TITLE:
The Hypothetical Question of Bilingual Education in Schools in Cameroon
AUTHORS:
Charles Esambe Alobwede
KEYWORDS:
Bilingualism, Bilingual Education, Language Attitudes, Anglophone, Francophone
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.11 No.8,
August
7,
2023
ABSTRACT: This article examines the implementation of bilingual education in
secondary schools in the Republic of Cameroon. In the wake of independence in
1960, Cameroon adopted two educational sub-systems from its former colonial
masters, England and France, who administered the country as a mandated
territory and later as a trusted territory after the First and Second World
Wars. While the English language was used in the former British territory
(current Southwest and Northwest regions), the French language was used in the
former French territory (current Adamawa, Centre, East, Far North, Littoral,
North, South, and West Regions). This gave birth to an official bilingual
situation. It is common knowledge that a language question will arise whenever
there is language contact that always requires a solution. The adoption of two
foreign languages as official languages was thus a prelude to the problem of
bilingual education in Cameroon. To promote bilingualism the authorities
adopted a bilingual academic system that brought together both sub-systems
within the same campus, intending to train young Cameroonians who will be able
to produce in both English and French works of art or science of the highest
class. The present article aims to find out why sixty-one years after the
creation of these bilingual schools in 1963 and 1965, and subsequent ones,
Cameroonians are not able to produce in both official languages works of arts
and science with consummate skills. The reasons for this failure lay in the
methodology adopted in the teaching of languages and the different curricula
that need a thorough revision.