Linguistic imperialism: African perspectives

Ninety per cent of the population in Africa today speak only African languages. (Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o 1992: 27) Seventy per cent of South Africa's population understand Zulu. (Neville Alexander in Bhanot 1994) There's no such thing as Nigerian English. (Achebe 1992: 73) This is a response to a recent article in ELT Journal on aspects of African language policy (Bisong 1995). Among the points taken up are: research evidence from African scholars; multilingualism and monolingualism; proposed changes in language policy from the Organization for African Unity and in current initiatives in South Africa; the language that literature is written in; bilingual education; and whose interests ELT is serving.