Language and Learning in a Post-Colonial Context

A Critical Ethnographic Study in Schools in Haiti

Marky Jean-Pierre

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781134629886
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Theory & Practice

This book explores the social, political, and historical forces that mediate language ideology and practices in post-colonial education and how such ideology and practices influence students' academic achievement. Jean-Pierre provides empirical evidence that a relationship exists between language practices and school underperformance.

He takes Haiti as the focus of study, finding that students and teachers experience difficulty constructing knowledge in a setting in which the language they speak at home (Creole) differs from the language of instruction (French). The research is based on ethnographic data collected in classrooms in both private and public school settings in addition to different sectors of the society (e.g. state and private institutions).

1 Introduction

While discussing language-in-education issues in Haiti with two school principals and a group of teachers in Vilterèz, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, the following comments were made:

Mrs. B (a first grade teacher) said, “Creole is our mother tongue, whereas French is the language of instruction. To make sure that my students understand a text that is in French, I have to explain it and translate it into Creole so they can get it because the Creole is in their veins. In first grade, particularly, they are not familiar with the French language. When we want them to learn something in French, we have to make them repeat it. We have to make them rehearse it, rehearse it, and rehearse again so they can learn it.”

The principal of the school where the discussion was being held said, “Here is the problem: it is only in the school that the child has access to a little French. Once s/he is at home, the child is completely immersed in Creole. It is difficult for the child to learn well because they do not speak French at home.”

So I asked the group, “What would be better for children, instruction in French or Creole?”

The third grade teacher replied, “Instruction has to be in French given that most books are in French. Besides the reading and grammar books that are in Creole, the books are all in French: experimental science books, social science books, math books; even though students do not understand them most of the time.”

Then, referring to the wider societal context, the fourth grade teacher added the following comment: “Anyway it would not be a good idea to teach the children in Creole because in most offices people tend to ignore someone who cannot speak French. One has to speak French to get people’s attention. They despise you if you speak Creole. They think that you are from a low social background. They tend to give priority to someone who speaks French.”

The vice principal of the school, who was also in the meeting, agreed, saying, “Yes, this is true. And it is not only in offices that this happens, it happens even when you go to see your doctor.”

The fourth grade teacher took the floor again and added, “People attribute great importance to someone who can speak French wherever s/he goes. So we have the obligation to speak French.”

I then asked them, “So, being able to speak French seems to be the solution?”

The 6th grade teacher replied, “Well, we have a serious problem in this country. Our nation rejects its own culture and values other cultures. Creole is ours, but French is not. When I go somewhere I have to force myself to speak French. So, in the school also we have to do our best to help students to learn some French to be able to fend for themselves in the society.”

The second grade teacher then said, “The students speak Creole but they cannot write it.”

The third grade teacher picked up on this point, saying, “Even us, we learn to write in Creole only in our adulthood.”

The discussion continued thus. As the conversations came to an end, three teachers offered the following comments in turn:

“In Haiti, in order for someone to speak French, one has to learn it just as one would learn English, Spanish, or any other language.”

“Some schools are considered great schools not because their students know anything more than other students but because they are able to say a few things in French.”

“Very often, my students fail exams because they cannot answer the questions in French. When I ask them to say it in Creole they can, but they can’t say it in French.”

Bringing this part of the discussion to a close, the principal made the following observation: “After all, we know from history that Creole was something that was used by slaves working in farms. French was the language spoken by the big people, the French people. So we inherit the same situation: Creole is considered as something that illiterate people speak whereas French is the language that educated people speak.” (Focus group discussion, May 2009).¹

The conversation above was recorded as part of the critical ethnographic study presented in this book. The conversation provides a vivid snapshot of the problems associated with language-in-education policy and practice in Haiti. After two centuries of freedom from slavery, the Haitian population faces a language dilemma that pervades different aspects of the society. According to the participants in this conversation, the language that is widely used in society is poorly represented in different domains of social life, and particularly in institutional contexts, so students have limited opportunities to employ their home language in educational settings. As Dejean (2008) has argued, the country does not have a “language problem”—Haitian² serves as a language of wider communication. From north to south and from east to west, Haitians can interact with each other in the Haitian language. Linguistically speaking, this is a significant social advantage in comparison to other societies (e.g., different countries on the African continent), where interaction among different social groups is sometimes limited by the presence of multiple languages. However, the main ‘language problem’ lies in the high status still accorded to French and in its continued use as a means of differentiation.

There is still a strong tendency to use French in public spheres, and even in private ones. The country is yet to have a constitution that delineates a clear policy on language, and more importantly, education takes place mostly in French, from primary school right up to the university level. This situation challenges traditional diglossic approaches to the study of multilingualism in society and instead, invites us to take a critical perspective and to investigate the historical, social, and cultural forces that have shaped language use in Haiti in the past and that still permeate contemporary language practices and ideologies. It also invites us to scrutinize the way the society deals with the enduring symbolic dominance of French and the consequences of this dominance. Adopting a critical, sociocultural perspective in which language is seen as a profoundly social practice, the study presented in this volume investigates the ‘language problem’ in Haiti from two angles: (1.) One that considers the social, cultural, and historical factors that have shaped contemporary language practices and ideologies (including those prevailing in education); and (2.) one that focuses on classroom routines, interactional practices, and uses of texts, distinguishing routines and practices that contribute to the reproduction of the dominance of French and to the legitimization of particular ways of knowing as opposed to those that open up spaces for more dialogic forms of interaction and for alternative ways of knowing. Both of these dimensions of language-in-education are then viewed through the lens of post-colonial theory and recent social theory, drawing on notions such as “coloniality” (Quijano, 2000) and “symbolic power” (Bourdieu, 1991) with a view to offering a deeper understanding of the political and ideological forces that interact with language practices both in society and in education.

Drawing on recent research in Haitian primary schools, I take a close look at a range of classroom discourse practices involving the use of French or Haitian as the media of instruction. I also consider different pedagogical practices, different uses of texts, and different approaches to classroom-based knowledge building. In the final part of the volume, I take account of the insights from this research and I attempt to chart out ways in which language policy and practice might be redesigned so as to provide greater support for student learning.

Addressing School Failure in Haiti

Among the French-based Creole speaking countries³ in the world, Haiti is the largest, with its 27,750 square kilometers and its 10 million inhabitants. It is the most populated creolophone country to have emerged in the post-Columbus era. Haitians who are born and who grow up in Haiti have oral fluency in Creole for everyday purposes. However, as demonstrated above, school instruction is predominantly in French, and the French language is favored in different official settings in society. Haiti has faced chronically low levels of academic achievement in its schools and high dropout rates. Although the vast majority of Haitian students learn French for the first time at school, they are expected to perform well in classroom activities and in exams, which are typically in French. Similarly, in many service encounters in offices in both the public and private sectors, employees have a tendency to interact with people in French. Members of the Haitian parliament often conduct debates in French and, although the situation is evolving, members of the government still use French⁴ when addressing the public, either face-to-face or via the media.

The Baccalaureate⁵ is the national state-mandated system of high school exams. The average number of students who succeeded in passing the Baccalaureate exams over a 10-year period (1996–2006) is estimated to be 474,000, which represents less than one third of the approximately 1.5 millions students who registered for these National State Exams.⁶ This dismal 30% success rate differs little from the results of the two previous decades, that is, from 1976 to 1996. During this period, 143,142 students passed Baccalaureate I,⁷ out of the 491,814 who took the exams, which represents a general percentage of 33% of success in twenty years. During the 2008–2009 academic year, when I was carrying out my research, 27,761 students passed the exams out of 118,539, which represents a success rate of about 23%, and during the 2013–2014 academic year, 37,493 students passed the exams out of 165,541, which represents a success rate of 22.65%.

Turning to the school dropout rates, we see another pattern of school failure. According to a study of the education system conducted in 1995 and published under the title Diagnostic technique du système éducatif haïtien (Technical diagnosis of the Haitian educational system), out of the 1,000 children who had started first grade, only 288 of them had made it to the 7th grade. Of these, only 164 reached the 10th grade, and less than a quarter completed their secondary education.⁸

Public opinion in Haiti tends to explain the problem of school failure by pointing to the political turmoil that the country has known for decades. In particular, blame is placed on the political unrest resulting from the 19-year American occupation (1915–1934), which paved the way for the 30-year dictatorship of the Duvalier regime. This was followed by a long period of political instability (e.g., ephemeral military regimes, coup-d’états against constitutionally elected presidents), and conflict during electoral periods from 1986 to the present day. Other strands of public opinion point to poverty as a key dimension of the problem of low school achievement and high school dropout rates. Rarely are issues related to language mentioned as possible sources of academic underperformance in the country.

While I was participating in a professional development program for teachers in Haiti in March 2009, a representative of the Ministry of National Education made the following comment: “Too many children fail in the school system in Haiti. We do not know if it is a problem of exam preparation, or because the teachers do not do their job, or because the students do not study… But there is a problem somewhere” (Field notes, April 2009). I followed this discussion closely, making note of the points that were raised during the session, and I kept a copy of the handout on which the training session was based. The issue of the language of instruction was never raised.

Likewise, during the focus group discussion with the group of teachers (and two school principals) in a public primary school that I referred to at the beginning of this Chapter, the language issues only became part of the discussions when one of the teachers briefly mentioned it, albeit in rather vague terms, after more than one hour of debate about the problems of the education system in Haiti.⁹

The language question is also given rather little attention in official documents about education. The National Plan for Education and Training, which was designed in 1997, does not mention language in any of its four major action plans (see PNEF, 1998 part I, p. 52), and the new Strategic Plan for Education for All only touches briefly on an action plan with regard to language in its one hundred and sixty seven-pages (Strategic Plan for Education for All, 2007, pp. 102–103).

Scholars in the field of education also appear to overlook language when writing about the Haitian education system. For example, Joint (2006), a sociologist of education, mentions several causes of school failure in Haiti, including the lack of books, the precarious socioeconomic situation of families, the problem of curricula, and the lack of teacher training (p. 172). In passing, Joint (2006) does, however, recognize that “after fourteen years of instruction, most students do not master either French or Creole, worst are the cases of English and Spanish taught as foreign languages. Nevertheless, they consider themselves to be well-educated ” (p. 173).¹⁰ Apart from this brief remark, Joint (2006) does not make any reference to the language of teaching and learning as one of the possible factors contributing to school failure in the country.

My own view is that it is vital to take into account the language of teaching and learning if we are to fully understand education outcomes in Haiti. The problems arising from the dominance of French in communicative and textual practices in schools in Haiti today are reverberations of the ambiguous language policies and practices that stem from the colonial history of the country. Thus, to understand the lived experiences of students in education today, it is crucial to take a very close look at the day-to-day interactional and pedagogic practices of classrooms and the ways in which these contribute to the reproduction of language ideologies, to the building of particular kinds of classroom relationships and student identities, and to the construction of particular ways of knowing.

As indicated in the conversation with the group of teachers mentioned earlier, most Haitian students have to learn the language of instruction through formal academic tasks. They have limited opportunities to use the Haitian language in school, and they rarely have the chance to draw on funds of knowledge from outside the classroom (e.g., about family, culture, the environment, political life, the micro-economy) or on ways of speaking learned in out-of-school contexts. As Moll et al. (1992) have emphasized, not being able to build on such funds of knowledge in a language that is familiar to them limits opportunities to access other forms of knowledge with local or global relevance.

Referring to the asymmetry between home language and school language in her model of the “continua of biliteracy,” Hornberger (1989) argues that “[there] is a need for schools to allow learners’ agency and voice in every aspect of [their instruction]” (p. 30). She also acknowledges that the reconceptualization of the use of the home language in school “requires contesting the current societal weighting of the continua towards the powerful ends and instead prioritizing the powerless ends of the continua” (Ibid.). As Hornberger and others have pointed out, language ideologies can operate as forces that impede student learning but, at the same time, such ideologies can be locally contested. In this respect, Gebhard (2004) suggests that one of the roles of research is to lay bare the forces that constrain student learning. She argues that we need to pose questions “related to the role played by power dynamics in schools as institutions and the ways in which issues of […] language proficiency are implicated in the production and reproduction of social relations and material conditions” (p. 19)

In the same vein, Hall and Walsh (2002) have argued that it is difficult “to understand […] fully how classroom discourse shapes both the processes and consequences of learning (p. 308)” if we fail to acknowledge “the larger instit...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Tables
• Chronology
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introduction
• Part I Haiti: Colonial Hierarchies and Language Ideological Legacies in the Building of a Nation
• Part II Researching and Theorizing Language-in-Education in a Post-Colonial Context
• Part III Doing Lessons in French and in Haitian in Two Schools: Texts, Talk, and Ways of Knowing
• Part IV Moving Beyond the Workings of Coloniality: Redefining Language and Education Futures
• References
• Author Index
• Subject Index