Late last year, Myanmar’s Ministry of Education (MOE) and chief of peace negotiator, Railway Minister U Aung Min, approved a reform that allowed for Mon language to be taught in government schools throughout the country.
According to the Mon Literature and Culture Committee (MLCC), the new educational reforms have been accompanied by several stipulations that threaten the integrity of ethnic languages taught in the country’s schools. The proposed ethnic language teaching plan of the education department, aims to restrict, and in some cases augment, the ethnic literature taught throughout the country’s schools.
Issues with cross-language translation are what threaten the success of the education curriculum. Such phrases as “MaMa WaWa, HtaHta Ka” in Burmese, when translated to the Mon language do not share the same meaning. “If we teach the same meaning using the Burmese language, the Mon vocabularies are changed and the Mon children can’t understand,” commented one Mon literati.
“I have already translated the government school textbook. The problem is if we are teaching Mon children sentences written in the Burmese language that we translated, they will not be able to understand what is taught using the Mon alphabet. If they do not properly study the alphabet it is much more difficult for them to understand.”
The government has already formed a Burmese textbook for ethnic languages schools by translating text directly for basic primary school grades, first standard and second standard. On March 1, the minister of education stated that efforts to improve the situation will be made by appointing experts in ethnic literature with training to rectify the issue.
Several ethnic groups do not want to accept the government curriculum because of the inequality in language use and difficulties presented during translation These groups are more interested in freely establishing a basic education primary school textbook that is overseen by state education committee.
The government has already prepared and trained teachers to teach ethnic languages and literature.
Ethnic groups have accused the government of not maintaining and developing the Myanmar’s ethnic literature; the government should allow freedom in the execution of the ethnic curriculum freely. The current government system does not offer the same benevolence as the governments before, several ethnic observers remarked.
In 1954 the Mon Education Board was established by the government and granted permission to teach the Mon curriculum in government schools, as well as in the Buddhism Culture University. After U Ne Win (Nay Win) seized state power in 1962, teaching ethnic literature was forbidden from 1964 until recently.
Some education experts have suggested Myanmar should adopt an education system similar to Malaysia where ethnic languages are part of the basic primary school curriculum.
