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Introduction

This paper attempts to study the role of language education in the creation of
national identities. I define language education to mean both teaching of the
language in educational institutions as well as the usage of the language as a
medium of instruction for other subjects. I will briefly look at historical evidence to
point out the use of the French language as an instrument in the large scheme of
creating a distinct French national identity. Drawing from the colonial India
landscape, I will also explore the idea of an almost unconscious creation of identities
with the dissemination of language education.

The replacement of terms like rector and headmaster in the post 1789 landscape to
instituteur because the teacher was to institute the nation, brings forward the
intended role of education in creating the French identity. Around seventy years
forward in history, this intent becomes clearer through written records of
instructions for student teachers like, must above all be toldthat their first duty is
to make their charges love and understand the fatherland. The subjects taught in
primary school included both history and geography, both which can be argued to
play an important role in creation of national identities, French history to form
French citizens and geography to realize that the fatherland extended beyond the
immediate environment. However, when we examine this against the evidence that
these subjects were taught by teachers who neither grew up in a unified France nor
have studied French history and that there also existed no clear curriculum weakens
any potential role they could have played in invoking nationalist or patriotic
emotions. I can then unravel the thread of language teaching to unveil its
superiority in the framework of education to create a national identity in the France

setting. In addition, the growing economic opportunities tied with education, made
the children of a largely illiterate generation seek French instructed education to
higher levels, thus implying an increasing competency in the language and its
subsequent spread.

The encouragement of a language by itself is not often sufficient to ensure its


success as the dominant language of the nation. This has at many times caused
states to use coercive force to erase narratives in local dialects and indigenous
languages found in little pockets hidden away. The rural landscape of France offers
many such tales. In 1870s the printed form that school inspectors used included
the line Need to teach exclusively in French. Regulations to be reviewed in pays
where Basque, Breton, Flemish and German patois etc. are spoken. Speaking Patois
was prohibited in Bernais schools in 1874, translation exercises were introduced to
make Basque children acquire the French language and there were even instances
of children being punished when they were caught using Breton in school. The
significance of these measures should be examined against the fact that despite
schools being taught in French, the villages continued to speak in their local
languages because French was not accessible for large parts of the adult
population. In this light, the strict enforcement of the language within the confines
of the school in addition to making basic education compulsory ensured a fully
French speaking adult population in a few decades. The French language then
slowly becomes a tool for national cohesion and for creating a uniquely French
identity.

I briefly explore another setting removed from the France, to emphasize the role of
education in creating a national identity through another historical example. I look
at the Irish language with over three thousand years of history which was only
largely spoken by peasants till the Gaellic League revived its use. The revival though
can be in part attributed to other sources like newspapers and the Church, it still
remains that the fact that the Irish language began to be taught in majority of
elementary and secondary schools and the importance given to it at the university
level helped diffuse the language and create a unique Irish identity. The creation of
both French and Irish identity thus involved a very conscious role by the state and
various interest groups.
It is also possible that a national identity is created as a spillover rather than a
conscious ploy, in these cases the identity formed will be less rigid and will often
simply throw a shadow of a national identity over the pre-existing personal
identities. I pick out a region where through history languages constantly
supplanted each other in superiority and with multiple languages existing at the
same time, there could not be a single unifying language. Tracing from the 17 th
century India with Persian as the functional language I pause at the establishment
of the college at Fort William in the year 1800. I study the college keeping in mind
the backdrop of British interest in Indian languages. The motivation of the British in
India to learn Sanskrit was only partially scholarly and was partly owing to Warren
Hastings belief that India should be governed by Indian laws. Similarly the study of
the Hindustani language led to its classification by Gilchrist into three levels which
imposed an identity of sorts on the population that speaks these variants. The
competition of languages in the education space is demonstrated by events like the
1780 delegation of Muslims to Hastings for the establishment of a madrassa. It must

be noted that the college at Fort William was primarily established to train young
British men appointed to the Companys civil service. Lord Minto while addressing
them in an annual prize ceremony at the college in 1808 stated that the nature of
their relationships between Indians would be mediated through language. This very
statement makes a case for language education to extend an identity of sort to the
natives that the English dealt with.
Conclusion
It can thus be concluded that language education does aid in creation of national
identities. A vein for further exploration on this topic would involve studying in detail
the differences in the path and speed of national identity creation under different
settings like conscious proliferation, number of already existing languages in the
given space, education, culture and history of the region.

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