By Maryna Parfenchuk
The 21st of February is International Mother Language Day as proclaimed by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) in 1999. If we go to the official UN website (http://www.un.org/en/events/motherlanguageday/), we can see their small article on this holiday stating the following, “Languages are the most powerful instruments of preserving and developing our tangible and intangible heritage. All moves to promote the dissemination of mother tongues will serve not only to encourage linguistic diversity and multilingual education but also to develop fuller awareness of linguistic and cultural traditions throughout the world and to inspire solidarity based on understanding, tolerance and dialogue.”
The UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova emphasizes, “Mother languages in a multilingual approach are essential components of quality education, which is itself the foundation for empowering women and men and their societies.”However, is it so? Is it true that many languages add to both our cultural and personal diversity?
In sociology, there is a term called ‘Radical Immanence’ which is normally called ‘complexity’ meaning that everything is connected and is a result of complex processes. Let’s see how it actually works with language. As we live in a capitalistic society it would make sense for language to be a source of profit and money. All kinds of education, work and everyday life come down to using language, which includes the use of reading and writing materials, such as books, pens and notebooks and means of obtaining information such as the use of newspapers, computers and television. . Thisadds up to consumption and production of more goods, thus leading to prosperity and enrichment of companies and businesses while trees continue to be cut without reforestation, pollution levels become higher and higher and labor continues to be as cheap as possible.
Believing that language adds up to uniqueness of our culture, we tend to forget that it also becomes our biggest limitation. According to the German sociologists Sybille Krämer and Horst Bredekamp , “the manipulation of alphabetic and numerical signs is blocking sense and understanding” What they mean to say is that language is blocking our understanding of the world around us, because texts do not always have meaning and feelings do not have words.
Education creates numerous terms and, hence, narrows the accessibility of knowledge only to those who understand those empty words. Scholars and academics are writing papers upon papers, books upon books, undertaking researches to show their mastering of the terms but not the sense behind it. Society has turned to a point where we justify and judge one’s cleverness by one’s ability to talk, to use language and to master terms that nobody understands. Even in this article, I have already mentioned the term ‘Radical Immanence’ which was probably created by some clever guy who was too smart and definitely too bored. I would not understand the works of physics, business or computer science as much as other people who have no interest in the social sciences would understand scholarly articles on sociology or politics. This is because of the difficult language used to convey these topics which creates a gap between the reader and their essential right for knowledge.
Languages also help to create the shift towards in-equality. Because certain countries are considered to be superior to others, some languages become more important than others. For instance, the European languages which are mostly taught in any university or school around the globe are considered to have value and pride because their mastery adds to one’s CV and reasonably increase chances for a successful future. How many people would actually like to learn languages like Ukrainian, Afrikaans, Maori or perhaps even Thai? Because why should we spend so much time and effort on learning something that cannot be used forfuture benefit? Why should the developed countries think about the languages of the so-called ‘Third World’ and create a bridge between cultures if they can simply turn it into a wall which will protect theirs? At least, it will serve as a motivation for the ‘under developed’ world to make an effort in learning and, if successful, unlock all the wonders and pleasures of the world (read: Western world) ). It is interesting to note how a language is affected by Westernization: the powerfully developed and educated West deciding the destiny of weak, illiterate and underdeveloped rest of the world.
It feels like from all the diversity and beauty of the languages we come to one notion of an’international’ language, namely English, which chops down “our tangible and intangible heritage” (as suggested by the UN), making the world ‘monoculture’Then where is the “multilingual approach”, , where is “quality education”, where is the “foundation for empowering” that Bokova suggested?
I agree there are many positive sides to the issue of multilingualism and I know that I myself am very involved in this circle of both consumption and Westernization. However, what I aim to do is to make you think a tiny little bit. Perhaps we can buy as many things we need but not as many as we want. Perhaps we should promote our own Western and non-Western cultures and scientists. Perhaps we should give the word to other non-established opinions. Perhaps we should express our thoughts in a simple manner.As one of the greatest authors of all times, Leo Tolstoy said, “ The surest sign of truth is simplicity and clarity. A lie is always complicated, pretentious and verbose”.
Maryna Parfenchuk, Class of 2018, is a Sociology and Politics major from Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine.
