Impracticability of using Dzongkha
During the recently concluded parliament session, confusion had arisen regarding a Dzongkha word for ‘institute’. A same word for both University and Institute was used in the new bill introduced to the parliament for establishment of Bhutan Institute of Medical Sciences (BIMS).
One of the media surveys last year had shown that younger generation in Bhutan prefer to go English against Dzongkha. And this is fact since English has been the medium of instruction in schools since modern education system was introduced in the country. English has been serving its good not only for inter-community communications but also as unproclaimed national language.
Many media reports say, Dzongkha speakers have now turned to Dzonglish speakers – a connotation copied from India where people call Hinglish for a mixture of Hindi and English. In Nepal, it is Nepangreji. Dzonglish is bud that will ultimately grow into English flower. The trend shows, Bhutan’s new generation is moving to English than Dzongkha. Dragging reverse is not possible.
There are millions of good reasons for youngsters to accept English over Dzongkha. English has international dimension, greater opportunities for jobs, wider applications, helps understands the international affairs and most research documents are published in English. The 40 years old language, Dzongkha, has very little to offer its speakers. This has obviously been reflected when the legal ‘experts’ from Bhutan sought vocabulary from Tibetan language to translate the meaning of constitution. That invited more confusion among citizens.
Today, the human civilisation is moving at light’s speed. Discoveries and educational dimensions have widened to such an extent that Dzongkha will not suffice their needs.
Under this critical juncture, Bhutan’s education ministry runs through confused policy on language. The political leadership under pressure have been pushing wider use of Dzongkha while they remain incapable to compel the citizens to learn the language. A section of Bhutanese society, which remains immensely influential in decision making, still forces the political leadership to impose compulsory Dzongkha policy.
Last year, curriculum in history has been turned back to English after a test run of few years. Teachers could explain nothing about world history in Dzongkha. Failure of the new generation to take up teaching as profession, and more precisely Dzongkha teaching, created a huge vacuum in Bhutan’s education system to continue teaching Dzongkha.
After a study, the Dzongkha Development Authority submitted recommendations to the government in April this year that more subjects must be taught in Dzongkha. Questions are being raised of its practicality though the cabinet approved the recommendations.
It had recommended teaching environmental studies and maths in Dzongkha for classes PP to VI. It also recommended social studies and value education to be taught in Dzongkha. Between classes VII and X, it recommended value education and history to be taught in Dzongkha and that it should be made a main subject in classes XI and XII as well. A feasibility study is scheduled and will be extensively discussed in September about translating curriculum into Dzongkha.
Academics are sceptical that changing existing textbooks to Dzongkha from English would have negative implications on teachers. Additionally, they have found out that students, currently learning environment studies in Dzongkha, in classes PP to III lack science knowledge. Parents, who want their children to learn more, will obviously not accept this situation.
The authority’s initiative is perfectly impractical and unwelcome for the society. Even the NFE students in various parts have shown interest in learning English instead of Dzongkha. These people who grew up only with Dzongkha knowledge, in fact, know the real importance of English in daily life.
Even the latest Kuensel report indicated that illiterate are interested to attend NFE classes if they are run in English. The story should be the critical example for the authority.
An ongoing gathering of assistant district education officers, curriculum officers, NFE instructors, illustrators and writers in Paro reached the understanding to develop English curriculum for NFE. The new English curriculum for NFE will start next year.
The two scenarios are contradictory. While illiterate Bhutanese population, finding no use of Dzongkha, are yarning to learn English, the government and the DDA are forcing younger Bhutanese generation to adopt Dzongkha as the only language of their life.
While studies have shown, English is the preferred language for all Bhutanese, government has turned deaf ear. I wonder if the policy makers are looking at the practicability of Dzongkha. Without English, life will be harder now on. Reading labels in market products, knowing expiry dates, distinguishing brands, knowing ingredients of the products, reading phone contacts, making calls or reading SMS, etc. is not possible without English. Is DDA looking into these facts?
Kuensel quoted an UNICEF official saying, “NFE learners want to watch international news on CNN and BBC to better understand what is happening around the world,” she said, adding that it would also help learners to read instructions on electronic appliances, such as rice cookers and water boilers, which have now even reached the remote villages.
I am not sure whether it is me failing to understand government’s mission or it is the absence of language policy experts in Bhutan.
Dzongkha is a language with limited vocubulary, so quite at infancy interms of linguistic development. In Samchi High School, back in 1990 I was the hero of Dzongkha having nothing to study during exams. I learned nearly 100 words that were ‘Buzz’ words for Dzongkha exams and I used to finish my first paper of dzonghkha within one hour and half and sleep rest forty five minutes. I mean Dzonghkha is not promoted to be learned by the commoners with variety of translated books, picture books for children, young or adults and all applied was a forcible learning by whipping or caning. Adult programs for dzongkha learning is not yet developed in villages and very few of the bilingual teachers are recognized to conduct the program.
This is a very critically reviewed article. Bhutan needs to send its blooming youths for higher and professional studies to foreign lands. If by chance with the flourishing trend do not meet the minimum language standard such lots will miss the chance in this competitive world. Dzongkha language is not the bread and butter for its citizen and the discouragement in the policy may not help to refine the purity. A language spoken not more than by 200,000 populations in this whole universe of nearing 7 billion populations may not enrich and develop the required vocabulary in spite of its evolution from nearly 40 years earlier.
Compulsion is not the choice to frame the vertebra of a nation and Bhutan should understand this procedure in time before it is too late. Localization has become a bottleneck in many forms to compete in international forum and there happened many disasters with such results from its policy framers. Inhabitants are more concern for their children’s future and may understand the shrewdness behind the scene.
Exactly. There is no concrete grammatical rules in dzongkha language as it was only a local language untill 1990 imposed as a national language though. Bhutan government in efforting to impose dzongkha language in so called medical science college as a means of communication is proving itself that it is heading towards the stone age.
1) In addition, you cannot send texts in Dzongkha, which is becoming a craze among the young population.
2) The irony is that the very officers who are rallying behind Dzongkha do not want want their children to learn Dzongkha. They have their children going to schools in Kalimpong, Darjeeling, Dehradun, Mosoorie and even Delhi in India and some foreign countries. The motive is to place them in good English speaking schools. These kids do not speak in Dzongkha when interact with each other even in a private conversation. Dzongkha is obviously the family language in most households in Thimphu, especially in the home of dashos.
3) Bhutan is driving in the reverse gear by forcing Dzongkha into its population. This is exactly the same situation that prevailed in Srilanka in the 70s and 80s. The rise of Sinhalese nationalism then, overrode the use of English in Srilankan schools and universities. Result – Srilanka plunged into social, political and educational turmoil. Its educational institutions lost rapport internationally. One Srilankan scholar has admitted that this was Srilanka’s biggest blunder – bigger than the creation of the Tamil problem.
4) In an age when even Laloo has accepted the importance of English, the Butanese rulers are just making a joke of themselves. Bhutan will face the same Srilankan music sooner or later.