Languages of Africa and the Diaspora

Jo Anne Kleifgen is Professor Emeritus of Linguistics and Education, Teachers College, Columbia University, USA. Her publications include Educating Emergent Bilinguals: Policies, Programs, and Practices for English Language Learners (with Ofelia García; Teachers College Press, 2010) and Languages of Africa and the Diaspora: Educating for Language Awareness (with George C. Bond; Multilingual Matters, 2009).George Clement Bond is the Director of the Center for African Education and William F. Russell Professor for Anthropology and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. His interests include education and elite formation in the United States and Africa, African studies, African religions and politics, agrarian transformations and cultural dimensions of urban and minority populations.

This is a rich collection of generally convergent, stimulating takes on the “Creole Exceptionalism” thesis. Extending it to African languages and African American English, most of the authors show the disastrous consequences of underrating and marginalizing these vernaculars in school. Other contributors apply the thesis to the profiling of African Americans, making it obvious that attitudes to these varieties reflect social prejudice toward their speakers. Still others show how a better understanding of structural and stylistic peculiarities of these vernaculars can be used profitably in education and the promotion of their speakers. Sadly, both contemporary Black Africa and its Diaspora still suffer from the European colonization’s legacy of devaluating the languages and manners of the subjugated populations, thereby disenfranchising them!

• 1. Introduction: Discourses of Linguistic Exceptionalism and Linguistic Diversity in Education - Jo Anne KleifgenPart 1: Language and Education in AfricaIntroduction to Part 1 - George C. Bond2. African Perspectives on Linguistic Diversity: Implications for Language Policy and Education - Sinfree Makoni and Barbara Trudell3. Language in Education in Africa: Can Monolingual Policies Work in Multilingual Societies? - Casmir Rubagumya4. Perspectives, Challenges and Prospects of African Languages in Education: A Case Study of Kiswahili in Tanzania - Peter Mtesigwa5. Languages, Literacies, and Libraries: A View From Africa - Kate Parry6. Street Setswana vs. School Setswana: Language Policies and the Forging of Identities in South African Classrooms - Susan E. CookPart 2: Language and Education in the DiasporaIntroduction to Part 2 - Jo Anne Kleifgen7. Creole Exceptionalism and the (Mis-)Education of the Creole Speaker - Michel DeGraff8. Political and Cultural Dimensions of Creole as a Regional Language in the French Antilles - Ellen M. Schnepel9. Success or Failure? Language, Tracking, and Social Stratification of Anglophone Caribbean Students - Shondel Nero10. Sierra Leonean and Liberian Students in ESL Programs in the US: The Role of Creole English - Christa de Kleine11. Continued Marginalization: The Social Costs of Exceptionalism for African Refugee Learners of English - Doris S. Warriner12. Linguistic Profiling, Education, and the Law Within and Beyond the African Diaspora - John Baugh13. On Shallow Grammar: African American English and the Critique of Exceptionalism - Arthur K. Spears14. African American English and the Public Interest - Walt Wolfram15. Rockin' the Classroom: Using Hip Hop as an Educational Tool - Jon A. YasinIndex