English only, please
The Philippines is still the thirdlargest English-speaking country in the world. But more and more, we have to qualify this statement. Does it mean a deep knowledge of English, or functional English just enough to get by? And what does this statement mean – that there is only one kind of English in the world?
Linguists and language specialists have concluded that there is nothing wrong with code-switching, i.e., using English and Tagalog, when discussing difficult concepts in subjects like Science and Math. Moreover, they have found out that students in their early years (Grades 1 to 2) learn concepts better when they are taught in their native languages. In short, one’s first tongue – or the language one has imbibed like mother’s milk – is best in laying the foundation for learning. And the Department of Education has taken heed, for it has institutionalized mother-tongue based teaching in Grades 1 and 2. Which means that poor Juan and Juana no longer need to translate English words whose meanings he or she barely knows into Bisaya, or Bicol, or Tausug, then re-translated it back into English when the teacher asks for the requisite “sample sentence” or “fill in the blanks.”
But this doesn’t indicate the uselessness of English. Learning in English will still be introduced in Grade 3 for those whose first language is not English, and we are talking here of a majority of Filipinos. The foundations having been prepared, the students can now navigate the shoals of concepts and arrive at insights using another, borrowed tongue. How so? Because they would already have the confidence to form concepts and insights without translating them several times in their minds.
Dr. Isabel Pefianco Martin, again the chair of our English Department at Ateneo de Manila University (due to popular demand, if I may say so, because I want a teaching load next semester, hee-haw), wrote that in our country, “The language most feared is English. I see this in my students who joke that their noses bleed after they talk in English; in my friends who claim that they speak English only when they’re drunk; and in my doctor who suddenly switches to Tagalog after I tell him I teach English.
She continues her observation on this stance: “We see this fear of English in classes where students feel stupid because they mispronounced a word; in contact centers where applicants take accent neutralization sessions; and in English review centers that continue to mushroom in Metro Manila. Fear of English is also manifested in predictions that the country is approaching an English-deprived future; in House bills that seek to make English the sole medium of instruction in schools; and in courses or training programs that focus only on developing grammatical accuracy.” How can we banish this fear of English? As in relationships, we stop fearing somebody when we look at him or her as a friend. A friend now, exclusively dating tomorrow (if you want to follow the celebrity mode), and forevermore in the future.
Thus, what Stephen Krashen calls “affective filters” should be eliminated. These are the emotional barriers that prevent one from liking, or even loving, a language. And logically, one can like or love a language when these “affective filters” are gone.
I’ve been teaching English for 30 years at the Ateneo (so ancient) and have taught all kinds of students – from the poor, book-deprived but bright scholar from Malaybalay, Bukidnon to the cool, casual, and book-hating Fil-Am from Queens, NY. There’s also the occasional Cambodian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, or Vietnamese who has enrolled for my undergraduate or even strayed into graduate classes in the Modern Novel of the 20th Century.
I must have a reputation (or notoriety) to protect because they come to me wide-eyed and open-mouthed. Some of them would later they tell me they were children of my college classmates, and their parents made them enrol in my class. Others had seen my books displayed in National Bookstore and were amused to find that there is, indeed, a living writer in the Philippines. They had earlier assumed that every Filipino writer, like Dr. Jose Rizal, was already dead, if not on the way to martyrdom.
I hunker down to work and tell them outright to be familiar with English. In short, to live in that language, to inhabit it, to embrace it. They should read their texts, watch English-language films, listen to language CDs and love songs, trawl (not troll) language lessons in YouTube, keep a journal or a blog in English. I encourage them to talk to each other in English. So in my class, Vith the Cambodian talks to Hanh the Vietnamese in English that may be slow now, but we are going there. Maria of Malaybalay begins to string together longer sentences in English, describing the green hills of her province. To learn a language is to know its culture. Therefore, I tell them (especially students from other Asian countries) to be more open to other cultures and ways of being. In short, to open the doors and windows of their houses to the call of another language.
Another way to banish this fear is to remember that there are now many varieties of English. Its ownership is now shared by many countries and continents. English is no longer talked about in the singular form. Rather, like an organism, it has mutated into many forms. When I was studying in the UK, I heard Kenyan English from Peter Okeke and Nigerian English from Orufemi Abodundrin. When I studied later in the USA, my conversations with Felicity (from Isle of Skye, Scotland), with Marta (from St. Lucia, Caribbean) and with Bob (from Malta) sounded some kind of rich, varied, and musical English to my Project 4, Quezon City ears.
English is important and will always be so. It’s one of the 150 languages we use in the Philippines today. Studies show that Filipinos – a talented lot – speak at least three different languages. Who knows, one of them could even be English!
As the poet and UP Professor Dr. Gemino “Jimmy”Abad has said, English is no longer a foreign language. It’s already ours, for we have already colonized it. As with a T-shirt or a pair of jeans that you own, you should wear it proudly – and wear it mightily well.