PRESERVING AFRICAN LANGUAGES AND TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY IN THE FACE OF EDUCATION AND GLOBALIZATION

TitlePRESERVING AFRICAN LANGUAGES AND TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY IN THE FACE OF EDUCATION AND GLOBALIZATION
Publication TypeJournal Article
Year of Publication2013
AuthorsAyodeji Olasunkanmi Abari, Idowu Olufunke Oyetola, Okunuga, AA
JournalProblems of Education in the 21st Century
Volume57
Start Page8-15
PaginationDiscontinuous
Date PublishedDecember/2013
Type of ArticleOriginal article
ISSN1822-7864
Other NumbersICID: 1083810
KeywordsAfrican languages, education, globalization, preserving, territorial integrity
Abstract

With the colonization of Africa, the language of the colonial masters has taken precedence over the indigenous languages of the Africans to the extent that the latter seems to be going into extinction. Yet, education is better founded on the native language of a people which also preserves their culture and tradition and gives them their own separate identity. Meanwhile, the world has turned into a global village and there now exist international languages with the owners’ ways of life. The latter seems to have subsumed the culture and tradition of others who are borrowers of the international language. Where then lays the fate of Africans, between the preservation of their indigenous languages and the risk of being left out and behind the rest of the world if they do not simultaneously come to terms with international languages. It is these issues of language and education, as well as globalization and African territorial integrity that this study examines separately and jointly with a view to juxtaposing them. The study then recommends balanced ways out of the dilemma one of which is the compulsory use of the mother tongue by Africans as the medium of instruction at the foundational level of education.

URLhttp://oaji.net/articles/2014/457-1420056486.pdf
DOI10.33225/pec/13.57.08
Refereed DesignationRefereed
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