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Undoing Education – Learning: Decolonising the Mind Module

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Undoing Education – Learning: Decolonising the Mind Module Undoing Education – Learning: Decolonising the Mind Role Name Affiliation National Coordinator Department of Sociology, Subject Coordinator Prof. Sujata Patel University of Hyderabad Department of Studies in Paper Coordinator Prof. R. Indira Sociology, University of Mysore Dr. Shalini Suryanarayan Hindu College, University of Content Writer Delhi Prof. R. Indira Department of Studies in Content Reviewer Sociology, University of Mysore Language Editor Prof. R. Indira Department of Studies in Sociology, University of Mysore Technical Conversion Module Structure Undoing Education – Learning: Introduction, Language and learning, The Indian situation, Decolonising the Mind Mahatma Gandhi on Education, Decolonising the mind: The Gandhian alternative, Rabindranath Tagore, The scenario in post-independence India, Theorizing the Language Debate, An alternate view, Evaluation, Conclusion. Description of the Module Items Description of the Module Subject Name Sociology Paper Name Education and Society Module Name/Title Undoing Education – Learning: Decolonising the Mind 10 Module ID Decolonising the mind is to do with establishing new Pre Requisites paradigms for knowledge production that are free from the biases of colonisers’ knowledge. The ultimate goal of decolonising the mind is the transformation of society; it is a discourse of freedom that is non-western and non-euro- centric. Objectives This module is designed to explain the fundaments of decolonisation of the mind. It shows the significance of language as the medium of education as the central category in the discourse of decolonisation. Key words Language, learning, decolonising the mind, freedom UNDOING EDUCATION – LEARNING: DECOLONISING THE MIND Key words: Language, learning, decolonising the mind, freedom A people which takes no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants. — Thomas Babington Macaulay. Introduction The wise often say that one must first unlearn in order to be able to learn. The principle involved here is quite absurdly simple. It is like creating space on your computer to save data. If you want your mind to receive and assimilate new knowledge, you may have to make a conscious effort to purge yourself of embedded bits of older knowledge and make a fresh start. If we transpose this to a higher level of abstraction and review the entire philosophy of our education system, we realise that as learners we are recipients of a knowledge that belongs to and is legitimated by a particular class – and through the process of education, layers after layers of this knowledge are plastered on our minds, erased, then re-plastered, and the process continues through our lives. If we pause to reflect, we realise that our mind is constantly being subjected to the dominion of outside forces and our true disposition has been quite effectively quelled. The mind becomes like a colony for outside powers and our own worth and potential is replaced by the needs and yardsticks of those who colonise it. In this module you will explore this very aspect of the systems of education and learning. If freedom is the ultimate goal of every human, then at some level this freedom has to be experienced by freeing the mind from the shackles of an education that is alien to us. The question of language becomes central to this discourse on education and freedom. We articulate our curiosities, our anxieties, our desires and our aspirations through language. In this module we reflect on how education conducted in a language that does not belong to a people, as it were, can also be a mechanism for domination. We usually conceptualise colonialism in its territorial, politico-economic, social and cultural aspects, but often tend to overlook that colonial powers, as well as groups and classes within a society, gain stronghold over others through controlling the mental structures of the people that they wish to reign over. The most effective way of gaining control over the mind is through the educational system, and the language in which knowledge is produced and given out becomes the arbitrator of that colonial conscience. The idea of decolonising the mind therefore is to give oneself the chance not only to think for oneself, but to be able to pose questions about one’s existence in the primary language in which one’s thoughts reside. Language and learning The human species is endowed with the ability of language. Language is our primary medium of communication. It is the means through which all our learning is imparted. Language is the pivot upon which our ideas and mental constructions rest. The role and significance of language can thus never be sufficiently stated. We comprehend and express our identities through language – be these of caste or race, religion or creed, gender or sexuality. The language in which we think is usually the language through which we conceptualise and make sense of the world around us. Language is thus central to our existence. Acclaimed linguist and psychologist, Lenneberg, popularised the view that there is a critical period usually sometime between shortly after birth till the age of puberty, when children can most effortlessly acquire languages. Beyond this age it is usually difficult to acquire a language and requires much effort and is ultimately less successful. Education is largely a linguistically driven process. Recognising the importance of language, educational theorist Paulo Freire favoured imparting learning through the medium of one’s own native tongue. In his campaign for teaching older people to read and write, Freire felt that they should be made to relate to knowledge as proximately as possible to their own conditions of existence and this is best achieved through communicating in one’s own language. According to Freire, the tyranny of the educational system reflected the tyranny of society, and the means to decolonisation was the concerted struggle for freedom which included but was not limited to attaining a libertarian education. The Indian situation In India, there has always been a linguistic divide between the elite and the masses. In the past, Sanskrit used to be the language of the literati and the interpreters of knowledge became the conscience keepers of society. Throughout Indian history, the language of the court has been the language of knowledge, trends and lifestyles; the poor usually getting further marginalised due to the linguistic gulf – whether between Sanskrit and local languages, or Persian, and subsequently, English. The case of English is the most ubiquitous illustration of colonisation through language. English education came to India during the time of the rule of the East India Company. Thus the Indian educational system had been well and truly colonised even prior to the formal declaration and enactment of the ‘British Raj’. Lord Macaulay was a strong advocate of the use of English as the medium of education, and his educational proposals got enacted through the English Education Act of 1835 under the tenure of Lord William Bentinck who was then Governor-General of India. This remained the cornerstone of the British-Indian educational policy and in fact also spilled over into the Indian educational system even after Independence. The very stated objective of this educational paradigm was to assist the colonial powers in their rule – that it also produced a class of thinking intellectuals who would eventually lead India to its freedom was verily an unintended consequence of this policy. To quote Macaulay: It is impossible for us, with our limited means, to attempt to educate the body of the people. We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern,—a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect. –Thomas Babington Macaulay, Minute on Education, (1835). … To that class we may leave it to refine the vernacular dialects of the country, to enrich those dialects with terms of science borrowed from the Western nomenclature, and to render them by degrees fit vehicles for conveying knowledge to the great mass of the population. – (Macaulay’s “Minute on Education” arguing for the use of English in India) But to be fair to Lord Macaulay, as he reasoned for the spread of English education, he mentioned that one of the functions of that ‘class’ of subservient people would also be to reinvent knowledge in the vernacular. Today the term Macaulayism is used for this doctrine of consciously trying to annihilate indigenous cultures through the planned substitution of the alien culture of a colonising power through the education system. Mahatma Gandhi on Education Mahatma Gandhi was a vociferous critic of this model of education for Indians. He was not anti-English per se, but more due to the colonial context, in which the language had been introduced as the medium of instruction to be an instrument of British rule in India. Moving amongst the masses, he realised that lack of fluency in English was taking away the self-esteem of Indians. “I find daily proof of the increasing and continuing wrong being done to the millions by our false de-Indianizing education.” … “We seem to have come to think that no one can hope to be like a Bose unless he knows English. I cannot conceive a grosser superstition than this. No Japanese feels so helpless as we seem to do ...” The medium of instruction should be altered at once, and at any cost, the provincial languages being given their rightful place. I would prefer temporary chaos in higher education to the criminal waste that is daily accumulating. According to Mahatma Gandhi, receiving western education, we grow up in awe of the west and imitating the west. So educated, we lose our capacity for original research or deep thinking, and lack the qualities of “courage, perseverance, bravery and fearlessness”.
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