Translanguaging as an approach to address language inequality in South African higher education: summary writing skills development

Abstract

Literacy  challenges  among  the  majority  of  African-language  speaking  students  learning through  the  medium  of  English  impact  on  unequal  throughput  in  South African  higher education. To address this social injustice issue, academic literacy practitioners have a critical role to play in the inclusion of linguistic diversity in higher education. This requires that the curriculum   be   revised   in   such   a   way   that   classroom   activities   and   assessments   give recognition to students’ African languages. In this paper, we outline how translanguaging as a teaching  and  learning  approach  promises  to  develop  literacy  in  both  the  students’ African languages and English. The paper describes a summary skills development teaching approach and  its  accompanying  activities  which  enable  the  students  to  move  between  isiZulu  and English.  The  summary  writing  activities  are  followed  by  a  guided  reflection  note  from students  on  their  perceptions  and  experiences  of  the  new  communicative  approach  that  has been  introduced  to  them.  The  majority  of  participants  express  positive  perceptions  of  this approach as they find it familiar to what they are used to doing when learning on their own. It is hoped that the translanguaging approach would contribute to the promotion of equality in language and literacy development in the South African higher education sector.