Translanguaging in Assam: A Strategy for Equitable English Literacy and Viksit Bharat @ 2047

Abstract

Standard Language Ideology (SLI) is a global, pervasive challenge in multilingual education; this has consequently mostly prescribed a monolingual-centric pedagogy that views the linguistic repertoire of the learners, especially those among Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Groups (SEDGs), as some kind of deficit. In India, this tension runs counter to the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 mandate, which aims at leveraging Mother Tongue (L1) as a resource for English language acquisition. The study is a Qualitative Policy and Theoretical Analysis through the use of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of the language-in-education policies and a comprehensive Literature Synthesis around Translanguaging (TL) theories so as to probe this policy-practice gap. This analysis underlines an important lacuna in literature on the use of an innovative framework, Crosslinguistic Translanguaging Theory (CTT), specifically for newly recognised tribal linguistic communities in Assam, for instance Mising, Karbi, Rabha. The full policy recommendation at the end positions TL as a scalable, equitable tool for achieving national development goals as encapsulated in the Vision of Viksit Bharat @ 2047.

Keywords: Translanguaging, Viksit Bharat, English Literacy, Multilingualism, NEP 2020, Assam