Personal Perspective: Such Darling Dodoes - 01 June 2003

by Rajiva Wijesinha

And grey walls moulder round, on which dull Time Feeds, like slow fire upon a hoary brand (Shelley)

A couple of weeks back I had to give a paper on ‘The Role of Education in Ethnic and Religious Conflict: The Sri Lankan Experience’ for a workshop arranged by the Centre for Policy Alternatives together with the United States Institute for Peace. I shall present an adapted version of this for my column over the next few weeks, but this is not only because of indolence.

Nor is it simply the view that my findings are of general interest. Rather, it is because I was astonished at the opposition to one of my arguments evinced by some of the very respectable Sri Lankan participants. They found almost abhorrent my claim that forbidding English medium education had been destructive, and that permitting choice of medium was essential for educational as well as social reasons.

A majority of the Sri Lankans present seemed to support this, as did practically all delegates from five other countries in South Asia. These last indeed found it astonishing that government had power to regulate in this respect, since in all those countries choice was available. But the deep fervour with which the older generation of Sri Lankans clung to the idea that what one called ‘the Sri Lankan brain’ required education in the mother tongue struck me as preposterous. The simple fact that parents can be relied on to choose what is best for their children rather than administrators was of no interest to them whatsoever.

So, for what it is worth, let me repeat my arguments here -

The two pillars on which the Sri Lankan education system is built are segregation and uniformity. These arise from the directive principles of nationalism and statism which long dominated Sri Lanka. These, and the education system they spawned, have contributed immeasurably to the social conflicts that have dogged Sri Lanka’s recent past. The prejudice and irresponsibility they fostered will not diminish easily.

It was however on the basis of apparent ideals that our educational system commenced its steady decline. To quote from J. E. Jayasuriya’s seminal study of it:

‘For the replacement of the multi-dimensional dualistic structure of education`85.. by a unitary structure that was fair, democratic and egalitarian certain changes of an important character were needed. They were, firstly, `85 a system of schools rationally planned and organized under the management of the state `85 secondly, the dethronement of English from its position as the medium of instruction for a privileged few, and the substitution in its place of the national languages as the media of instruction; thirdly, the elimination of qualitative differences among schools purporting to serve the same age groups`85.. The motive force behind the agitation for change was derived from a predominantly egalitarian ideology `85`85.it came largely from that sector of the elite which, while it had received a high quality education through the English language `85 had its roots planted firmly in the national ethos `85 some espoused the cause of the common man through a nationalistic orientation and value system, while others espoused the cause of the common man through a socialistic value system.

From a liberal perspective, finding these nationalist and statist ideologies the main cause of our present sad state, I am tempted to say QED. However, a more detailed critique will indicate how these measures contributed to the ethnic problem, and also to lowering the denominator exponentially in the lowest common denominator approach they encouraged. To exemplify the approach of these politicians I should also quote a preposterous assertion by the politician perhaps most responsible for the prevailing ethnic conflict, former President J. R. Jayewardene. He was first elected to the State Council in 1942 after drawing attention to the Christianity of his rival E. W. Perera. But J. R.’s father too was a Christian and, like S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, J. R. had to run twice as fast as everyone else to stay in the same place. It was perhaps to prove their Sinhala Buddhist credentials that they became the twin pillars of nationalism in this country. Yet, as befits the demon they were exorcising, they upheld Sinhala against English - discrimination against Tamil was not initially their aim.

So in 1944 J. R. moved an amendment to the recommendations of the Executive Committee for Education which, while making mother tongue the medium of instruction at primary school, suggested English also as a choice higher up. He said "our educational structure is divided into two types of educational institutions; some institutions giving instruction through the mother tongue, and the other institutions giving instruction through English. This particular defect has created to my mind, two different nations; one nation learning Sinhalese and Tamil and speaking in Sinhalese and Tamil, and the other speaking and learning English."

J. R.’s amendment was defeated, but a decade later his party abolished English medium education. Bandaranaike later only hastened what had already been decided, and by the sixties children had to study in the mother tongue. Of course English was kept on as a compulsory second language, but Jayasuriya rightly calls this ‘one of the greatest deceptions perpetrated on the people of this country`85 about 20 per cent to 25 per cent of the schools never had a single English teacher in them. Secondly, the calibre of the staff recruited to teach English was sub-standard.’ What Jayasuriya does not note is that, with English medium education abolished, it became impossible to find good English teachers.

I have quoted Jayasuriya at length, because he indicates the ideals to be achieved through education while ignoring the problems his approach raises. Today we note immediately J. R.’s blithe assumption of a dichotomy in Sri Lanka between English speakers on the one hand, and those who speak Sinhalese and Tamil on the other. What we now know, that the more serious dichotomy is between those who speak Sinhalese and those who speak Tamil, was not something the elite of those days could comprehend.

Perhaps that impracticality arose from the very successes of the education system they destroyed. Politicians blithely making these changes could not conceive that the results of their policies would be a land divided. They communicated fluently with Tamil politicians in English. That this would not be true of the vast majority in the future would never have occurred to them, cocooned as they were in Colombo. In their schools even not born with silver spoons in their mouths, whose parents perhaps knew no English, had rapidly picked it up so that they could function on (almost) equal terms with Bandaranaikes and Jayewardenes.

And so Jayasuriya could ignore the schooling system that had made that possible. Instead he lamented about those who suffered because they could not cope with English medium education. He ignored the obvious answer, to ensure that they could learn in the vernaculars as well as in English. Vernacular education was widely available, since the 1945 decision allowed choice. The problem was that schools offering it were considered inferior. But, instead of developing those, Jayasuriya’s solution was ‘eliminate qualitative differences among schools purporting to serve the same age groups’, i.e. bring all schools down to the level of those considered inferior to begin with.

So English medium schools, where children of different communities might have learned together, were abolished. Given this straitjacketing in segregated classes, children of different communities grow up in isolation from each other, and see each other as different. The destruction of English medium, and so of a potential pool of English teachers, means that, except in privileged urban areas, children hardly learn a second language. Thus those whose mother tongue is Sinhala cannot communicate with those whose mother tongue is Tamil. One important reason then for our failure to build up a national identity is that our system of education makes us think of each other as alien.