Language Education Policy in Multilingual Mali: Keeping French or Promoting Local Languages as Media of Instruction?

Abstract

The present research intends to measure Malian learners and teachers’ attitudes towards the French language and their native languages, regarding their statuses and uses particularly in education. Education based on mother tongue has been advocated in sub-Saharan countries for its learning efficiency, whereas the French is still the language of instruction for Malian learners regardless of the learning difficulties it implies, often resulting in the underperformance of Malian schools. This research was therefore conducted on the basis of a mixed methods approach using multiple-choice questions and semi-structured interviews to collect data. The quantitative analysis of the results with a follow-up qualitative argumentation divulged that learners and teachers are impetuously expecting language policymakers and planners to enterprise roughly serious and real measures to realise the mother tongue-based education for Malians and the use of their languages in formal sphere. Accordingly, this research emphasised that knowing and taking into account attitudes are crucial for a successful implementation of a linguistic policy.