This collection of papers examines, from an international perspective, opportunities and challenges of societal bilingualism in the new millennium. The 18 papers include the following: "Introduction: Opportunities and Challenges of Bilingualism" (Li Wei, Jean-Marc Dewaele, and Alex Housen); "'Holy Languages' in the Context of…

This paper reviews the teaching of English as a second language in the secondary schools in the Transvaal, the syllabuses which have been in use since 1956-57, and the importance of an audiolingual approach. In attempting to discover the reasons for students' failure to attain a satisfactory standard of bilingualism, the author examines (1) the…

Pupils in South African Bantu schools spend one third of their time in Standards (Grades) 1 and 2 learning the official languages, English and Afrikaans. Nearly as much time is given to the learning of their own Bantu mother tongue, the language of instruction from Sub-Standard A (Preprimary) to Standard 6. In the Lower Primary schools, through…

This paper reports on results of a questionnaire survey of 84 schools representing 25,928 Afrikaans-speaking pupils in the Cape Province of South Africa. The survey revealed that only 13 of the teachers were English-speaking; the rest were Afrikaans-speaking. Most of the children never hear English out of school, or hear it under conditions…

This volume contains the published version of selected papers from the 2000 Georgetown University Round Table on Languages and Linguistics (GURT). Plenary speeches include the following: "The Talk of Learning Professional Work" (Shirley Brice Heath); "Linguistics, Education, and the Ebonics Firestorm" (John R. Rickford);…

The superordinate problem that the Threshold Project addressed is the nature of the language and learning difficulties that South African Standard 3 (Std 3) children experience when they change from their mother tongue to English as a medium for instruction. The primary focus of the Threshold Project work in 1987 was on a section of the South…