Non-linguists are sometimes asked to make important decisions by impulsive administrations regarding the employment of language teachers. It is important that educational decisions related to languages are made by language experts.
Decisions regarding language teaching made by experts in other areas are usually old-fashioned, naïve, clumsy and presumptuous, often a result of psycho-social insularity or an inferiority complex brought about by an exaggerated respect for political and linguistic imperialism. Unprofessional decisions often ridicule both upstart and the institution s/he represents.
Regionals, nationals and natives
Two divergent opinions, at least, exist regarding the success of language teaching by native or non-native speakers. The author of this article is Maltese and has studied language extensively. He does not claim to teach the language efficiently to foreigners without specific training for this purpose. This reality is related to what is commonly known as The Native Speaker Fallacy.
Some linguists believe that a language teacher who speaks and teaches a regional version of a language is quite acceptable, though not necessarily to parents, as a language teacher. While not sharing this opinion, I agree that it must be respected as a language expert's opinion. What cannot be respected is the opinion of an expert in a subject pontificating about another subject. In Malta this is sometimes referred to as "żatatism". One also comes across colourful comparisons such as "experts in wind farms interfering in lettuce production".
Usually, people tend to speak a regional idiom especially if they work and mix mostly in one particular region. When these persons work as teachers, they face policies related to the teaching of their own language according to their regional idiom or according to a standard, national version of the language.
I am aware of the probability that parents whose children are learning a foreign language prefer that their child learns the standard, national version of the language - while still loving and practising the regional language at home. David Crystal comments on this reality thus: "We may, in due course, all need to be in control of two standard Englishes - the one which gives us our national and local identity and the other which puts us in touch with the rest of the human race."
Commentary of this type may be found in Paul Rusch's National vs Regional Models Of Language: The Case Of Austrian German.
Parents' contribution to democracy in education is not the only factor placing me on the side of parents in this case. There are other reasons such as my belief that a frequent "monolingual" speaker of a regional language finds more resistance in the use of standard, national language as compared to the non-native foreign language scholar who learns the standard, national version of a foreign language. More info on this from Robert Phillipson's The Native Speaker's Burden and Péter Medgyes's Native Or Non-Native. One may also refer to Rosie Maun's work at the Centre for Applied Linguistics, Washington DC.
A common opinion among researchers on this matter is that non-natives have a keen awareness of the differences between mother and foreign tongue which gives them an ability to anticipate their students' linguistic problems.
In many countries, large numbers of non-native language teachers and lecturers trained and employed by the state and private education continue to carry out their work with expertise and enthusiasm. At the same time, they may have to sadly contemplate hysterical experts from other fields making fools of themselves by attempting to impose language policies that are of an emotional nature and in total contradiction with the rationality and requirements of language teaching.
Meanwhile, for dozens of years, embassies in Malta and all over the world have been financially helping thousands of students and teachers to continue their cultural and linguistic studies in different countries. The aim is to combine the locals' knowledge of the country, customs and people where they live with the knowledge of the culture whose beauty they are spreading in their own counties. Some non-linguistic language "żatats" who know little about education indeed have to be reminded that to teach something you must also know the learner and his/her culture well.
If all the embassies worldwide are spending millions of euros to send locals to mix with foreign natives, and it is just a waste of effort and funds, then the presumptuous false experts of language and linguistics are right. It is more probable, however, that these embassies are promoting rational policies agreed upon in their countries by all political groups.
Also, perhaps non-linguists who pose as language experts and declare "natives are best" have a hidden, subconscious love for anthropology?
Dr Licari is a researcher in multiculturalism and applied linguistics.