Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures and tables
- Acknowledgements
- Editors’ note
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Chapter 1 Conditions under which language policy affects social stability
- Chapter 2 The case of the Catalan language: Some lessons
- Chapter 3 Language and hegemonic power: How feasible is conflict management by means of language policy?
- Chapter 4 The language issue and the quest for lasting peace in Africa: Prospects and challenges
- Chapter 5 The role of language in the process of constructing, preserving and reinforcing peace in Africa
- Chapter 6 Language policy and identity conflict in relation to Afrikaans in the post-apartheid era
- Chapter 7 Linguistic politics and the Northern Ireland peace process
- Chapter 8 Language policy and conflict management: A view from Galicia
- Chapter 9 Overcoming ethno-liguistic divisions: Developing educational materials in post-war Bosnia-Herzegovina
- Chapter 10 On language and peace: Some theological remarks
- Abbreviations and glossary
- Author biographies
Chapter 5 - The role of language in the process of constructing, preserving and reinforcing peace in Africa
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 March 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures and tables
- Acknowledgements
- Editors’ note
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Chapter 1 Conditions under which language policy affects social stability
- Chapter 2 The case of the Catalan language: Some lessons
- Chapter 3 Language and hegemonic power: How feasible is conflict management by means of language policy?
- Chapter 4 The language issue and the quest for lasting peace in Africa: Prospects and challenges
- Chapter 5 The role of language in the process of constructing, preserving and reinforcing peace in Africa
- Chapter 6 Language policy and identity conflict in relation to Afrikaans in the post-apartheid era
- Chapter 7 Linguistic politics and the Northern Ireland peace process
- Chapter 8 Language policy and conflict management: A view from Galicia
- Chapter 9 Overcoming ethno-liguistic divisions: Developing educational materials in post-war Bosnia-Herzegovina
- Chapter 10 On language and peace: Some theological remarks
- Abbreviations and glossary
- Author biographies
Summary
The aim of this paper is to raise awareness on issues relating to the specific role currently played or which could be played by languages in the process of constructing, preserving and reinforcing peace in Africa. The study addresses this crucial issue, which requires collaborative and interdisciplinary research, pertaining to the different spots of tension and conflict which are spreading all over northern Africa and sub-Saharan African countries. The focus on the Cameroon experience is an attempt to stimulate global research on the issue.
In the following pages, we wish to show through the Cameroonian experience and that of some other African countries how a non-exclusive linguistic policy could help to avoid conflicts in spite of the prevailing African linguistic and cultural diversity. Here, we are not talking of armed conflicts, but of frustrations which could justify the initiation of an armed uprising. We shall thus briefly present and describe the multilingual context of Africa and Cameroon before proceeding to the history of language policy models discussed and then developed and implemented in Cameroon 30 years ago by researchers and scholars, and which are still in use today. This discussion will help us to establish the parameters for the management of languages as a guarantor of peace and as a conflict avoidance tool in multilingual contexts.
The multilingual context of Cameroon and the potential sources of conflicts
Multilingualism in Cameroon
The multilingual nature of Cameroon is characterised, on the one hand, by the presence of two official languages, English and French, languages inherited from colonial education at the beginning of the last century. These languages were respectively established in the Western and Eastern parts of Cameroon by the colonial and the post-colonial administrations as the languages of administration, communication and education. On the other hand, 239 living local languages are identified in Cameroon, according to the latest estimates of the authors of the Atlas Linguistique du Cameroun revised version (Ndongo Semengue & Sadembouo [forthcoming]).
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Language Policy and the Promotion of PeaceAfrican and European case studies, pp. 47 - 58Publisher: University of South AfricaPrint publication year: 2014