The report above is taken from “The use of Melanesian Pidgin in Education” by Jeff Siegel, a chapter in the recent publication: Pacific Languages in Education edited by France Mugler and John Lynch (Institute of Pacific Studies, Suva, 1996). Three other chapters are relevant to PACE in Melanesia.

In the first, “Solomon Islands Pijin in education” (pp.191-208), Ernest W. Lee describes the unofficial status of Pijin as the national language and reviews two arguments against using Pijin in formal education: lack of standardization of spelling and lack of materials. According to the author, both of these would not be problems if “the value of including Pijin in the curriculum is taken seriously”. The chapter also describes the translation courses he teaches in Pijin at the Bishop Patterson Theological College. In these courses he gives students the history of Melanesian Pidgin and helps them appreciate that it is a genuine language. He also teaches students to use a standardized spelling for Solomons Pijin. In addition, students examine some of the grammatical differences between Pijin and English, and some of these are described. The chapter ends with a short description of Lois Lee’s teaching of basic literacy in Pijin to the wives of the students. He emphasizes the importance of people learning literacy in a language they know before learning it in English.

In “The banned national language: Bislama and formal education in Vanuatu” (pp.245-57), John Lynch describes how “in some schools students may actually be punished for speaking their national language [Bislama] in the school grounds”, and examines the reasons for such a state of affairs. These include the view that Bislama is not a real language and that it is unsuitable because of lack of standardization and necessary vocabu-lary. However, Lynch shows that the real difficulty “lies in the lack of official recognition or endorsement of any standard orthography, and in the lack of official encouragement of vocabulary development”. Several recommendations and proposals for using Bislama in education are described, but none of these have been implemented, and will not be, according to the author, until people’s attitudes change. Until that time, Vanuatu will remain as “probably the only country in the world in which the constitutionally recognized national language is neither an official medium of instruction nor a subject in the primary or high school systems”.
In contrast, the use of Bislama for teaching a university level course about Bislama is the topic of Terry Crowley’s chapter: “Yumi toktok Bilsma mo yumi tokabaot Bislama: Teaching Bislama in Bislama” (pp.259-72). He presents a rationale for teaching the language as a subject to people who already speak it, describes the course “Introdaksen long stadi blong Bislama” he wrote for the University of the South Pacific in the 1980s and discusses the development of linguistic terminology in Bislama for use in talking about the language in the course.

Vernacular Education in the South Pacific by Jeff Siegel (International Development Issues No.45, AusAID, Canberra, 1996) is a report reviewing the literature on vernacular education in general and in the South Pacific in particular. Melanesian Pidgin is considered a Pacific vernacular and its use in education (especially non-formal education) in Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu is described in detail.