This document discusses language-in-education policies in Southeast Asia. It notes that many ethnic minority groups face barriers to education due to differences between the language used at home and the language of instruction in schools. While national languages are primarily used for instruction, some countries are piloting multilingual education programs that incorporate local languages. However, monolingual policies also persist due to beliefs that using multiple languages will confuse students or hinder learning of dominant languages. Overall, the document examines the complex issues around language policies in education across Southeast Asian countries.

1. Language-in-education policies
in Southeast Asia
Kimmo Kosonen
SIL International & Payap University
Chiang Mai, Thailand

2. Many ethnolinguistic minority
(and other) groups face a
‘language barrier’ in education

3. ‘Language barrier’ – Access
Primary Level Net Enrolment Ratios
in Lao PDR (Source: Lao National Literacy Survey 2001)
65.6
77.2
53.7
47.8 46.3
64.1
75.4
52.8
44.7 44.2
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
National average Thai-Kadai Austroasiatic Sino-Tibetan Hmong-Yao
Language Family
% Male
Female

4. 60 Million Out-of-School Girls
(Lewin & Lockheed, 2007)
• Nearly 70% of out-of-school girls belong to the ethnic,
religious, linguistic, racial and other minorities,
• Many ethnolinguistic minorities are poor in remote rural
areas,
• Significant increases in primary education have not
helped these “doubly disadvantaged” girls,
• Language of education is a reason for exclusion,
• Mother tongue-based bilingual education can help
get girls in school and learn.
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• World Bank (2005): “50% of the world’s out-of-school
children live in communities where the language of
schooling is rarely, if ever, used at home”

5. ‘Language barrier’ - Quality
 Minority children with poor Standard Thai skills
had 50% lower learning results than Thai-
speaking students in all main subjects
 About 13% of Grade 2 students could not read
or write Standard Thai
 Over 25% of students in 10 education areas
have problems in reading and writing Standard
Thai
 A reason: teachers and students speak different
languages
Thailand – surveys on educational quality

6. Quality of Literacy in
OECD’s PISA (2000-2002) report
• In Indonesia 69% of 15-year-old students
performed at or below the lowest of five
proficiency levels for reading literacy.
– (94% at level 2 or below)
• In Thailand the figure was 37%
– (74% at level 2 or below)
http://www.pisa.oecd.org

7. Lao PDR - Tested "Secured Functional Literacy"
rate in the Lao Language (Lao National Literacy Survey 2001)
37.4
47.6
28.6
22.1
28.7
24.5
33.5
17.2
14.6
6.8
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
National rate Tai-Kadai Austroasiatic Sino-Tibetan Hmong-Yao
Language Family
Percent
Male
Female

8. Language policy
• Legislation on (and/or practice of) the use
of languages in a society
Language-in-education policy &
practice:
• Language (or medium) of instruction (LoI)
• Language of literacy

9. Key Concepts
Mother tongue – first / home language – L1
Local & regional language
Subject of study vs. language of instruction
Oral use of a language
• An auxiliary language helping learners understand
Bilingual / multilingual education (MLE)
Mother tongue- / L1-based MLE
First language first MLE
Mother tongue as a ‘bridge’

11. What do they look like?
Sustainable strong programmes
of mother tongue-based
multilingual education …

13. The New York Times, 19 July 2005
Data: Ethnologue, 2005
The World According
to Linguistic Diversity

15. Number of Languages- Southeast Asia
(Source: Ethnologue 2005)
742
180
147
113
104
86
84
30
24
19
17
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800
Indonesia
Philippines
Malaysia
Myanmar
Vietnam
Laos
Thailand
Singapore
Cambodia
Timor Leste
Brunei

16. Number of Languages spoken in Asia
Country Languages
• Uzbekistan 40
• Tajikistan 33
• Kyrgyzstan 32
• Bhutan 31
• Singapore 30
• Turkmenistan 27
• Cambodia 24
• Timor Leste 19
• Brunei 19
• Japan 16
• Mongolia 15
• Sri Lanka 7
• Korea, South 2
• Maldives 2
• Korea, North 1
TOTAL: ~ 2200
Source: Ethnologue (2005)
Country Languages
• Indonesia 742
• India 427
• China 241
• Philippines 180
• Malaysia 147
• Nepal 125
• Myanmar 113
• Vietnam 104
• Lao PDR 86
• Thailand 83
• Pakistan 77
• Iran 75
• Afghanistan 51
• Bangladesh 46
• Kazakhstan 43
(30 countries)

17. National or Official Languages in Asia
• Kazakh,
• Kirghiz,
• Khmer,
• Konkani,
• Korean 2,
• Lao,
• Maithili,
• Malay 3,
• Malayalam,
• Maldivian (Diwehi),
• Mandarin Chinese 2,
• Marathi,
• Meitei,
• Myanma,
• Nepali 2,
• Northern Uzbek,
• Oriya,
• Assamese,
• Bengali (Bangla) 2,
• Bodo,
• Dogri,
• Dzongkha,
• Eastern Farsi (Dari),
• Eastern Punjabi,
• English 4 (1),
• Filipino,
• Gujarati,
• Gurung,
• Halh Mongolian,
• Hindi,
• Indonesian,
• Japanese,
• Kannada,
• Kashmiri,
(50 languages)
(22 in India)
• Portuguese,
• Russian 2,
• Sanskrit,
• Santhali,
• Sindhi 2,
• Sinhala,
• Southern Pashto,
• Tajiki,
• Tamil 2,
• Telugu,
• Tetum,
• Thai,
• Turkmen,
• Urdu 2,
• Vietnamese,
• Western Farsi
Source: Ethnologue (2005)

18. Language map
of Thailand (70
living
languages)
Language map
of Thailand (70
living
languages)
 Linguistic
diversity is
evident
 Few
monolingual
nations
 Many
education
systems use
only one
language

19. Population with access to education
in mother tongue in 2000
(Source: UNDP 2004, SIL International 2004)
13
62 66
74
87 91
0
20
40
60
80
100
Sub-Saharan
Africa
East Asia and
the Pacific
South Asia Central and
Eastern
Europe and
the CIS
High-income
OECD
Latin America
and the
Caribbean
Region
Percent

20. Estimated population with access to education in first
language - Southeast Asia (no info on bilingualism)
(Source: Ethnologue, 2005)
91 90
61
50 50
45
33
26
10
5 2
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100 Vietnam
Cambodia
Myanmar
Laos
Thailand
Malaysia
Singapore
Philippines
Indonesia
Timor
Leste
Brunei
Percent

21. Country Official / national language
Brunei Darussalam Standard Malay, English
Cambodia Khmer
Indonesia Indonesian
Lao PDR Lao
Malaysia Malay
Myanmar Burmese (Myanmar, Bamar)
Philippines Filipino, English
Singapore English, Malay, Mandarin, Tamil
Thailand Thai (de facto national language)
Timor Leste Portuguese, Tetum (Eng. and Indo. working la)
Vietnam Vietnamese

22. Country
Minority languages in
the Constitution
Brunei Darussalam No (1959)
Cambodia No (1993)
Indonesia Yes (1945), RLs respected & preserved
Lao PDR No (1991)
Malaysia Yes (1957), preserve & sustain the use & study
Myanmar Yes (1974), ? (2007)
Philippines Yes (1987), LLs auxiliary languages
Singapore Yes (1965), preserve & sustain the use & study
Thailand No (1997), No (2007)
Timor Leste Yes (2002), Tetum & NLs valued & developed
Vietnam No (1992)

23. Country Languages of Instruction
Brunei Darussalam Malay, English
Cambodia Khmer, 5 LLs
Indonesia Indonesian
Lao PDR Lao
Malaysia Malay, English, Tamil, Mandarin, some LLs
Myanmar Burmese
Philippines Filipino, English, some LLs
Singapore English
Thailand Thai, some LLs
Timor Leste Portuguese, Tetum
Vietnam Vietnamese, some LLs

24. Country
Local languages as medium of
instruction - allowed/legal?
Brunei Darussalam No
Cambodia Yes
Indonesia Yes
Lao PDR ?
Malaysia Yes
Myanmar ?
Philippines Yes
Singapore Yes
Thailand Yes
Timor Leste ?
Vietnam Yes

25. Languages-in-education: SEA
• National languages used as the main media
• Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and
Singapore use several languages as media of
instruction (including English)
• Brunei, Laos and Singapore do not use local
languages at all
• Laos uses national language only
• Myanmar has NFE in LLs by NGOs only
• Cambodia, the Philippines, Thailand and
Vietnam have pilot MLE projects which use
local languages
• Cambodia, Thailand and Timor Leste reviewing
their language-in-education policies (inclusion
of local languages?)

26. Regional Trends in the Use of
Local Languages in Education
• Promising pilots in several SE Asian countries
• Increased interest in the use of local languages
by govt agencies, UN agencies, INGOs, local
NGOs
• Local languages used more in NFE than FE
• Local languages used orally quite widely, even
without official endorsement
• NGOs provide more education in local
languages than governments
• Policies on paper vs. implementation & practice

27. Thank you!
kimmo_kosonen@sil.org

29. • Educational efficiency and quality
• Social, political, and economic participation
• Social equality & equity
• Language endangerment, maintenance,
and revitalization
• Multilingualism, pluralism
• Human rights
Key Issues 1 – Language-in-education policies
Rationale for policies supporting the use
of local languages:

30. • Economic factors
- Multilingual education is too costly
• National unity
- Using many languages in education disintegrates
the nation
• Power issues
- Distribution of power, decentralization
Key Issues 2 – Language-in-education policies
Rationale for monolingual and
elitist policies:

31. • Misunderstanding of language &
education issues and multilingualism
- Using several media of instruction confuses students,
- Using non-dominant languages will delay the learning
of dominant (national, official, international) languages,
- Parents want the national/international language only,
as they don’t understand multilingual approaches
Key Issues 3 – Language-in-education policies
Rationale for monolingual and
elitist policies:

32. • Technical and ‘logistical’ challenges
- Non-dominant languages: no orthographies, ‘modern’
terminology & standard form
- No literature and learning materials
- No teachers speaking non-dominant languages
- Multilingual classrooms / linguistic diversity in schools
- Minority communities not interested (or this is what the
decision-makers think)
- MLE not seen as high priority by donors / program
implementers
Key Issues 4 – Language-in-education policies
Rationale for monolingual and
elitist policies:

33. • Policies vs. implementation
- Supportive policies exist in documents, but policies
not implemented
• Colonial “legacy” and example
- Colonialists supported elitist and dominant language
only-policies
- Major issue in Africa, less so in Asia
• Language classification
Key Issues 5 – Language-in-education policies
Rationale for monolingual and
elitist policies:

34. Language classification
Nationality Language (population)
Tai Dam (699,000)
Tai Don (280,000)
Thai (1,370,000) Phu Thai (209,000)
Tai Daeng (140,000)
Tai Thanh (20,000)
Ethnicity vs. language e.g. the Thai in Vietnam

35. Additional issues
• Role of media (TV, Radio, Internet, print)
• Role of English
•