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Highlighting the Importance of Mother Tongue Education

Highlighting the Importance of Mother Tongue Education

The DUT Arts and Design Faculty, in partnership with the University of KwaZulu-Natal, recently hosted a dialogue to highlight the importance of indigenous African languages in higher education institutions in driving the transformation agenda.

Statistics have shown that many students drop out within their first year of study and those who remain are not able to finish their studies in minimum time due to socio-economical issues; the language barrier also being a prevalent obstacle.

“The failure to develop indigenous languages for the purpose of scientific and scholarly discourse means that universities in Africa are not well equipped to harness indigenous or local knowledge which is deeply embedded in communities, values, ethics, philosophies and ways of life in general,” said Professor Nobuhle Hlongwa, Dean: Teaching and Learning at UKZN’s College of Humanities.

Speakers at the event argued that students are able to express themselves better in their mother and gain full confidence, therefore, the promotion of indigenous African languages as languages teaching and learning alongside English would yield positive outcomes given the higher percentage of African students who could be mother tongue speakers of these languages.

“The transformation process involves readdressing the inequalities of the past and erasing all forms of discriminations. For us to see change in our education system, we need to accommodate African indigenous languages from the early stages of childhood development,” added second speaker Dr Hloniphani Ndebele.

– Nomtsikelelo Mthabela

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