Multilingualism and Local Literacy Practices in Ethiopia: Language Contact in Regulated and Unregulated Spaces1

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Multilingual Margins 2014, 1(1): 74—100 55 Multilingualism and Local Literacy Practices in Ethiopia: Language contact in regulated and unregulated spaces1

Elizabeth Lanza University of Oslo, Norway

Hirut Woldemariam University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

[email protected]

Abstract The study of the linguistic landscape has provided a new dimension to theories and issues related to multilingualism, including language policy. In this growing field of inquiry, however, not enough attention has been given to the linguistic landscape in sites in the Global South. Since one of the aims of literacy studies is to reveal the variety and social patternings of practices, there is a need to compare linguistic landscape data with other various textual materials. In this article, we present linguistic landscape data from two federal regional capitals in Ethiopia that demonstrate multilingual language use. We also compare the linguistic contact patterns with those found in schoolbooks used in the same region. Such a comparison involves language use in unregulated as well as in regulated spaces (see Sebba 2009). Regional ethnically based languages are now being used in new arenas, including the linguistic landscape and education because of a new language policy promoting the use and development of regional languages. The two regional capitals provide privileged sites for examining the products of local literacy practices, involving values, attitudes, ideologies, and social relationships. We discuss the results in light of various ideologies and argue for the speaker-writer’s active mobilisation of multilingual resources in new language arenas.

Keywords: linguistic landscape, literacy, language contact, language ideology, regional languages, Amharic, multilingualism

Introduction contact between African languages is dramatically underresearched’, as most he study of written language has studies of language contact situations in- Tcome to the fore in current ap- volving African languages entail contact proaches to multilingualism. As a result, between a local and a former colonial a ‘new approach to multilingualism’, the language. While work on language con- study of the linguistic landscape (Gorter tact often deals exclusively with structural 2006) or the written language in the pub- properties of language, a more function- lic sphere has emerged. First proposed by alist perspective, as noted in Matras Landry and Bourhis (1997) as a barom- (2009: 4), rests on a view of language eter for measuring ethnolinguistic vitality as social activity for which ‘bilingual (or in Canada, this study is today a thriving multilingual) speakers have a complex field of inquiry documenting various so- repertoire of linguistic structures at their cio-cultural aspects of languages in mul- disposal’. tilingual societies (Shohamy and Gorter Literacy is conceived of as ‘situated 2008). In more recent work on linguistic social practices embedded within rela- landscape, the focus has been on signage tions of culture and power in specific con- in world cities and its role in the construc- texts’ (Prinsloo and Baynham 2008:2). As tion of social and cultural meaning in Barton and Hamilton (2000: 7) point out: multilingual urban spaces (Ben-Rafael, ‘The notion of literacy practices offers a Shohamy and Barni 2010). However, not powerful way of conceptualising the link much attention has been given as yet to between the activities of reading and the study of the linguistic landscape in writing and the social structures in which urban sites in the Global South (but see they are embedded, and which they help Kasanga 2010; Reh 2004, Stroud and shape.’ Literacy practices involve values, Mpendukana 2009). Dagenais, Moore, attitudes, ideologies, and social relation- Sabatier, Lamarre and Armand (2008) ships – in sum, how people in a particular make particular mention of the paucity of culture construct literacy, how they talk studies on the linguistic landscape in the about literacy and make sense of it. The educational domain. Showing its value, social approach to literacy as articulated Cenoz and Gorter (2008) discuss how in Barton and Hamilton (2000), Barton the linguistic landscape can be seen as (2001), and Prinsloo and Baynham an additional source of input in second (2008) emphasises the historical dimen- language acquisition, contributing to a sion to literacy. Literacy practices change type of literacy that is multimodal and and new ones are often acquired through multilingual. processes of informal learning as well as In this article, we attempt to place the through formal education and learning. study of the linguistic landscape within a The two regional capitals of Ethiopia larger framework of literacy practices. We in question provide privileged sites for do so by specifically examining multilin- examining the products of multilingual- gual language use, particularly language ism and local literacy practices. Because contact as documented in the linguistic of a new language policy promoting the landscape of two regional capitals in use and development of ethnically based Ethiopia, and by further comparing it regional languages, these languages are with language contact phenomena in oth- now being used in new public arenas, in- er texts, namely children’s schoolbooks. cluding the linguistic landscape and edu- Lüpke (2010:2) points out that ‘language cation. Ethiopia does not have a colonial

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 57 past yet English is an official second lan- languages spoken, divided among four guage and thus has a prominent place in different language families: the Semitic, the linguistic profile of the country. Hence Cushitic and Omotic families of the Afro- a focus on regions in Ethiopia provides an asiatic Phylum, and those belonging to opportunity to investigate language con- the Nilo-Saharan Phylum (for an over- tact between African languages as well as view of languages in Ethiopia, see Crass contact with English, a language usually and Meyer 2008). The Semitic languages, associated with globalisation, which has such as Amharic and Tigrinya, are spoken been recontextualised as a local language in northern, central and eastern Ethiopia. in Africa (Higgins 2009). In this article, The Cushitic languages are mostly spo- we explore the issue of language contact ken in central, southern and eastern in local literacy practices in Ethiopia, Ethiopia. The language of the largest a country considered marginal from a ethnic group in the country, Oromo, is global perspective. Focusing on regional considered by Ethnologue (Lewis 2009) capitals, we also take further steps to the as a ‘macrolanguage’, that is, ‘multiple, margins within the country. Yet the urban closely related individual languages that areas in focus in each region are indeed are deemed in some usage contexts to be centres within the margin. Such a vantage a single language’. point allows us to trace multilingual lit- Ethiopia’s major ethnic groups in- eracy practices across trajectories of cen- clude the Oromo, who speak the Cushitic tre and periphery, or margin, within one language of the Cushitic people who country and within a global perspective. make up about 40% of Ethiopia’s total In the following section, we first pre- population. The Semitic Amhara and sent an overview of the linguistic situation Tigrayans comprise only 32% of the in Ethiopia and the new language policy population; however, historically they that became operative in the early 1990s; have dominated the country politically. this overview is contextualised within an Despite the common Semitic background historical framework. Next, we present of the Amhara and the Tigrayans, their the methodology we employed in collect- languages are mutually unintelligible. ing the various data in the two regions. Amharic diverges significantly from the Subsequently, we provide an analysis of other Semitic languages of Ethiopia as a the language use and particularly the result of its extensive contact with Cushitic language contact we found in the two and Omotic languages (Yimam 2004). types of data – the linguistic landscape Amharic is used as a lingua franca and the educational texts – in light of by all Ethiopians. This practice is encour- local ideologies. In conclusion, we offer aged by a range of opportunities, includ- alternative interpretations of the patterns ing its function as a working language of we found and discuss their implications the federal government, trade, urbanisa- for multiling-ualism on the margin. tion, labour migration, displacement and other forms of migration, education and literacy, and perhaps most significantly, Multilingual Ethiopia by the high proportion of intermarriages thiopia, located in the Horn of Africa, between members of different ethnic or Ehas a population of about 80 million linguistic groups. Amharic continues to and is multilingual, multiethnic and cul- spread, both as a first language and as turally pluralistic. According to Ethnologue a second language, in spite of the intro- (Lewis 2009), there are eighty-five living duction of regional languages for wider

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 58 LANZA AND WOLDEMARIAM purposes (Cohen 2006: 171). Amharic regime. In order to conform to the ideals continues to be the most widely used lan- of socialism and to demonstrate political guage in Ethiopia and has a long literary change, the military government of the tradition. The sociopolitically dominant Derg attempted to use 15 regional lan- social group in Ethiopia has histori- guages as part of the national literacy cally used and promoted Amharic while campaign. However, while the govern- in fact, not all Amhara or all Amharic ment had declared that regional language speakers were dominant or powerful. development would be its aim, regional Nevertheless, the historical hegemony languages continued to be restricted to of the Amharic language, which has led orality. Hence, the use of Amharic as the to a form of domination, often regarded most prestigious language, particularly in as ethnic in character, has been well literacy, continued nationwide. documented. Some historians claim that In 1991, the country underwent the Amhara led the so-called ‘Abyssinian a dramatic change in regimes and Conquest’ in the nineteenth century several major political, social and eco- during which they ‘colonised’ territories nomic changes came about at the same to the south and west of the country, time (Pausewang, Tronvoll and Aalen particularly the area predominantly 2002; Smith 2008). The Ethiopian inhabited by the Oromo (Marcus 2002). People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front This claim has been disputed by other (EPRDF), the ruling political coalition historians who prefer to describe the in Ethiopia with the Tigrayan People’s process as ‘nation-building’. Nevertheless Liberation Front (TPLF) as the dominat- a strict policy of ‘amharization’ of the new ing party, was responsible not only for regions ensued, actively promoted by the the overthrow of the Derg, but also for state under Emperor Haile Selassie’s some important political changes. A new regime (1930–1974). Mazrui (2004: 6) constitution advocating a policy of ethnic points out that sub-Saharan Africans are federalism was initiated. In terms of this, rarely ‘strong linguistic nationalists (such Ethiopia’s Federal Constitution guaran- as in Asia, the Middle East and Europe, tees that persons belonging to various for example) (who) tend to resist any mas- ethnic and linguistic minorities shall not sive dependence on languages other than be denied the right to enjoy their own their own’. However, he notes that among culture and to use their own language. the exceptions to this phenomenon are Various proclamations have been made the Amhara, along with the Somali and to bring about the decentralisation of the Afrikaners. decision-making from central to regional The policy of amharisation was administrations. Today there are nine based on the assumption that the use autonomous federal regions, ethnically of one language would be necessary to based, and two chartered cities, including produce national unity. Haile Selassie’s the capital Addis Ababa. government came to a dramatic end with Until 1991 Amharic was used as the the overthrow of the regime by a mili- language of instruction and literacy in tary coup and the transfer of power to a primary education. After the downfall Soviet-backed communist junta, referred of the communist military regime, the to as the Derg. In contrast with the policy newly formed government introduced a during the former regime, there were national educational policy based on the some attempts at enhancing the status use of ‘mother tongues’ as the medium of regional languages during the Derg of instruction in all public schools. The

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 59 stated purpose of the policy was to foster are part of the linguistic landscape at national unity, identity, and development federal and regional offices, businesses, while respecting cultural diversity. Yet shops, streets, a situation that is relatively the implementation of the educational new in the Ethiopian context. Moreover, policy shows that the regionally domi- English, the de facto official second lan- nant language serves as the official work- guage in Ethiopia, is in the equation of ing language and language of education language use, alongside the national throughout the region, which is also the working language Amharic and the re- homeland of other minority linguistic gional languages that have gained status groups. Hence ‘mother tongue’ meant in through the policy of ethnic federalism. reality and still generally means the regional language. This language policy of ethnic federalism as applied to education A focus on two has its critics who argue that education in important regions in the regional languages will inhibit social Ethiopia: Tigray and and national mobility (Vaughan 2007). Oromia The policy of ethnic federalism was xamining literacy practices in two re- mainly introduced to recognise the various ethnolinguistic groups in the country, Egions that have been associated with and the goal of using ethnic/regional linguistic and social struggles can provide languages was to satisfy the diverse needs insight into the impact of language policy of Ethiopia’s multiethnic and multilin- and the ideologies associated with the gual population. There was, however, no languages. In the following, a general clear statement in the language policy introduction to current linguistic prac- about how this goal should be attained. tices in various domains in each region is In practice, this was achieved by the presented. The two regions were chosen decisions taken by official bodies. Today purposesively. regional and local languages are widely As the two largest languages of the used in the educational, administrative country aside from Amharic, Oromo and judiciary systems as well as in the and Tigrinya occupied and still occu- media. As a result, the written form of 28 py a special place in the debate about regional and local languages that were language rights and language use in formerly used only in spoken form are Ethiopia …. Oromos and Tigreans now being used in primary education, in were in the forefront of the demand for the use of their own languages official communication, and in the media in all the apparatus of modern life and the public spheres. Regional govern- in Ethiopia. Language rights were ments have developed their languages by conceived as one of the first and most creating scripts for them and are prepar- tangible facets of the recognition of ing teaching materials in them to meet other ethnicities’ rights. (Appleyard the needs of the national curriculum. and Orwin 2008: 277) The Latin alphabet has been adopted for writing most of the country’s languages Given the historical dominance of while some have opted for the traditional Amharic, one would thus expect a move Ethiopic script that Amharic uses. In the towards divergence from that language regional cities, regional languages have in the assertion of various regional lan- become visible in the public sphere: they guages’ newfound linguistic rights.

Tigray and Tigrinya instruction from Grades 1 to Grade 8. Recently, Kunama (a Nilo-Saharan lan- Tigray Regional State of Ethiopia, which guage) and Irob (also known as Saho, a is mostly inhabited by people of Tigrean Cushitic language) have been introduced (or Tigrayan) origin, is the northernmost as a subject in Grades 1 and 2 in the re- of the nine autonomous regions of fed- spective localities of the region. On the eral Ethiopia. Its current population is other hand, the role of Amharic in Tigray estimated at 4.3 million. Although there has been reduced and is currently only are major towns and urban areas, this introduced to students as a subject from federal region, with Mekele as the capital Grade 3 onwards. In addition the basic and administrative centre, is mainly com- curriculum calls for English to be taught posed of highland rural territory. Mekele, from Grade 1. founded in the nineteenth century as a According to Ethnologue (Lewis 2009), capital city by Emperor Yohannes IV, is the literacy rate in Tigrinya as an L1 is a point on a major axis of urbanisation 1%–10% while in Tigrinya as an L2, it is along the route from Ethiopia’s capital 27%. No reliable up-to-date government city, Addis Ababa, to Asmara in Eritrea, statistics are available on literacy rates. and is located 650 kilometres north of Similar to Amharic, Tigrinya uses the Addis Ababa (Tamru 2007). Since being Ethiopic script, also called Fidel. Tigrinya founded, Mekele has grown to be one of is also Eritrea’s national language and Ethiopia’s principal economic centres. since that country’s independence from The city has greatly flourished and ex- Ethiopia in 1993, the language has been panded under the current government developed making written material avail- with a significant population growth, able. Tigrinya speakers in Ethiopia, how- making it the largest city in northern ever, do not have access to this material Ethiopia. According to Census 2007 because of the political situation and also (Addis Ababa: Central Statistical Agency, because cultural exchanges do not take 2008) (the most recent available statistics), place between the two countries. The in- Mekele had an estimated total population troduction of the new language policy in of about 215,000, and a high population Ethiopia, has had positive effects on the density. Given its significant growth and development of the language and literacy thriving commercial interests in the re- in the language has increased, relatively gion, Mekele presents an excellent point speaking, especially among the younger of departure for investigating literacy generation in Tigray. practices in the linguistic landscape. Tigrinya, the official language of Tigray, is spoken by nearly three million Oromia and Oromo people in the federal region. Despite Oromia is the largest of the nine federal Tigrinya’s dominance in Tigray, there regions of Ethiopia, in both size and pop- are other minority languages spoken in ulation, covering a vast area of the south the region, including Afar, Saho, Agew, of the country. It has a population of Oromo and Kunama, all of which belong about 24 million. This region covers most to other non-Semitic language families. of the territory of the Oromo people, According to the language policy of the who had originally migrated into the area region, Tigrinya serves as the official during the 16th century and are now the working language and the language largest single ethnic group in Ethiopia of education, used as a medium of (Marcus 2002). Addis Ababa, the capital

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 61 of Ethiopia, is located in this territory. is written with a modified Latin alphabet It was considered the regional capital of called Qubee, which was formally adopted Oromia until 2000 when the Ethiopian in 1991. Various reasons were given why government moved the capital of Oromia the Ethiopic script could not be adopted, to Adama, a city that is located along a including claims that it could not cap- major road in the region that connects ture Oromo phonemic structure. This, the capital with other urban centers as however, was refuted by the linguist Baye well as with the port of Djibouti. This Yiman (1996). Pasch (2008) notes that was a highly political move interpreted the introduction of the Latin or Roman by some as an attempt to divorce the alphabet in Africa was the first attempt of country’s capital from the Oromia region mass alphabetisation on the Continent. and its people; however, the govern- However, Humery (2010) points out the ment insisted that the development of pre-colonial African tradition of Ajami, in the Oromo language and culture, as which non-Arabic languages were written provided in the new Constitution, would in Arabic script. In Senegal, writers of be best accomplished outside the capital Pular started using Roman script primar- of Addis Ababa. Adama, the new capital, ily to distance themselves from the domi- officially reverted to its original Oromo nant Ajami writing tradition for Wolof language name in 2000, but its previous (Humery 2010). Similarly, the choice of name, Nazreth, named after the Biblical the Latin alphabet by the Oromo people Nazareth by Emperor Haile Selassie, is as the basis for Oromo literacy has indeed still widely used. In 2005, following the ideological roots and may be interpreted highly contentious national elections that as an assertion of linguistic and cultural resulted in the victory of the opposition to identity in contrast with the dominating power in the city of Addis Ababa, the re- Amhara and Ethiopic script. In the first gional government of Oromia was moved six or seven years following the adoption back to Addis Ababa although Adama of Qubee, it is believed that more texts remains the cultural and economic hub were written in the Oromo language be- of Oromia. According to Census 2007 tween 1991 and 1997 than in the previous (Addis Ababa: Central Statistical Agency, 100 years. Literacy rates vary across the 2008), the population of Adama is about different Oromo-speaking areas from 1% 220,000. to 15% (Lewis 2009). As with Tigrinya, no Oromo, which is also known as Afan reliable up-to-date statistics are available Oromoo or Oromiffa(a), is the most widely spoken Cushitic language of the Afro- for current literacy rates in Oromia. asiatic Phylum. It is the official language of the federal region of Oromia, which is Methodology spoken as a first language by more than 25 million Oromo and neighboring peo- According to Barton and Hamilton ples in Ethiopia and Kenya. Since 1991, (2000), a social theory of literacy is under the new system of ethnic regions, methodologically grounded in linguistic Oromo has been introduced as a me- ethnography. The linguistic landscape dium of instruction in elementary schools study of Mekele, Tigray (see Lanza and throughout the region (including areas Woldemariam 2008 for details), was part where other ethnic groups live and speak of a larger ethnographically oriented their languages) and as a language of study on language ideology and use in administration within the region. Oromo the federal region in which both authors

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 62 LANZA AND WOLDEMARIAM participated, as they engaged in partici- Adama were selected to do fieldwork and pant observation in the heart of the city. take pictures of various types of signage. In line with what may be considered the About 100 pictures representing mono- first wave of linguistic landscape studies, lingual Oromo signs, bilingual signs an important area of the city was cho- involving Oromo and Amharic, and tri- sen, the main shopping district that was lingual signs of Oromo-Amharic-English precisely demarcated by certain streets were collected. The overall linguistic and squares. A locally trained field assis- landscape profile of Adama, though in- tant took digital photos of all tokens of teresting, is not addressed in this study. environmental print found in the public For our purposes here, special attention domain including signs, names on build- is given to the examination of signs indi- ings, advertisements, commercial shop cating language contact. signs and public signs on government The linguistic landscape data were buildings, amounting to a total of 376. also complemented with data from ran- The data were subsequently categorised domly selected student textbooks and the as public or private, and according to the accompanying teachers’ manuals used in frequency of representation of specific the two regions (see References). These languages and according to the visual were examined to check for language presentation of the languages in the ma- contact between Amharic and the target terial, polarised as top and bottom. languages. These texts were deemed Furthermore, ethnographic interviews representative of other student textbooks with randomly selected shop owners were by our research assistants. Graduate conducted with the aid of local field assis- students, native in Tigrinya and Oromo tants during which questions were asked respectively, were assigned to identify fea- concerning language choice on the shop tures they judged as not conventionally signs. Tigrayan shop owners extolled the belonging to the language in which the use of the regional language, as noted in textbooks had been written and comment their own shop signs while those whose on them. shop sign was written in Amharic were These texts had been translated themselves Amhara. from Amharic into the respective region- Based on their observation of lan- al language in accordance with the new guage contact in the linguistic landscape language policy of ethnic federalism. The of Tigray, the researchers decided to ex- texts were first published in 1992 by the plore whether the situation was the same respective regional educational bureaus, in other regions. The data from Adama with new editions issued later. During in- were collected in a follow-up study under- terviews with officers at these educational taken by the second author. Before the bureaux, we learnt that the textbooks data compilation, graduate students of had been prepared by a group of experts linguistics at Addis Ababa University who who were believed to have a good knowl- came from that region were interviewed edge of the subject and who were first and consulted to elicit their intuitions language users of the respective regional concerning the matter. They confirmed languages. The experts also had a good having observed a similar phenomenon command of the Amharic language from in Adama to that attested in Mekele, that which the materials were translated. In is, language contact between Oromo and the Oromia region, where Oromo has Amharic. Subsequently, two graduate been used as the medium of instruction students who used to reside and work in up to Grade 8, textbooks for Grade 7

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 63 and 8 were translated from English as et al. 2011: 1); this analogy is applied to there is no comparable Amharic book at schoolbooks as well. Initially, we examine that level. In this study, we focused our the texts that local shop owners write attention on language contact between for their shop signs and then we exam- Amharic and the two regional languages ine educational textual materials, with in Ethiopia and thus have limited the language contact as the unit of analysis. scope of our inquiry to textbooks translat- The issue of language contact figures ed from Amharic for grades below Grade prominently in discussions of language 7. Nonetheless we discovered during our change, which involves an innovation study that English was claimed to play a and the spread of that innovation. role even in the texts meant for younger Whether features in a language can be students. considered contact-induced change or as having evolved through internal causes or developments within a language re- Language use and quires careful scrutiny not only from a language contact in synchronic perspective but also from a diachronic one, and there is debate in the literacy practices literature (see Poplack and Levey 2009; n the following section, we address the Thomason 2011). Nonetheless in the Iliteracy practices in the two regional Ethiopian context, an exploration into capital cities. The linguistic landscape is attested examples of purported language construed as a ‘discursively constructed contact can provide the basis for further space and consequently signs as ‘frozen inquiry beyond structural description. actions’ by various actors’ (Pietikäinen Ethnographic observation has shown

Transliteration: ‘Photo central’ English: ‘Photo central’ Transliteration: ‘Video photo copy’ Tigrinya: ‘ID card laminating’

FIGURE 1 English, Tigrinya and transliteration (Lanza and Woldemariam 2008)

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 64 LANZA AND WOLDEMARIAM that given the country’s history and the practices, individual actors positioned abrupt change in language policy, people themselves towards the official language in fact perceive these instances of non- policy and to multilingualism in their conventional language use as language contribution to the linguistic landscape. contact between the previously dominant Spolsky (2003) points out the need to Amharic and the regional languages. distinguish between policy and practice in any language policy framework. An Multilingualism in the linguistic example of a bilingual sign that also landscape in Tigray and Oromia includes transliteration from English is shown in figure 1. In Lanza and Woldemariam (2008), we In private signs, Amharic is still investigated the distribution of languages used despite the new policy of ethnic in the signs of the main shopping area federalism although Tigrinya does ap- of Mekele, the capital of Tigray, where pear more clearly in Mekele’s linguistic Tigrinya is the dominant regional lan- landscape. This new language policy has guage. Results indicated that the lin- promoted language emancipation from guistic landscape exhibited three main the perceived hegemony of Amharic. languages in monolingual and bilingual Hence with an ideology favoring ethnic signs: Amharic, Tigrinya, and English, regionalism, Amharic appears weakened, and that the linguistic landscape in a view pervasive among many Ethiopians Mekele was indeed influenced translo- with some even proclaiming Amharic to cally. As expected, signs of regional be an endangered language. Nonetheless concern were in Tigrinya and signs with the influence of Amharic is still present in a national focus were in Amharic, with the linguistic landscape of Mekele. English variably co-occurring with each The influence and dominance of language. What was of particular inter- Amharic is not only at the surface level est was how through their local literacy of the signs in the linguistic landscape,

FIGURE 2 A stationery shop in Mekele

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 65 but also at the abstract grammatical level, such as the use of diphthongs (sequences as noted in many of the Tigrinya signs of different vowels) and consonant clus- that employ Amharic word order (see ters, were also noted. In some cases a Woldemariam and Lanza). A particularly particular Amharic functional element relevant linguistic construction within was included, as noted in figure 3 below. which to examine word order is the noun In figure 3 we see the Amharic phrase as shop signs invariably contain genitive marker ya occurring in both the such constructions. Noun phrases in Oromo as well as the Amharic version Amharic are right-headed while their realised in different orthographies; the equivalents in Tigrinya are left-headed. Oromo is parsed in example 2. However, Tigrinya noun phrases follow- On the surface, it appears that ing Amharic word order were attested in Amharic in the public sphere remains the linguistic landscape in Mekele. Such dominant. This is evident not only in the expressions, which are not considered ac- wide occurrence of signs in Amharic, but ceptable Tigrinya forms, are believed to also in its structure co-occurring in items be the result of the influence of Amharic from Tigrinya and Oromo in the respec- (Nega 2003). For example, various syn- tive regions. tactic structures, several of which involve English also figures in the linguistic Amharic word order, were documented landscape of Mekele and Adama. In post- for the expression ‘stationery shop’. colonial Africa, many have deplored the In figure 2, we see such a shop sign in ‘linguistic imperialism’ of English, and which the embedded noun phrase fol- critics of globalisation and its implica- lows Amharic word order while the main tions for trade in developing countries noun phrase follows Tigrinya word order, have resisted the use in the public sphere although the lexical items are all from of languages such as English that sym- Tigrinya. bolise power derived from colonialism. In Example 1, the structure is parsed Ethiopia has no colonial past and thus indicating the respective word orders. an ideology of resistance to English is not evident in the public sphere. Hence 1) [[mədəbir] [s’ihfət məsarihi]] looking at local agency in the appro- ‘shop writing instruments’ priation and spread of English as a world [[TIG] AMH]] language is relevant (see Blommaert Conventional Tigrinya structure: 2010; Stroud and Mpendukana 2009). [[mədəbir] [məsarihi s’ihfət]] Through her fieldwork in Tanzania and ‘shop instruments writing’ Kenya, Higgins (2009) succeeds in under- [[TIG] TIG]] mining prevalent conceptions of English as a global language by drawing attention There were numerous examples of to how hybridity is crafted on English Amharic structure below the surface locally. In the Ethiopian context, the level in Oromo signs as well. For instance, Ethiopian languages are predominantly while NPs in Oromo are left-headed, placed at the top of bilingual signs in- their counterparts in Amharic are right- volving English, as opposed to European headed. However, we encountered nu- mediascapes in which English is ‘on top’, merous right-headed NPs in the linguis- as the preferred language for framing tic landscape of Adama, structures that purposes (Androutsopoulos, 2012). In are not accepted conventions in Oromo. the Ethiopian context in fact there are Some phonological features of Amharic, many cases in which the use of English

FIGURE 3 Amharic genitive marker ya used in an Oromo sign (NB Oromo with Latin alphabet at top of sign)

2) Use of Amharic ya- in Oromo Sign: Kiliniika Giddugaleessa ya - hiwat clinic medium-level GEN- Hiwat

Conventional Oromo structure: Kiliniika Giddugaleessa Hiwoot-ii clinic medium-level Hiwat-GEN

‘Hiwat medium-level clinic’

did not necessarily have a communicative traditional dress. This sign indexes mo- function but rather a more emblematic dernity through the very use of the Latin or symbolic function as a marker of mo- alphabet, recognised as English by local dernity. This is evident in figure 4 from speakers, although they may not speak Mekele, in which the word modern writ- English themselves. ten in Latin script has been inserted in a In sum, the general picture of lit- sign written in Ethiopic script. eracy practices in the linguistic landscape An English speaker without knowl- of both Mekele and Adama shows the use edge of the regional language would not only of the regional language, a new not understand the sign as referring development, but also the continued use to modern clothing as opposed to of Amharic, in addition to English. What

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 67 is of particular interest is the purported use that is perceived locally as somewhat language contact between Ethiopian lan- stilted and that is associated with the con- guages revealed in the linguistic landscape text of media broadcasts. particularly at the abstract grammatical Another interesting case of textual level. production in ‘regulated spaces’ is the use of schoolbooks in Tigrinya and Oromo Multilingualism in monolingual in the elementary schools in the respective regions. As noted above, literacy schoolbooks in regional languages is a fairly recent The literacy practices described above are phenomenon and pedagogical materials not just a phenomenon of the linguistic in these languages have been developed landscape. They also involve other tex- since the language policy of ethnic feder- tual production in the two regions under alism was first introduced. In the Tigrinya study. Signs in the linguistic landscape and Oromo textbooks we consulted, we may be considered ‘unregulated spaces’ found examples of expressions in both (Sebba 2009), as the shop owners inde- these languages that follow Amharic pendently make their signs. However, syntactic structure. This is particularly contrary to what may be expected in true of noun phrases, as was the case with ‘regulated spaces’ where monolingual the linguistic landscape. As mentioned norms prevail, the same type of language above, in Amharic, noun phrases are contact occurs. This is indeed the case in right-headed, and in general, in both such a regulated space as official media Tigrinya and Oromo, noun phrases are broadcasts. According to information left-headed. from media consultants who work in In the Oromo texts, we discovered Ethiopian broadcasting, the Amharic examples of noun phrases that appear to news is taken as the main source for the follow Amharic word order. For example, respective transmissions in Oromo and while a unit of measurement convention- Tigrinya, as the regional programmers ally occurs following a qualifying numeral translate it into the respective languages as in digirii zeeroo, ‘zero degree’, the ex- of the program. The result is a language pression used is zeeroo digrii, that is, as in

FIGURE 4 A tailor shop in Mekele (Lanza and Woldemariam 2008).

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 68 LANZA AND WOLDEMARIAM the Amharic zero digri. Similarly, while Tigrinya Textbook (1997: 62, 82, and 103) measurement expressions conventionally with the conventional form listed below follow the pattern as in km 800, m167, each attested example. etc., we found the reverse order: 800 km, 3) Attested structure 167 m, etc. (Grade 5 Social Science Book ħasab mägɨls’ɨ 2004: 19 and 22). This word order does idea expression not reflect current spoken Oromo in the ‘opinion box’ region. Similarly, noun phrases like Baha Afrikaa ‘East Africa’ and Dhihaa Afrikaa Conventional structure ‘West Africa’ (30) would conventionally mägɨls’ɨ ħasab be written in the reverse order: Afrikaa ‘opinion box’ Bahaa and Afrikaa Dhihaa. The presence of 4) Attested structure such expressions may be the result of the s’ħfät mäsarħi transposition of the Amharic structure in writing instrument the translation process. In other words, in ‘stationery’ the process of recreating the text from the source language to the target language, Conventional structure the experts may have maintained some mäsarħi s’ħfät Amharic word order while substituting instrument writing the lexical items with the target language. ‘stationery’ Notably, the Amharic word order is in fact 5) Attested structure the same as for English. When officers at ħriša kadrä the Educational Bureau of Oromia were agriculture cadre asked why such a word order was used in ‘agricultural expert’ the expressions above, they replied that it was to safeguard students from becom- Conventional structure ing confused when they encountered kadrä ħriša the word order in English in Grade 9, cadre agriculture when English becomes the medium of ‘agricultural expert’ instruction in Oromia. They claimed that following English word order for Oromo Interestingly, Example 4 reflects a similar expressions would help facilitate the tran- example attested in the linguistic land- sition from Oromo to English at Grade scape of Mekele, as demonstrated in 9. This observation deserves further Figure 2 above. Similar structural trans- inquiry. As previously noted, the basis positions from Amharic were also en- for Oromo literacy has ideological roots countered in the teacher’s guide manuals opposed to the dominance of Amharic. (Grade 5 Teacher’s Guide 2001:19). Such a distancing from potential Amharic 6) Attested structure impact in the translation of the textbooks därasi šum into Oromo may in fact be interpreted in author name light of this ideology. ‘author’s name’ The textbooks in Tigrinya demonstrated some Amharic features, with Conventional structure Tigrinya noun phrases following Amharic šum därasi word order, similar to the findings in the name author linguistic landscape. The following ex- ‘author’s name’ amples are taken from Grade 3 Students’

7) Attested structure opportunity for it to become the most de- ħɨto milkt veloped literary language in the country. question mark It became established as the language of ‘question mark’ literacy in all non-liturgical arenas until the introduction of the new language Conventional structure policy of ethnic federalism, which pro- mɨlkt ħɨto moted the development and literacy of other regional languages. As illustrated mark question in this study, even though regional lan- ‘question mark’ guages such as Tigrinya and Oromo have In sum, while examples of language con- assumed the position normally reserved tact were attested in unregulated spaces, for Amharic in their respective localities, the linguistic landscape, where multi- people nevertheless still employ elements lingual norms prevail, similar examples of Amharic structure in writing their own were found in regulated spaces in which language. Such examples of language there is an expectation that monolingual contact are not widely documented in the norms will prevail, indeed especially in spoken forms of Tigrinya or Oromo, yet light of the new language policy of ethnic they appear in the linguistic landscape federalism, which promotes the develop- and other textual materials; and they are ment of regional languages. This policy used in educational materials as well as catapulted a change in literacy practices in media broadcasting. As noted above, in the country and the data suggest that Ethiopians view the language used in language contact, particularly involving media broadcasts as stilted. The sociolin- Amharic with the regional language, guistics of multilingualism requires ‘an serves as input for both informal and for- approach to language from the vantage mal learning. The influence of English is point of the social circulation of languag- also noteworthy. While these documented es across spaces and different semiotic ar- texts are not exhaustive data, they are tifacts’ (Stroud and Mpendukana 2009), nonetheless in line with ethnographic such as in the various media involved in observations in the two regions. these case studies in Ethiopia. As previously noted, a pervasive language ideology in the country points to the general Discussion and dominance of Amharic as an explanation conclusion for the language contact, in spite of the fact that Amharic is claimed to have a In previous centuries, literacy practices weaker role in Ethiopian society under in Ethiopia were left to members of the the new language policy. elite and those belonging to religious The question then remains as to how communities of the Ethiopian Orthodox to interpret these findings. One may be Church, an important institution in the tempted to view the texts in question as country. The language of learning was ‘poor’ translations, often the interpreta- Ge’ez, a now extinct Semitic language, tion given by Ethiopians. Yet the pattern and it was limited to the Bible and other of structural borrowing persists. One religious works. Subsequently, Amharic clear reason for such structural borrow- assumed the role of Ge’ez especially ing is the historical status of Amharic in in non-religious domains. Amharic’s the country and the intensive contact dominant role until 1991 created the between the regional languages such as

Tigrinya/Oromo, on the one hand, and counteracts the monolingual bias in Amharic on the other. Most of the speak- dealing with language contact (see Auer ers of regional languages are bilingual in 2007). Multilingualism should not be Amharic, a situation that allows the lan- seen as merely guages to be in extensive and long-term a collection of ‘languages’ that a contact. However, the type of language speaker controls, but rather as a contact illustrated in this article is more complex of specific semiotic resources, restricted. It involves literacy practices, some of which belong to a conven- both in writing and in the transmission of tionally defined ‘language’, while written texts through media broadcasting. others belong to another ‘language’. The shop owners belong to the genera- (Blommaert 2010:102) tion for whom Amharic was the medium of instruction in schools and hence the Such a functionalist view of linguistic key to literacy. Despite the regional acqui- resources is certainly empowering to sition of new language rights regarding speakers (Matras 2009). These Tigrayan written language in the public sphere, it and Oromo speaker-writers can therefore seems that Tigrinya and Oromo speakers be perceived as active agents in adapting continue to perceive Amharic as the lan- their multilingual competence to new guage of literacy even although they em- linguistic practices. Indeed the language ploy their own language in writing. This contact, which has been witnessed in lit- may be encouraged by the tacit accept- eracy practices since the introduction of ance of widespread language contact, and the new policy of ethnic federalism, ap- the fact that Amharic has traditionally pears to have an indexical value signaling been the language of literacy. Therefore, a new register of language use, hence a it can be said that this is evidence of the process of potential enregisterment (Agha covert power of Amharic, despite its re- 2005) that deserves further attention. duced role in current language policy. Agha (2005: 38) defines processes of Languages, however, are not agents; enregisterment as ‘processes whereby dis- agency is a capacity of speakers. If we take tinct forms of speech come to be socially the view of language as local practice, as recognised (or enregistered) as indexical opposed to the analyst’s view of language of speaker attributes by a population of contact between two separate ‘reified’ en- language users’, that is, the process by tities (see Makoni and Pennycook 2007), which they become ‘ideologically linked what we are witnessing is how speakers with social identities’ (Johnstone 2011: of the regional languages draw on their 657). Such enregisterment has been pro- multilingual resources to create a new posed for a language contact situation arena for language use – an arena that by Babel (2011) in a study of speakers develops a new register for the regional of Andean Spanish where she noted that language. Hence in the words of Makoni some features borrowed or calqued from and Pennycook (2007), we as analysts Quechua appeared in their speech. Babel need to ‘disinvent’ our conceptions of demonstrates that ‘while some Quechua language as preset notions in regards to contact features in Spanish have been multilingualism, and rather ‘acknowl- linked to informal contexts associated with edge that languages are inherently hy- Quechua and Quechua speakers through brid, grammars are emergent and com- the process of enregisterment, other munication fluid’ (Canagarajah 2007: features bypassed this process, retaining 233). Indeed research on code-switching Quechua pragmatic content that links

© Lanza, Woldemariam and CMDR. 2014 Multilingualism and local literacy practices in Ethiopia 71 them to a formal register’ (56). Indeed change. The examination of local lit- more detailed studies of spoken language eracy practices in both regulated and use in the contact situations reported on unregulated spaces in two federal here are needed before any specific con- regions in Ethiopia provides insight clusions can be drawn on the possibility into the role of both individual agency as well as social processes in language of enregisterment. Nonetheless contact contact phenomena. Further work on features such as those documented here new emerging literacies, for example, in the written language are recognised in text messaging and online chat as indexing literacy practices pursuant forums, can provide further insight to the new language policy promoting into individual speakers’ agency in regional languages. the use of their linguistic repertoires, The linguistic landscape and the including language contact. textbooks investigated in this article were created by a generation of speak- This exploratory investigation into lan- ers educated when the national working guage contact in literacy practices has fo- language Amharic was the language cused on a country considered marginal, of instruction and literacy. A new gen- or peripheral, from a global perspective eration of Ethiopians is coming of age, yet issues concerning centre and periph- having been educated and socialised ery are also at play. The cities in focus under the new policy of ethnic federalism in each region are indeed centres within during the 1990s, with texts similar to the margin. Examining language contact those under study in this article. To what shows how multilingualism and literacy extent this new generation will maintain practices are enacted across trajectories these literacy practices is the subject of of centre and periphery. Speakers/writers future research. Indeed these speaker- of regional languages draw on resources, writers may well become active agents of both their linguistic and literacy skills, language change not only within more from the language of the centre in the written language use but also in spoken country, and the traditional language of discourse. More data on other potential literacy in creating new literacies in their language contact features in both spoken formerly marginal languages within the and written discourse are needed to ex- regional context. The marginality of the plore these issues within the Ethiopian regional capitals and their centrality with- context. While structural change that is in that marginality may be considered as induced by contact is usually attributed an explanation for the language contact to social processes, Matras (2009: 310) ar- phenomena studied in this article. The gues for the role of multilingual speakers analysis of the similarity of language con- as agents of language change: tact patterns of the two remote spaces, particularly in the respective linguistic While it is obvious that isolated landscapes, implies individuals are not in a position to introduce changes that will shape a an approach to linguistic landscapes language’s diachrony, it is also crystal in terms of a sociolinguistics of multi- clear that no societal process can lead lingual mobility rather than linguistic to language change unless it prompts localisation, where one would need to individuals to innovate their own look at how multiple encodings of speech. The shop owners and sign de- a discourse are transfigured across signers as well as the textbook writers signage, contexts and languages. are all potential agents of language (Stroud and Mpendukana 2009: 381)

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