The Importance Of Mother Tongue

The beauty of the importance of mother tongue could have never been better expressed than by the great Nelson Mandela when he said,"If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart."

A substantial spectrum of people worldwide is of the erroneous impression that mother tongue denotes only the language that an individual learns from their mother; rather, it is the speaker's dominant and home language which is foundational to the learning process. It is not only the first language according to the time of acquisition, but the first with regard to its importance and speaker's ability to master its linguistic and communicative aspects. The mother tongue as a matter of fact, defines a person’s thoughts. In this  write-up, 'mother tongue' will be used  interchangeably with 'indigenous' and 'vernacular' languages, in the broader context of ubuntu and value of the society at large.

At the expeditious rate at which urbanisation and the development of technology is occurring, it is beyond the shadow of doubt that tons of people globally are losing their understanding on the importance and the immeasurable impact of vernacular languages in their lives.

Children are most familiar with their mother tongue, as it is the language they speak at home. This language, if taught at schools, makes understanding better and learning easier. This because children enjoy more when they are taught in their mother tongue. They enjoy school more and feel more comfortable being surrounded by pupil and teachers speaking a familiar language. They gain confidence in themselves and surety about picking up new concepts with ease. This actually exponentially increases the self-esteem of the students. For this reason, kids learn faster and better in their mother tongue. 

A film grasp of a learner’s mother tongue would facilitate easier learning for a new language, as it will lay a strong foundation for learning. When one thoroughly knows their indigenous language, they can have high-potency literacy skills in other languages. The mother tongue in learning a foreign language is indistinguishable to a well from which vast knowledge is drawn. It is often used as a formulation to motivate and titivate learning a new language as it allows you to explore the new language in real life communication. 

The mother tongue incontrovertibly keeps our cultural heritage alive as it best helps us stay connected to our culture and roots. Often the essence and meaning of culture is modified during the direct or indirect translation of one language to another. The mother tongue is also an essential tool in conversing deeply with our grandparents and ancestors. It would be an intolerable deed to appeal to our ancestors in a foreign language.

As businesses go the local way, the importance of mother tongue has exponentially increased. Thus, in such scenarios, having a firm understanding of one's mother tongue, where one knows how to read and write, is immensely helpful if you are interested in becoming a successful businessperson. Use of the mother language in business, also aids in creating an adamantine bond between you and the local customers whose support in a business can raise the business sky-high.

Knowing your mother tongue well is a matter of pride. It boosts one's confidence and creates one's awareness in the individual mind and helps them connect with their local environment and culture in a better manner. The mother tongue also plays a prestigious role in shaping the personality and mentality of an individual.

In order to primarily promote the mother tongue, it is of great essence to embolden literature in the mother tongue. Novels and poems in the mother tongue would assist the reader to pick up the morphological aspects and communicative facets of the language.

As a way to enhance the promotion of the mother tongue, we can utilise media. Radio producers and presenters may employ the mother tongue in the production and presentation of both advertisements and news. For instance, the Starz FM station of Tsholotsho in Zimbabwe present all their production in English interchanging with indigenous languages.  Notwithstanding that with the advancing technology, only a handful of people give attention to the radio, the use of the mother tongue in production makes an enormous difference.

The production of films in the mother tongue, significantly exposes tons of people to the use of indigenous languages; which in a way, promote cultural diversity with translations to English helping in the learning process. This has clearly been recognised and put to application by the award-winning Mzilikazi actor Percy Soko in most of his productions, these include: Mandla, Scars-Amanxeba, Jaiva Sbone amongst many others. 

To promote the mother tongue, it is crucial that indigenous languages are nationally recognised as  official subjects in school. That way, it would mean that the learning population will always find itself equipped with a deep understanding of the language.

With the technological improvements we are experiencing, it is patent that we are heading for a period dominated by computers. This is exactly why it is critical that computers are also developed to clearly recognise vernacular languages.

Due to the spread of the European and American culture around the whole world, countless people globally are of the delusive belief that being fluent in English designates superiority of an individual. Consequently, it is really important that family elders teach the growing population about the importance and the undisputed role played by the mother tongue.

Parents of today are given to naming their children English names that they hardly know meanings to. It is therefore, essential that  this  tradition of correctly naming  children  is passed from generation to generation, to reflect a hereditary foundation and promote the spirit of ubuntu. The government also has a critical  role to play in the promotion of native languages as evidenced in the provisions of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, (GoZ, 2013).  Legislative debates/ announcements can  also be done in vernacular languages, enabling the majority populace to follow the proceedings  and to  identify with the outcomes as their own.

The most effective method to achieve maximum promotion of the mother tongue is that, teachers in schools should use multilingual teaching. This  approach in the teaching and learning process will brighten the children's perspective on the mother tongue, and enhance the  understanding of the sophisticated concepts that need to be grasped.

Although, people have begun to pave the way to promoting the mother tongue, it has been an absolute mammoth task; as nut-cracking challenges are faced every step of the way. As such, these challenges include the paucity of vocabulary in these vernacular languages. In as much as teachers have adopted the strategy of multilingual teaching, they face gigantic hardships when they have to translate certain words to indigenous languages as some words are just unavailable. 

Notably, in the latest amendment of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, sixteen languages have been officially recognised. Amongst those, the lion's share goes to indigenous languages. For this reason, it is a tough thing to try multilingual teaching in schools as the student emerge from different families that do not necessarily consider the same language as their mother tongue

With the well spread belief that indigenous languages are inferior, people seldom communicate in the mother tongue lately. In fact, nobody even wants to hear about the mother tongue. Whenever one attempts to promote it, people view him as boring and bogus. This negative eye that has been set against vernacular languages has made it very difficult to successfully promote them.

As most of our local men are now engaging into international business, investors are sought abroad. It is due to this scenario that the business industry has no room for the mother tongue. In order to please the foreign investors, the work space has absolutely ruled by the universal English language.

In conclusion, mother tongue is an international phenomena which should be taken seriously as stated by Mahatma Gandhi's famous words,"If the English educated neglect, as they have done and even now continue, as some do, to be ignorant of their mother tongue, linguistic starvation will abide."