PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

This is the sad picture. About the 1.3 billion people known as the world’s ‘bottom billion’ who somehow live on less than US$1 a day and about the 10 million children every year who die before their fifth birthday because of poverty-related malnutrition. Although many successful efforts are underway to address these issues, the overall picture remains bleak. In 2005, economist Jeffrey Sachs, who headed the UN Millennium Project, took a comprehensive, authoritative look at the problems of poverty in the 21st century.

Recounting his 25 years of work in places such as Bolivia, China, India, Russia, and several African nations, Sachs illuminates the complexities of extreme poverty. “Ending global poverty by 2025 will require concerted actions by the rich countries as well as the poor,” he writes. The poor countries must take ending poverty seriously, and will have to devote a greater share of their national resources to cutting poverty rather than to war, corruption, and political infighting. The rich countries will need to move beyond the platitudes of helping the poor, and follow through on their repeated promises to deliver more help.” Sach’s solution is based on the framework developed by the UN Millennium Project, which outlined ways to achieve the UN Millennium Development Goals – including cutting the rate of extreme poverty in half – by 2015.

Since the effort began, billions of dollars have been spent to help reduce global poverty, but much of that money has gone into the pockets of thugs, corrupt politicians, militias, and unethical multinational corporations. This is indeed very depressing when efforts go into waste and do not benefit the people who really need them. Perhaps Rotary needs to set up centers in abject communities so that aid can directly be given to the right people. Eradicating global poverty is a mammoth task that may not be achievable. We need to think of individuals. We touch an individual rather than the masses. Rotary is limited in resources but we are aware of the sufferings of the poor.

Today, language is closely associated with education. The better teachers are asked to handle the younger learners. In the UK, the PhD holders teach in the primary and the kindergarten. That clearly reflects the importance of early education. A good start in education ends well at the tertiary level. Education administrators in Malaysia failed to understand this. In the 50s and the 60s, teachers who had only the LCE were asked to teach in the primary schools. How wrong it was! The situation has not changed much. I don’t think all primary schools teachers in Malaysia have a basic degree in education.

Language helps a child to think. If you do linguistics as a degree, language and thought is a subject that is essential. A teacher who uses the language well can explain principles to his students in a concise manner. His students then can understand them adequately and also appreciate the expressions of the teacher without him relying too much on the language of the textbook or references. As language and thought go hand in hand, so do language and knowledge. Most of the time, lecturers are only concerned with the impartation of knowledge. They do not monitor their language. They do not think of how effective their expressions could have impacted their listeners. They have no knowledge of syllable stress that is an important feature in English. They do not have intonation patterns. They do not stretch their vowels and do not complete uttering the final consonants. I was luckier. I had teachers who were good with their knowledge and their language as well. I am sure you too.

Modern-day language teaching requires any language teacher to be conversant with linguistics, the theories of languages. In the case of English, you need to know so many things. Semantics, pragmatics, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations, genre, modalities and many more linguistic jargon that pop up every day. By knowing linguistics, you become sensitive to language and its use. You know about the history of the language and the contemporary usage of it. The final result – you become a better teacher of language. It is no more about verbs, nouns, clauses, phrases, etc.

Pointers to be aware of:

Thanks Jimmy for sharing with us your expertise.