No Nation Can Develop on a Borrowed Language – AUCC Prez

By Ruth Aryeh

August 9, 2022. East Legon, ACCRA: The President of African University College of Communications (AUCC) has charged the stakeholders in the Ghana educational sector to encourage reading and learning in local languages.

Prof. Abeku Blankson explained that no nation has developed on a borrowed language. Therefore, parents are not doing their children any favour by teaching them English language fluently without introducing to them first their native language.

“Linguistics relativism says you are only limited by your language and your vocabulary. In other words, you interpretate your surroundings or make sense of the world through your language. Therefore, if we have borrowed someone’s language, our sense of the world is limited.”

Prof. Blankson was speaking at the launch of the 8^th annual #Readcamp organized by Mother of All nations Foundation on the August 9, 2022 at Erata Hotel in East Legon. The theme for the occasion was “LITERACY, AND ITS ROLE IN NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT”

He said Ghanaians must face the reality that formal education has so far not helped the nation much. He said for literacy to play a role in national development, it must be first done in vernacular, and be based on practical problem-solving learning.

The Executive Director of Mother of All Nations Foundation, Zico Ishaq Abubakar Newton, a graduate of AUCC, is a product of such learning.

“[Zico Newton] is an example of how you can take learning to make an impact on society, and I particularly am very proud of him because what he is doing is what Ghana needs”.

The AUCC President commended Zico and his team for bringing back reading and creative writing into the system.

“When kids learn to read, they get excited to read and for that reason, they will love to read anything given to them because they know the value of reading.”