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| Sunday, 09 March 2003 |
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Musings of a ghost from the past (part V) by Prof. Suwanda H. J. Sugunasiri The culture indeed offers models Here is one I wrote about in my column in the Dawasa of June 11, 1964, under the pseudonym Madhupa. It was about Ven. Weliwitiye Sorata Thera, who had just passed away. I quote: "As a branch gets heavy with fruits, it begins to lower. Lowered branches thus are an indication of the maturity of a tree. It was as if to bring home this truth that Ven. Sorata Thera showed an increasing humility as he shone more and more in matters scholarly." Learned as he was, humble he was more. Picking up G. B. Senanayake's Pally geneema just the other day after 40 or more years, here's a line I encountered, in his post-script of the forties: "An attempt was made to tell these stories in a way that would appear like pictures in front of their eyes. They were written in a very simple language, free of alamkaara embellishments". (p.99) If perchance the professors and the other
learned a) begin to write in the simple language of the masses, without necessarily bringing down the quality (Sigiri poets did it), b) engage in an active campaign of providing good books cheap on a variety of subjects, new and old, then perhaps the cashiers, the farmers, the fisherfolk, the dancers, the drummers, the washerfolk, the mothers and the daughters in particular, might, just might, begin to put their literacy to work, and gradually begin to crawl from under the net of ignorance, and with encouragement, even begin to participate in the business of creating knowledge, relevant to the land and the soil, and participate in the democratic process, and without necessarily flocking to the city in droves. (Sorry, I've got carried away there, on a long sentence.) Now this writer admits to not having the scholarly evidence to convince you here of such a utopian vision, but in his universe of chaos, when a butterfly flaps its wings in Japan, a storm brews in far off Canada. The cause and effect between providing good books cheap in a readable language and the knowledge base rising, to this naive observer at least, is more tangible. After all, those in leadership positions today gained their leadership positions through reading and gaining knowledge! Could the masses do worse? Or is it that the Brown Sahibs don't want to listen, lest the loot has to be shared with the peasants? Keeping the village out? on English and development: The stream of thought in this piece was triggered by reading a single line in the good Professor Gamlath's work. It reads (in translation): "The destruction began by destroying the only eye to world knowledge, namely English" (p. 131). Mind you, this is not merely his view. Professor Saratchandra is credited with the 'gem of a line' as published in a Lake House article, "The one who knows only Sinhala knows not even Sinhala." (p.50). Comrade N. M. Perera, too, is said to hold a view of the folly of not teaching English (p.50). And, of course, every single Sri Lankan I know, in Canada and Sri Lanka,, holds dearly to this view. Returning to the line cited, the destruction referred to here is of the quality of university education over the last "35 years." That takes us to 1962/3 (the articles were written in 1996-7). Although I might be wrong on this, is it perhaps a reference to the year when Sinhala, and Tamil-medium students were admitted to the Peradeniya university? If so, the connection seems obvious: It all happened when Banda came to town!. Or to put in crass terms, it was allowing access to higher learning to country bumpkins that created the problem. What a harrowing thought, my friends! Right off the bat, pardon the cricket idiom, do you see what I see? A total contempt for the Sinhala (and Tamil)-speaking masses. For the sin of not speaking an international language! Another connection seems clear. Intelligence comes on an English silver platter! The divide here clearly is not Sinhala vs Tamil, but rather English vs Sinhala/Tamil. Development literature allows us to put it in terms of city and village, town and country, core and periphery. Given that a majority of the people of Sri Lanka (over 80 per cent) - Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim, still live in the periphery, it begs the question. If higher learning is not to be accessible to these masses, how could a country expect them to be active partners in development, and in the democratic process? Oh, sure they vote. But is that all what democracy and development is about? Leaving aside that larger question for later, may I be permitted to ask a few practical questions relating to the said deterioration of university standards (which I don't doubt): Regarding the system: 1. What changes in philosophical outlook took place to face the new reality of students with no English? 2. How did the professors adjust to accommodate the needs of the new generation of learners to ensure standards? Re Curriculum, 3. What specific curricular changes did the university make to render the learning of the new intake relevant to their experience and applicable to the developmental needs, rural development that is? 4. What new texts were developed in the national languages? Re the intake itself, 5. To what extent were the students made ready for their new reality, primary among them, expectations of higher standards perhaps? 6. What steps were taken to teach the new intake English, if indeed that was "the only eye" to knowledge? Even as we berate the system for failure, however, we need to be understanding. The nation's energies were consumed by more pressing questions. Socio-political unrest, a tattered economy, values conflict. But then, why blame the victim? If the standards of the new intake were lower, as was likely the case, this was surely not their own doing. What about the learning facilities, the quality of teaching, availability of study time? Were they plentiful and satisfactory? Clearly, the students who made it to the university were not short of brain power! So was the problem, then, allowing country bumpkins into the university? Or allowing confused thinking enter the heads of .. shall we say, city pumpkins? Oh, pardon me, I mean, pumped-up-kings. Yes, that included me alright, and my friends and colleagues of my time. Having come to the defence of my country cousins (do I hear a boo?), we can now begin to deal with the larger question, namely, the relationship between English and development. And this, I am sure, is something the nation has thought through carefully. If so, I hope I have your sympathetic understanding for my amateurish blabber. Sir Ivor Jennings, the architect of the University of Ceylon, may he rest in peace, had a vision. His model of higher education came from Oxford and Cambridge, and he simply wanted to leave for Sri Lanka the best legacy possible. The Arts, Humanities and Science curriculum of the British university served the needs of a country that was relatively well-established - sociopolitically, economically, administratively, culturally. So, while, to put it in broad terms, the primary function of Arts and Humanities was to train civil servants to serve at home and abroad in the colonies, the science curriculum was to meet the industrial and technological demands. And all this knowledge, you might remind me, was in English. Of course. But English was also the language of the people! The needs of Sri Lanka, like of every other newly independent nation, were of a different nature. Sure there was a need for an efficient civil service to continue to manage the nation's administrative structure. Though not in the elitist sense of the time (for my thoughts on this, I refer the reader to my Ceylon Daily News article of January 15, 1969, "Do we get the Best Administrators?), but in the wider sense as today. There was certainly the need for well-functioning urban centers as well, though again, more than just the capital city of Colombo. And sure, the tea, rubber and coconut industries - the economic backbone of the nation, had to be run efficiently, and profitably. But there was also other needs that related to the periphery. You know them well. Rural health, managing water resources, better farming and fishing techniques, better and more carts, vernacular education, cultural and religious life, better roads and transportation to facilitate the movement of produce and people, a rural administrative infra-structure. To be continued |
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