On today's show, I asked the question "Why do some Nigerian parents, living with their children IN Nigerian forbid them from learn their native tongue"!
Living in the UK you find many other cultures actively encourage their children to learn not only about where they originally come from, but also their native dialect. So you could find a child born in the UK, who has never been out of the UK, conversing with its mum or dad FLUENTLY in their native tongue. Now that might be because they only speak their native tongue whilst in the home and talk to 'the wider world' in English. I think in doing this it in stills a sense of pride and belonging within that child.
OK, so that's for kids outside of their 'home' country. But why on earth, would you forbid the promotion and cultivation of your own culture, in your own country within your own kids?? By doing so aren't you saying really, that 'away' is better than home? That you have nothing really to be proud of? That to progress and be successful in life you need to minimize your 'ethnic-ness' and adopt the twang or purr of another language/culture?
Me o, I'm all for speaking well i.e grammatically , but that doesn't mean that I have to pretend not to come from where I DO come from.
The danger with not promoting or encouraging our kids to embrace their culture is that we could end up with a generation which has lost its identity and who are frantically trying to re-define themselves based on 'away people's' thinking.
Anyway sha, I'm just thinking aloud........
good to see this....
ReplyDeleteHere, here! `what I find amazing is our peeps at home are even more 'westernised' than we who live 'away'! I have loads of friends living in UK who have made it a point to speak to their children in Yoruba so at least their children understand the language even if they can't speak it but as you said kids living in 9ja have to take Yoruba lessons like it's chinese or something!
ReplyDeleteWe definitely have lost the plot somewhere :-{