional language, in Hindi and in English. English has maintained a sort of hegemony, in several areas, large number of books and magazines and newspapers are published in English. It’s worth highlighting that English is not only educated people’s prerogative. It also serves as ‘lingua franca’ to cover social and cultural gaps. English continues to occupy a strong position as the medium of instruction in all levels
ASSIGNMENT
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INTERFERENCE AND INFLUENCE OF MOTHER TONGuE
Introduction
Language acquisition is one of the most important and fascinating aspects of human development. There are various subconscious aspects of language developments such as metalinguistic, conscious, formal teaching of language in both L1 and L2.
During the period of 70s and 80s various studies were conducted with first and second language learners showing that phonemes played a role in speaker’s native categories. Three models were prepared to explain the functioning of L1 and L2. The first model talks about the relationship between mature phonological system and speech perception. It analyzes speaker’s L1 phonological system in perception of non-native sounds. Another model that focuses on the issue of L2 segment acquisition is speech learning model. It tries to find out how speech perception affects phonological acquisition by distinguishing the two kinds of sounds. In terms of second language acquisition learner face the same logical problems faced in process of acquiring first language. This learning is interferal both positively as well as negatively by the first language.
Interference and Influence of Mother Tongue
The second language learning environment encompasses everything the language learner hears and sees in the new language. It may include a variety of situations such as exchanges in restaurants and stores, conversations with friends etc...
Regardless of the learning environment the learner’s goal is mastery of the target language. The learner begins the task of learning a second language from point zero and through the steady accumulation of the mastered entities of the target language, eventually amasses them in quantities sufficient to constitute a particular level of proficiency.
This characterization of language learning entails the successful mastery of organizing this knowledge into coherent structures which lead to effective communication in the target language.
Second language learners appear to accumulate structural entities of the target language but demonstrate difficulty in organizing this knowledge into appropriate coherent structures. This appears to be a significant gap between the accumulation and the organization of the knowledge. When writing or speaking the target language, second language learners tend to rely on their native language structures to produce a response. If the structures of the two languages are distinctly different, then one could expect a relatively high frequency of errors to occur in L2 thus indicating an interference of L1 and L2.
Dulay et al defines interference as the automatic transfer, due to habit of the surface structure of the first language onto the surface of the second language. Lott defines interference as errors in the learner’s use of foreign language that can be traced back to the mother tongue. Transfer is governed by learner’s perceptions about what is transferable and by their stage of development in L2 learning. In learning the target language, learner construct their own interim rules, with the use of their L1 knowledge, but only when they believe it will help them in the learning task or when they have become sufficiently proficient in the L2 for transfer to be possible.
It appears to be much more difficult for an adult to learn a second language system that is as well learned as the first language. Typically, a person learns a second language partly in terms of the kinds of meanings already in the first language. In learning a second language, L1 responses are grafted on to L2 responses and both are made to a common set of meaning responses. Other things beings equal, the learner is less fluent in L2, and the kinds of expressions he/she uses in L2 bear tell tale traces of the structures of L1.
Carroll argues that the circumstances of learning a second language are like those of mother tongue. Sometimes there are interference and occasionally responses from one language system will intrude into speech in other language. It appears that learning is most successful when the situations in which the two languages (L1 and L2) are learned, are kept as distinct as possible. To successfully learn L2 requires the L2 learner to often exclude the L1 structures from the L2 learning process, if the structures of the two languages are distinctly different.
Beardsmore suggests that many of the difficulties a second language learner has with the phonology, vocabulary and grammar of L2 are due to the interference of habits fromL1. The.The formal elements of L1 are used within the context of L2, resulting in errors in L2, as the structures of languages, L1 and L2 are different.
Dechert suggests that the further apart the two languages are structurally , the higher the instances of errors made in L2 which bear traces of L1 structures. In both cases the interference may result from a strategy on the part of the learner which assumes or predicts equivalence, both formally and functionally, of two items or rules sharing either function or form. More advanced learning of L2 may involve a greater number of rules or marking features for distinguishing between the two languages.
One of the advantages of modern language education is that learner’s errors based on transfer of mother tongue properties into second language production are much less frequent than before, when language teaching took place in the grammar translation tradition. Some researchers have even claimed that children acquire L2 without reference to their L1.
In the present day language classes, children have lots of L2 input when we are dealing with English as a foreign or second language and when L2 learners both children and adults are in frequent contact with the L2 in the canonical second language context when language learning occurs in the country where this language is spoken. There is more direct L2 input in the classroom via multimedia and internet ad teaching methods and course material have also changed. Nowadays most course material both in L2 can be defined based on a communicative approach to language education. L2 learners come more into contact with real world, get natural L2 input. In such learning environment one does not expect to find L1 influence, especially not for young students.
The positive impact of mother tongue on second language is seen in acquiring the vocabulary and sentence patterns trough comparison and contrast when there is transfer of learning. The interference can be:
Linguistic: Certain grammatical forms may persist, certain pronunciation may be used and certain others may not be even heard in the second language as they do not occur in mother tongue.
Cultural: Foreign language learner is compelled to see the world through eyes of native speaker
Parental models: Parents who are not knowledgeable in the target language may act as wrong models.
Time factor: The time when the target language is introduced creates the major problem. Only after the basics in mother tongue have been established, the child has to start anew with fundamentals of another language.
CONCLUSION
First language interferes in the acquisition of the second language and it is applicable universally. While learning L2 alphabetical shapes and structures of first language would create interference. Mediums of instruction would create interference. Mediums of instruction and communication in schools or colleges are mostly held in first language. Monolingual students were better in English receptive vocabulary, reading comprehension and writing fluency. Bilinguals despite being proficient in two languages do not completely excel the monolinguals in reading- writing related skills. The experience or knowledge, which a person has about his mother tongue, would definitely be going to interfere in the learning of second language. There are a number of lexical spaces in mind in which words of particular language gets stored separately. The early identification would help in coordinating appropriate intervention programmes in learning second language without any errors.
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