Sociolinguistics and Language Education.pdf

552 Part 7: Language and Education
and communicative repertoire in their widest sense, including different language
varieties in bilingual or multilingual settings, different dialects,
creole varieties, styles, registers or other differentiated language use in
monolingual settings, as well as multimodal and literate varieties; in
Rymes’ apt phrase ‘the collection of ways individuals use language and
literacy and other means of communication (gestures, dress, posture,
accessories) to function effectively in the multiple communities in which
they participate’. Likewise, biliteracy, as I use the term here and elsewhere,
encompasses not only bilingual, but also trilingual and multilingual repertoires,
and indeed any differentiated communicative repertoire. Instances
of biliteracy may include biliterate classrooms and programs, and also
events, actors, interactions, practices, activities, sites, situations, societies
and worlds.
All teachers are language planners in the classroom (Lo Bianco) and the
decisions and actions educators take around language have profound
implications for learners’ futures (Kasper & Omori, McGroarty, Norton).
This is as true for Indigenous, immigrant and other language minority
learners (Kamwangamalu, Rymes), as it is for second and foreign language
learners (Higgins, Kubota, McKay, Sidnell), for heritage language
learners (Duff, Reyes), for dialect, creole, or pidgin speakers within socalled
monolingual settings (Siegel), for Deaf learners (Duff ), as well as
for differentiated language use along the lines of gender and sexuality
(Higgins), ethnicity (Reyes), class and race (Alim), style and styling variation
( Jaspers), literate and multimodal practices ( Janks, Street & Leung,
Vaish & Towndrow), and other fl uid and complex communicative practices
(Pennycook). Here, drawing from all the foregoing chapters, and
using the Limpopo instance and the four themes above as frame, I will
highlight some of the ways in which language and language use shape
and mediate young peoples’ participation in educational opportunities
and, ultimately, their contributions, real and potential, to their communities,
societies and the world.
Power, Ideology and Equity: Contexts of Biliteracy
Limpopo’s CEMS program emerged in the ideological and implementational
space opened up at the end of apartheid and the establishment of
South Africa’s new Constitution in 1993, recognizing 11 offi cial languages
(Hornberger, 2002). In the years immediately following the birth of the
New South Africa, Ramani and Joseph joined colleagues in advocating
that universities develop multilingual language policies, require the teaching/learning
of African languages as subject and introduce their use as
medium of instruction (Granville et al., 1998; Joseph & Ramani, 1997).
They went on to match their words with deeds, in founding CEMS.
Drawing on their experience with CEMS, they argue that acquisition