Biculturalism, blhnguahsm and scholastic 9
9
9
9
achievement in T u n i s i a Chadly Fitouri
For nearly a century the problems of bilingual education have been the subject of much discussion and heated controversy. Only recently has a more level-headed approach been taken to such problems--due partly to the development of language sciences and partly to the progress made in cultural anthropology. It is therefore not surprising that in a country like Tunisia the problems of bilingual education were seen, both before and after the period of the French protectorate, only in terms of a political and educational choice determined by linguistic and cultural dependence. The French language was regarded as the key to the modem world before and after the country became independent, implying that Arabic was not such a key and was even a straitjacket that for centuries had confined the nation to decadence. On such a basis the choices and judgements which influence these choices have much more to do with the culture conveyed by these languages than with the languages themselves. Hence, if one wishes to analyse fully this kind of linguistic situation, one is obliged to focus on cultural phenomena.
Chadly Fitouri (Tunisia). Before joining the International Bureau of Education (Geneva), where he is a divisional director, the author was formerly a Professor at the ~cole Normale Supdrieure of Tunis and director of the Institute of Education of Tunis. Author of numerous articles on Arabic/Muslim culture, bieulturalism and bilingualism.
In a recent book ~ the present author tried to draw a distinction between language and culture, while attempting to show, through various surveys and tests, that in the daily life of people who have to deal with two languages and cultures, language often masks, induces or reveals cultural phenomena. Just as we have tried to refute the arguments based on linguistic determinism in order to establish a scholastic determinism--or better still a more realistic and practical educative determini s m - s o we have tried, by comparing and contrasting the influence of the socio-economic environment to which each child belongs with that of his socio-cultural level, to reject a certain kind of economic determinism which claims to govern the whole psychological and academic development of the individual. To ensure that our views on the relationship between language and culture are neither purely theoretical nor dogmatic, we followed a cohort of pupils throughout the whole of their primary schooling~- to observe how they progressed and how their numbers changed as they went through school, particularly when they began studying French in their third year. Adversaries of bilingualism have constantly attributed the Tunisian pupil's difficulties to bilingual education, pointing out that he experiences most difficulty when he begins learning the second language. Our task was to examine that assertion, to identify the nature and extent of these difficulties and above all to see whether they were experienced by all
Prospects~ VoL XIV~ No. I~ I984
76
ChacllyFitouri
pupils, regardless of their social category, and whether they were superficial and ephemeral or deep and lasting, having repercussions on the pupil's whole education. Two methods of assessment were employed, namely evaluation by the teachers of each pupil's school results (expressed by the symbols + , o and --, according to whether the results were good, average or poor) and the number of marks obtained at the end of each year in the Gille mosaic test. 3 The teachers' assessment, especially when expressed on a three-point scale, may seem random and subjective. It gains in value, however, as it was conducted in schools associated with teacher=training colleges, with well-experienced teachers. An approximate assessment may be acceptable in place of a laboriotis calculation of annual averages which, despite the fact that they are expressed in figures, are scarcely more accurate. In addition, studying the results enabled us to detect a certain correlation between the teachers' assess= ment and the results of the Gille mosaic test, and to establish that those two sets of data could be used to provide a reasonably accurate forecast of pupils' success in school in general, and their success in the secondary-school entrance examination in particular. This study enabled us to come to the following three conclusions: I. The discrepancy between first=year and second-year results seems to be more or less the same whatever the school, the economic level4 or the socio-cultural category5 of the pupil. This would seem to indicate that during the first two years of school in which Arabic is the only language used, all pupils progress at the same rate, even if they are at different levels. ~. Pupils' progress from the first to the fifth year of primary school confirms the initial classification of pupils provided by the Gille mosaic test. In other words, from the first year onwards, the best pupils maintain their position throughout. 3. In the third year, the best pupils show a more or less marked improvement, whereas
pupils from the middle or low socio-cultural brackets and particularly those from underprivileged groups show signs of stagnation or even regression in the test results. The most significant factor, in our view, is the considerable progress made in the third year by the best pupils in the class. This is the year when Tunisian pupils begin to learn French. This seems to cause the more gifted pupils to blossom and leads to a real explosion of ability, whereas the mental development of the others slows up or even regresses. In addition, the less gifted rarely go further than the third year, which thus becomes the first real selective test in the Tunisian education system. Since learning French as a foreign language is comparable in difficulty to learning any other subject on the curriculum, it cannot alone provide an explanation of exaggerated progress on the one hand and stagnation or regression on the other, especially in a social and school environment which is steeped in, if not saturated by, the French language. These in our view can only be surface phenomena, the visible part of a much deeper process which the school, or rather the learning of French at school, will gradually reveal. In fact for the category of pupils who show considerable progress in the mosaic test (between thirty and forty points) when they begin to learn French in their third year, one plausible explanation lies in the role and status of the French language and culture in their family environment. The greater prestige of the French language in the privileged population groups explains why school is fully satisfying for pupils from this type of family background only when they begin to learn French. It is as if, when bilingualism first appears, the pupil discovers and establishes a link between his family environment, which is naturally bilingual, and the school which becomes bilingual in the third year. This feeling of gratification cannot, however, explain everything. In fact the progress shown by the mosaic test reveals a genuine leap forward in the mental development of these pupils. It should be noted nevertheless that these children were from the start more advanced than the
Biculturalism, bilingualism and scholastic achievement in Tunisia
others, since they were at the top of the class. It should also be pointed out, however, that their scores in the mosaic test in the second year were within the normal limits of progress (roughly between ten and fifteen points). It is as if the first two years of school (in which only Arabic is spoken) were, for these pupils from privileged backgrounds, a period of latency during which they continued to develop normally while nevertheless accumulating the experience of their family environment, until the new climate and context created by the teaching of French provided them with the practical and linguistic means of using everything they had learned. That experience is by no means purely linguistic. It is above all cultural in the anthropological sense of the term, that is, it refers to a certain view of the world and of people, which itself is derived from personal experience and from the constant influence of the family environment which imposes a certain tone and imprint on the child's experience and provides him with the material background and ideas on which that experience is based. A similar but opposite explanation may be given of the stagnation or even regression of pupils from underprivileged backgrounds when they begin learning French. In fact, even though their performance is not outstanding from the start, the mosaic test reveals that they make much clearer progress in the second year than in the third. It is as though the school environment suddenly becomes so frustrating that they experience a mental block. The family background of these pupils is, of course, decisive in creating an unfavourable attitude towards--it may even go as far as total rejection of--French language and culture. For most of them, however, much more significant than a hostile attitude towards the French language is the fact that they come face to face with a world that is totally alien to them and which is described in the very first French lessons. If these pupils have already had difficulties in their first formal Arabic lessons, they are going to be completely disoriented by the early stages of French. Their bewilderment
77
will be all the greater because everything in the teaching of French, from the sounds to the ideas, to say nothing of the writing--which completely reverses all the habits they have so recently and laboriously acquired--wiU seem to them absolutely new, foreign and hence strange. To attribute these pupils' problems solely to the difficulties of bilingualism--i.e, the early learning of a foreign language--is tantamount to making language the main target and regarding any difficult subject as the sole cause of the setback at school which results from a slowing up or even regression6 in mental development. This explanation, which is frequently put forward by teachers and parents, though plausible on the face of it, would be quite meaningless in the case of pupils from privileged backgrounds who, on the contrary, show surprising progress when they start to learn the second language. This sheds light on a fundamental aspect of the controversy which for more than a century has divided the supporters and adversaries of bilingualism. It is as if its supporters looked at the problem only from the point of view of children from privileged backgrounds and the adversaries from the point of view of those from less privileged homes. From there on it seems quite logical that the arguments for and against bilingualism should be equally numerous and cogent, which leads one to the conclusion that the real problem lies elsewhere. When comparing the performance of children who are favoured by the bilingual system of education with that of children who are disadvantaged by it, the successes of the former and the setbacks of the latter often tend to be imputed to purely economic considerations, chief of which is the economic status of the family (represented by the father's sociooccupational bracket). This shifts the discussion of bilingualism to discussion of the broader topic of opportunities for access to and success at school, thereby placing the problems of bilingualism on a more general footing. We have shown v that while the economic factor is a necessary condition of
78
Chadly Fitouri
TABLE I. Changes in the numbers of pupils from the upper economic bracket, by socio-cultural category (figures in parentheses denote percentages) Year Category
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
M+T
24
24
24
24
24
T=M
37
37
T+M
17
I7
T
4
4
35 (94.59) I5 (88.23) 3 (75)
35 (94.59) I5 (88.23) 3 (75)
P
2
2
I
o
35 (94.59) I3 (76.47) 3 (75) o
Admitted m middle school 23 (95.83) 3o (87.66) II (64.7) 2 (50) o
(5 o) TOTAL
84
84
78 (92.85)
77 (91.66)
75
66
9TABLE 2. Changes in the numbers of pupils from the middle economic bracket, by socio-cuhural category (figures in parentheses denote percentages) Year Category
M+T
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
9
9
8
8
Sixth
8
(88.88) T = M
55
T + M
78
T
33
P
I5 TOTAL
I9o
54 (98.I8) 76 (97.43) 33 I5 i87 (98.42)
45 (8L8I) 58 (74-35) 20 (6o.6) 3 (20)
43 (78.I8) 54 (69.~3) r4 (42.42) I (6.66)
40 (72.72) 54 (69.23) x4 (42.42) I (6.66)
i34 (70.52 )
I2o (63.I5)
i I7 (61.57)
Admitted to middle school 5 (55.55) 34 (61.8i) 28 (35.89) o I
(6.66) 68 (35.78)
TABLE 3. Changes in the numbers of pupils from the lower economic bracket, by socio-cultural category (figures in parentheses denote percentages) Year Category
Second
Third
M + T
o
o
T =M
o
o
T + M
41
4I
88
T P
77 TOTAL
206
82
Fourth
Admitted to middle school
Fifth
Sixth
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
12
o
21
(51.2) 22
(93.18)
(26.82)
53 (68.83) I76 (85.43)
2 (2.59) 45 (2L84)
I3
(31.7) 8
(9.09) o
2I (IO.I9)
(29.26) 8
(9.09) o
20 (9.7)
I
(I.13) o I
(0.48)
Biculturalism, bilingualism and scholastic achievement in Tunisia
success, it is not enough in itself, but yet this same factor is enough to cause the failure of children below the economic threshold which we have called the poverty line. Thus, having interpreted the findings of the longitudinal study, we also need to determine how much weight to assign to economic factors and how much to cultural factors in explaining why one group succeeds and the other fails. Tables I, 2 and 3 illustrate how, within a cohort of 521 pupils, numbers changed between the first and the fifth year of primary school according to the pupils' socio-economic brackets and socio-cultural categories. Table I shows that for pupils from the upper socio-economic bracket, the chances of success for the different cultural categories are not equal. This clearly demonstrates that while economic status is a necessary condition for success at school, it is, nevertheless, not enough in itself. The fact that socio-cultural categories T and P lost, respectively, 50 and IOO per cent of their pupils by the first year of middle school appears to show that without some contact with the foreign culture, the Tunisian pupil has very little chance of succeeding in the present education system. The chances of success increase as we go from the lower to the upper sociocultural categories. Thus while the chances are nil for category P, they increase progressively from category T to category M + T. While this observation is valid for the three socio-economic brackets under consideration, it is even more interesting in that it demonstrates the fact that pupils need some cultural tradition behind them (even that of socio-cultural category T) if they are to cope with the clash of two cultures at school. Actually, pupils in categories T and P manage to get through the first and second school years quite normally. However, only 35.43 per cent of the former manage to reach the fourth year, and at this stage the pupils from category P are literally decimated (4.5 per cent of the original population remaining). In other words, to succeed in learning a second culture or a second language, the pupil must be well rooted in his own cultural tradition. In the specific situation under study, social mobility,
79
so often put forward to justify a person's success, can be misleading. It is after all quite conceivable---especially in a country which for over twenty years has experienced a complete shake-up of its social structures--for people whose status was only recently very modest to reach the highest socio-economic brackets, but it is inconceivable that the same people should play a full part in the cultural tradition that is supposed to accompany their new economic status. In fact, cultural tradition is perhaps the most important aspect of the social heritage, and that heritage does not begin to take on substance and cannot, a fortiori become part of the individual's outlook and behaviour tmtil after its sediments have accumulated for generations and even centuries. This building-up process explains both why people find it hard to assimilate into a foreign cultural tradition and the great resistance of these traditions to the corrosive fluctuations of history. We are already familiar with the concept of 'cultural accents'. 8 We might add that when a socio-economic group loses its economic advantages in the wake of social upheavals, its members do not lose their cultural abilities. Consequently, it is ctfltural even more than economic conditions that enable them to cope to a greater or lesser degree with the education system. This fact may perhaps be seen more clearly by examining the failure rates in the fourth and fifth years than by studying the changes in pupil numbers given above. Tables 4, 5 and 6 show failure rates by socio-economic bracket, and, within each bracket, by socio-cultural category. The figures in Table 4 support the claim made above that while economic status is necessary for success at school, it is nevertheless not enough in itself. Thus while the failure rate 9 in the fourth year is 7.14 per cent for all pupils in the upper socio-economic bracket, it is 5o per cent for socio-cultural category P, 25 per cent for category T, II.76 per cent for category T + M, 5.4 per cent for category T - ~ M and zero for category M + T . Thus the performance of pupils from the same socio-economic bracket confronted by two languages a n d two different
80
Chadly Fitouri
TABLe 4. Failure rates in the u p p e r socio-economic bracket
Year
M+T
T=M
T+M
T
Fourth
o
2 out o f 37 or 5-4% o
2 out of z7 or I 1 . 7 6 % o
I out of 4
r out o f 2
6 out of 84
or 25% o
or 5o% x out o f I
or 7 . I 4 % r out o f 78
or Ioo%
or z.28%
Fifth
o
P
Total
TABLE 5. Failure rates in the m i d d l e socio-economic bracket
Year
M + T
T = M
T + M
T
P
Total
Fourth
x out of 9 or I I . I I % o
9 o u t o f 54 or I 6 . 6 6 % 2 out o f 45 or 4 . 4 4 %
r8 o u t o f 76 or 23.68% 4 out o f 58 o r 6.89%
I3 out o f 33 or 39.39% 6 out o f 20 or 30%
I 2 o u t o f I5 or 80% 2 o u t of 3 or 66.66%
53 or I4 or
T + M
T
P
Total
60 or I4 or
5 I out o f 53 o r 96.22% 2 o u t of 2 or t o o %
I 3 I out Of I76 or 74-43% 24 o u t o f 45 or 53.33%
Fifth
o u t o f r87 28.34% o u t o f r34 Io.44%
TABLE 6. Failure rates in the lower socio-economic bracket
Year
M + T
T= M
Fourth
o
o
20 o u t of 4 I
o
or 48.78% 8 out of 2 I or 38.09%
Fifth
o
cultures in the third year of primary school will vary widely according to the pupils' sociocultural category. The difference in failure rates between socio-cultural category P and category M + T removes any lingering doubts as to the selective nature of the education system and the role of cultural background in determining success at school. A child does not have to come from a bilingual and bicultural background in order to succeed in the type of school available to him. It is enough for him to be well-rooted in a cultural tradition in order to surmount, with varying degrees of success, the difficulties of bicultural education. The fifth-year failure rates are very revealing in this regard. Thus, pupils from socio-cultural categories M + T , T = M, T + M and T who managed to get through the third year succeeded in passing the
o u t o f 82 73.I7% out o f 22 63.63%
fourth year with a zero failure rate, while pupils from category P, and they alone, registered a failure rate of Ioo per cent in the fifth year after having already had a failure rate of 5o per cent in the fourth year. The same observations, with some slight modifications, can be made concerning the pupils of the middle-level socio-economic bracket. While the failure rate of these pupils is definitely higher than that of their classmates in the higher socio-economic bracket (one more indicator of the influence of economic level on success at school), the variations among the different socio-cultural categories are still very wide. Thus, while for the total population the failure rate is 28.34 per cent, iris 80 per cent for category P, 39.39 per cent for category T, ~3.68 per cent for category T + M , I6.66 per
Biculturalism, bilingualism and scholastic achievement in Tunisia
cent for category T ----M and I I . I I per cent for category M + T. In other words, the difficulties involved in having to contend with a foreign language and culture increase progressively as we go from pupils in category M q- T to pupils in category P. In addition, at this socioeconomic level and contrary to the figures for the higher socio-economic bracket, the trend continues in the fifth year with 66.66 per cent of failures for category P, 3o per cent for category T and only 6.89 per cent and 4.44 per cent for categories T + M and T -----M, falling finally to zero for category M + T. Thus the ability to surmont the difficulties of biculturalism and bilingualism seems to vary directly with the extent to which a pupil is rooted in specific cultural tradition and it is all the greater when that tradition is to some extent receptive to modem culture. Similar observations can be made for pupils in the lower socio-economic bracket. Table 6 shows first of all that socio-cultural categories M + T and T-----M are not represented in this socio-economic bracket. This is one reason why socio-economic bracket and socio-cultural category are so often confused. In addition, where the other three socio-cultural categories in this bracket are concerned, the fourth-year rate failure, which is already very high for the whole population (74.43 per cent), is 96.22 per cent for category P, 73.I7 per cent for category T and 48.78 per cent for category T + M. In the fifth year, the failure rate is 38.o9 per cent for category T + M, 63.63 per cent for category T and too per cent for category P. This shows that even pupils who are equal in their poverty and lack of material possessions are still unequal
8I
at school by reason of their different cultural backgrounds. This selection resulting from the economic status of individuals and their sociocultural background becomes more pronounced at secondary school and, eventually, at university. Thus, for the Tunisian population, Table 7 shows the results that were recorded for the entrance exam to secondary school. These results confirm previous observations which noted that the probability of success decreases as one goes from category M -k T to category P. Thus, all the data appear to indicate that the individual's cultural background is more important than his economic status in determining his probability of success at the type of school available to him. Differences in performance among pupils seem to indicate that the conflict arising from the biculturalism of Tunisian education is experienced differently as one passes from socio-cultural category M + T to category P. While the conflict does not exist at all for children in the first category whose family and social life unfolds entirely in a bicuhural and bilingual atmosphere, it is insurmountable for children in category P. It is resolved in many different ways by the children of the three intermediate categories--T ----M, T -k M and T - - t h e greatest difficulty nevertheless being experienced by category T. However, the fact that even 35.43 per cent of this category of pupils succeed in overcoming the difficulties of bicultural education demonstrates that the ability to contend with a second culture, or to acquire a second language, requires a pupil first to be weU grounded in his own authentic culture. I use the term 'authentic culture' to emphasize the fact that category P represents a
TABLE 7. Pupils a d m i t t e d to s e c o n d a r y - s c h o o l e n t r a n c e e x a m i n a t i o n s Economic bracket
M + T
Upper
23
30
II
2
o
Middle Lower TOTAL
5 o 28 o u t o f 331 o r 84.84%
34 o 64 o u t o f 92 or 69.56%
28 o 39 o u t o f r36 o r ~8.67%
o z 3 out of I27 or 2 . 3 6 %
I o I o u t o f I33 or 0 . 7 5 %
T = M
i. This figure indicates population at the start of the first year.
T + M
T
P
Ghadly Fitouri
82
TABLE 8. Progress made in the mosaic test by pupils, according to socio-economic bracket Socioeconomic bracket
Average scores in first year
Average scores in second year
Progress made in second year
Average" scores in third year
Progress made in third year
Total progress
Upper Middle Lower
I28.99 91.18 5o.8o
14o.32 99.31 55.oi
11.33 8.13 4.21
161.68 112.82 6o.44
21.36 13.51 5.43
32.69 21.64 9.64
degraded version of Arab Muslim culture, the product of centuries of decadence in Muslim society during which oral tradition--with its corollary of illiteracy--and folklore took over among the people at large from the dynamic cultural tradition which thus became the exclusive property of an 61ite. That 61ite mainrained its monopoly of culture and education until the second half of the nineteenth century, when the Nahdha (revival) movement made contact with Western culture. While not wishing to repeat what has already been said about the predictive value of the results of the mosaic test concerning success at school in general and success in secondaryschool entrance examinations in particular, 1~ we should take a close look at the progress made by each category of pupils from the first to the second year and from the second to the third year. We shall restrict ourselves to these two periods for two reasons. First of all, we want to see if, despite the teaching of French from the third year onwards, the scores obtained from year to year in the test progress in a way that is comparable to the scores of the French population. 11 Secondly, because the failure rates are very high from the fourth year onwards, the mean scores recorded for that and for the following years--and afortiori the differences between them--lose all significance. The large number of drop-outs, mainly among pupils from the poorer brackets, inflates the mean figures of the remaining pupils, and thus exaggerates the differences considerably. In addition, it should be pointed out that as the population on which our work was based is not really a representative sample, one should not expect results that are entirely comparable to those recorded for the French population. The
only value of the comparison is to provide a frame of reference and to give some indication of the reasons for the differences in mean scores in the second and third years. Table 8 shows that among pupils in the upper socio-economic bracket, progress in the third year was almost double the progress made in the second year, about one and a half times more in the case of pupils in the middle bracket and a little over a quarter more in the case of pupils in the lower bracket. The figures for total progress increase roughly in a ratio o~ 1:2:3 from the lower to the upper bracket. 12The most interesting point in these findings is the considerable progress made in the third year by pupils of the upper and middle socio-economic brackets. Taking as reference points the progress recorded for the French population in the same age-groups, we have to seek in the school environment the causes of the exceptional progress made by the first two categories and the scarcely perceptible progress made by the third. The tests were taken when the groups were 81 months, 93 months and Io5 months old. For these three age-groups, the difference in average scores were respectively 19 and 18 points. 13 In other words, if these pupils had developed in a normal way, their progress in the test would have been slightly lower in the third year than in the second. Leaving aside the qow' socio-economic bracket, where the difference between the scores in the second and third years is not significant, the pupils in the upper bracket showed a difference of lO.O3 points and those of the middle bracket 5.38 points. The figures in Table 9 point to the same conclusions concerning the different sociocuhural categories. The first observation is that pupils of category T ~ M made a greater
Biculturalism, bilingualism and scholastic achievement in Tunisia
83
TABLE 9. Progress made in the mosaic test by pupils, according to socio-cultural category
Category
Average scores in first year
Average scores in second y e a r
Progress made in secondyear
Average scores in third year
Progress made in third year
Total progress
M +T T= M T+ M T P
141-65 I I7.35 85.54 62.97 42.97
I5o.94 I27.87 93.03 66.95 44.60
9.29 lO.52 7.49 3.95 1.63
I68.27 I46.46 Io6.53 72.4I 47.26
I7.33 I8.59 I3.50 5.46 2.60
26.62 29.I I 20.99 9.41 4.23
improvement in the second and third years than did those of category M + T who, as we saw above, came out first in terms of successful promotion from one school year to the next and of passing the secondary-school entrance examination. All the data indicate that this category of pupils is much more adapted to the present education system than the other categories. It should be noted, however, that the three bicnltural categories M + T, T = M and T + M exhibit remarkable similarities in the differences recorded between progress in the third year and progress in the second year. These differences are respectively 8.o4 for category M + T, 8.o7 for category T = M and 6.Ol for category T + M. They are only 1.51 for category T and o.97 for category P. All the data thus seem to indicate that the Tunisian education system was designed only for the bicultural categories, who exhibit a dramatic intellectual development which is in sharp contrast to the anomic condition characteristic of the pupils in categories T and P. The application of the term 'anomy' to the bicultural context was taken from Professor Eddy Rosseel of the University of Ghent in Belgium, 14 who states: It goes without saying that the 'bicultural' situation is a particularly favourable ground for a phenomenon like this to flourish. T h e individual who belongs to a linguistic, cultural, social, or well-defined ethnic group finds himself suddenly facing another group that is generally larger and more favoured and whose motivations, values and needs are opposed to, or at least different from, his. It follows that the individual who tries to reconcile these two systems is faced with a practically impossible task. As he becomes aware that the task is beyond him, he experiences deep
feelings of frustration which can, indeed, turn into anomie. Thus, the principal cause of anomie is the inability to solve the problems caused by the pressure exerted on the individual in a 'bicultural' situation by two linguistic and cultural systems.15
This feeling of helplessness is all the greater for children in categories T and P, for whom the present system is, from the very start--and despite the fact that the teaching is exclusively in Arabic during the first two years--a break with the whole of their past experience. The physical and administrative structure at school, teacher]pupil relationships, work routines, teaching equipment, curricula, textbooks and the language of teaching, all seem to conspire to alienate the pupils of categories T and P. The break between the family and the school environment is certainly more abrupt and more painful for children of category P than for those of category T. For the children of both groups the world of the school with its routines and rituals and the whole mythology surrounding the school experience will be perceived as a distant and hostile world in which only those who have been 'Frenchifled' to some extent can hope to succeed. These few observations should help to show the magnitude and the depth of the problems caused by bilingual and bicultural education, not only in Tunisia but also in most countries where the social and educational systems are still founded on the cultural heritage of colonialism. An Arabization which aimed merely to strengthen the relative place and role of" Arabic in a system whose goals, structures, methods and contents still perpetuated a bi-
84
Ghadly Fitouri
culmralism and bilingualism fraught with conflict, could not contribute to improving the lot of the great majority of pupils. The latest reforms of the education system, is particularly those concerning the complete Arabization of the first three years of primary schooling and the Arabization of the teaching of arithmetic and science subjects in the whole of primary education, will only defer the pupil's confrontation with the foreign language and culture to secondary school. In fact, if the Tunisian pupil does not experience the conflict when he starts to study French in the fourth year of primary school, he will soon begin to feel the tension at secondary school of being subjected to two cultures and two languages of which the national language and culture are insufficiently respected, not to say disparaged. The difficulties which most pupils of modest or deprived socioeconomic backgrounds have to face in an education system such as this do not need any further demonstration. For these pupils, inability to adjust to the school environment, with its twin corollaries of frustration and failure, has become the rule. Referring to studies already famih'ar in the United States, Colette Chiland has drawn attention to all the dangers which problems at primary school could have for the subsequent mental health of the individual, t7 Should the need for contact with the modem world continue to justify the imposition on the mass of pupils of an education system with which they cannot identify or should the entire system be radically recast so as to make it fully adapted? The answer would seem to be dictated by simple common sense. In a situation like this, however, common sense calls for a measure of boldness in the revision of the present educational and linguistic policy. As far as the present author is concerned, it is quite clear that contact with the world through learning foreign languages and cultures can be achieved quite well in an atmosphere different from the atmosphere of conflict inherited from the colonial era and in a context of transcultural education, is []
Notes I. Chadly Fitouri, Biculmralisme, bilinguisme et dducation. Nench~tel/Paris, Delachaux & Niestl6, 1983, 3oo pp. 2. This cross-sectional study was conducted in the I96os when education in the first two years of primary school in Tunisia was entirely in Arabic. French was not introduced until the third year, with a total of ten hours a week as compared with fifteen hours of Arabic, then in the fourth year it totalled fifteen hours a week as opposed to ten of Arabic. Since I975, however, fairly substantial changes have taken place. These consist mainly in the complete Arabization of the first three years and the study of Frcuch as a foreign language, not as a language for teaching mathematics and science subjects as previously, from the fourth year onwards, for ten hours a week. 3. ' T h u s called because it is composed of a great variety of tests . . . and whose objective is to diagnose the acquisition of a number of intellectual skills which should normally appear in children between six and twelve years old.' Ren6 GlUe, CLes documents de base : le questionnaire et le "test mosaique" ', in Institut National d'l~mdes D6mographiques (INED), Le ni~eau intellectuel des enfants d'~ge scolalre ( I ) , PP. 77-8, Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 195o. (Travaux et documents~ I3.) 4- A. fairly detailed survey of the socio-economic level of the pupils' families enabled us to divide the population into three brackets: high, middle aud low. 5. Another fairly detailed survey among the families enabled us to divide our pupils into the following five socio-cultural categories: Peasant category (P) speaking only colloquial Arabic. Traditional category (T) speaking colloquial and sometimes formal Arabic (diglossia). Bicultural category with a slant towards tradition (T + M); bilingual Arabic and French (A + F). Balanced bicultural category (T = M); balanced bilingualism (A = F). Bicultural category with a slant towards modernism (M + T); bilingual F + A. 6. After administering three tests to 6, 8 and I2-year-old pupils from different socio-economic brackets, using a new intelligence test, the 'Nouvelle t~chelle M6trique de 1'Intelligence', Colette Chiland made the following observations: CThe sample was asymmetrical from the start in the direction of the upper categories. The most gifted children registered an increase in I Q scores that was superior to what is normally expected when using this test, while the IQ scores of the pupils in the lowest brackets either remained the same or regressed, but to a lesser extent than the norm for this test.' Colette Chiland, L'enfant de six ans et son avenir. 2nd ed., p. I3I, Paris, Presses Uuiversitaires de France, 1973.
Bicuhuralism, bilingualism and scholastic achievement in T u n i s i a
7. Fitouri, op. cit., pp. 254 et seq. 8. Ibid., pp. I85 et seq. The concept of 'cultural accents' has been taken front J. P. Sotfietti. See his article ('Bilingualisnt and biculturalism', Modern Language Journal (Boulder, Colo.), No. 44, I96O, pp. 275-7), which draws the parallel with 'linguistic accents' in order to designate what seems ~strange' in the behaviour of a bicultural individual who has grown up in a cultural community other than his own. 9. By this is meant the percentage of pupils who did not go up from the third to the fou_m.hyear. Similarly, the failure rate in the fifth year means the percentage of pupils who did not go up from the fourth to the fifth year. Io. See Iustitut National d']~tudes D6mographiques (INED), Le niveau intellectuel des enfants d'dge seolaire ( I I ) , pp. 38-9, Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1964. (Travanx et documents, 23.) t i. Institut National d'1~tudes D6mographiques (INED), Le niveau intellectual des enfants d'~ge scolaire ( I ) , Op. cito p. I51, i2. Pupils at the end of their third school year are normally between zo2 and Io5 months old. French pupils of that age-group improve their total scores by between 34.2 and 51.5 points (see ibid., p. 6i). I n Tunisia~ only pupils from the upper socio-economic bracket approach these figures. IS. Ibid., p. 155. This indicates that a slightly lower level of progress should normally have been recorded for the third as well as for the second year. 14. The author, quoting Hugo Baetens-Beardsmore~ ('Anomy in Bicultural Education', in M. De Gr6ve and E. Rosseel (eds.), Probl~mes linguistiques des enrants de travailleurs migrants~ pp. 9-22, Brussels, AIMAV & Didier, I977), defines anomy as follows: Ca state of lawlessness or n o r m l e s s n e s s ; . . , a state of society in which normative standards of conduct and belief have weakened or disappeared; . . . a similar condition in an individual, commonly characterized by personal disorientation, anxiety and social isolation; 9 a feeling of being cut off front the normal world; 9 . . loss of the ability to find the words for familiar objects or symbols.' 15. Eddy Rosseel, Un objectif majeur, pour l'enseignement des langues en milieu multicultural : le ddpassement de l'anomie, p. I5, Paris, Centre Mondial d'Information sur rl~ducation Bilingue (CMIEB)~ 1978. (Cahier No. 1o.) 16. See Bilan du ddveloppement de l'dducation en Tunisie, a report submitted by the Tunisian National Commission to the Fifth Regional Conference on Educational Policies and Co-operation in Africa (MINEDAF V), 28 June-3 July 1982, Harare, Zimbabwe. 17. Chiland~ op. cit.~ pp. 263-4. 18. Fitouri, op. cit., pp. 277 et seq.
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