Speak English our way

You must have seen the advertisements on TV, featuring several well-known Sri Lankan personalities talking about speaking English our way. They said that they didn’t know much English at the beginning of their respective carriers, but the circumstances led them to use the little English they knew and they were not embarrassed about using it their way.
These advertisements, sponsored by the Presidential Task Force seriously signal a paradigm shift towards the speaking, learning and teaching English in Sri Lanka.
This of course, is an initiative that should have started long before, but we extend our appreciation to the authorities who had the presence of mind to launch this programme even at this juncture.
English was never just a language for Sri Lankans like it was for Indians, Japanese and Chinese and to a lot of other Asian nations. In Sri Lanka, it presented a far more significant social connotation than a mere linguistic connotation. Even the teaching of English was targeted at creating ‘sudda’ type gentlemen, who could even beat the real ‘sudda’ fellows with their accent.
This confined the English language to the elites of the then Sri Lankan society and with their acquired Received Pronunciation (RP) they became ‘goda suddas’—leaving only their black skin to recognise them either as Sinhalese or Tamils.
Even after independence in 1948, this did not change and there was a huge demand from the lower strata of the Sri Lankan society to make Sinhala the official language of the country. Along with the ethnic issues, the way English had been isolated from the common man was the result of Sinhala becoming the official language of Sri Lanka. Hence, this decision by the politicians of that time made things worse and English became even more distant to the common man.
Even after English was included in the school syllabi later on, the average Sinhala and Tamil student did not pick it up well because the teachers who taught them were still following the conservative and obsolete teaching methods, and most importantly English was taught neither as a mean of communication nor as a life skill, but as a sacred possession that had to be mastered.
English has never been treated as a mode of communication in Sri Lanka, but as an instrument used for social oppression, a ladder to climb the social hierarchy, and also as a political tool. In that sense, English has never been given the right place in the Sri Lankan society. What an irony!
It is a well-known fact that a certain political party, which hails itself as leftist, has been using the lack of English knowledge among university students who are mainly from outside Colombo, to achieve their petty political interests. When the university authorities come out with programmes to enhance the English knowledge of these students, the members of this party, who are very much active in the university opposes, and if it is not enough, carry out protests unless the authorities put their plans to the back burner.
If this initiative produces results as it is supposed to, then the foundation of these political parties in almost all universities in Sri Lanka will crumple and the Sri Lankan universities would no longer produces “highly skilled barbarians” as one Western scholar said.
Sri Lanka does not have to go far to find examples to make this initiative a success. We only have to have a look at our neighbour India and learn how they have a foreign language as part of their day-to-day life and, especially as part of their native culture.
They speak English with a thick Indian accent and even have created a variation of their own called ‘Indian English.’ Almost all the Sri Lankan university students, who take English as a subject in their degree course, refer books written in Indian English to better understand Hemingway or Shakespeare.
We hope that this initiative by the Sri Lankan authorities will destroy the ‘Kadu’ attitude most of the Sri Lankans have towards English. Private sector, which always complains that there aren’t enough degree holders who can manage English well, should also in some way contribute to this programme because this initiative is likely to produce the persons they would like to recruit.
In conclusion, English should be stripped off from its history and should be treated only as a language. The socio-psychological barriers which readily identified English as ‘kaduwa’ should be taken down. English should be taught as a mode used for communication and as a life skill.