LETTER OF THE DAY - Nationalising Creole? You've got to be kidding!
Published:Wednesday | January 19, 2011 | 12:00 AM
THE EDITOR, Sir:
Whenever I feel there is nothing I have not yet heard, I am humbled to discover there is no limit to man's stupidity, and every day brings a new inanity.
Good money, I am sure, has been spent 'educating' these language experts, who must have nothing to do with their expertise but to sit down and dream up schemes that could only make sense to them.
Poor countries like Jamaica seem to view education as not a means to an end but the end itself, and we spend limited resources educating persons who will remain ignorant regardless of the amount of formal education they receive. Professor This and Professor That, bumptious self-serving people who never earn an honest bread working at an actual job, dream up schemes like nationalising a language. I guess that means anyone trying to use the language should pay a fee. My, we are going to get rich collecting royalties!
"We are all part of a linguistic experience with much more in common than separate," said Professor Ian Robertson. Yes, you noble sage, it's called English. You are advocating the Tower of Babel experience.
He continued: "We have become a blob of people, because we have lost a sense of self, because we have no language, and we are also immature because we have no 'nationalised language'!" What utter rubbish! The world has recognised the wisdom of learning English, and we are trying to further isolate ourselves in ignorance! I suppose this is to help dispel the colonial mentality.
I sincerely hope that our Government is not spending money to help foster this madness.
We would be better off converting the University of the West Indies into a vocational school, considering that most of its graduates contribute very little in tangible returns to their respective countries. Electricians, plumbers, carpenters and the like are much more beneficial to societies such as ours.
May the good Lord deliver us from these educated men, who are hell-bent on making a virtue of ignorance!
I am, etc.,
CARLTON REYNOLDS