Note: This is a facebook post I repurposed for my blog
What if Te Reo and English were banned at schools? And replaced with Klingon!
Imagine NZ was invaded tomorrow and all of a sudden our kids were banned from speaking English or Māori in school, they were only allowed to speak Klingon.
Furthermore our kids are beaten if they speak anything except Klingon.
We can speak English and Te Reo Māori at home but now the entire school system is based around a language we as parents can’t even help our kids out with.
Klingon speaking parents would be able to help their kids tho.
As a result our kids schooling is affected because they suck at Klingon. Low school performance leads to low grades which leads to low educational outcomes which leads to lower job prospects as adults which leads to low income/poor housing/fewer health and food choices and also an inability to help your own kids with their education coz school sucked for you coz you didn’t speak Klingon which then perpetuates the cycle.
Couple this with wars to enforce the plethora of new laws, coz let’s be honest, we don’t exactly have the strongest military presence, replace our religions, our tikanga, our good-ole-kiwi-DIY-no8-wire way of life with a completely foreign way of living, legislate it and you have the perfect recipe (give or take some bits) to suppress our nation.
In the meantime the Klingon speaking kids are doing amazing, they do well in school because they understand what is going on (even the unruliest of students would be able to comprehend better than a non Klingon speaker), their job prospects become better and long term whānau outcomes improve.
If this goes on for two generations and then it takes another three generations to even comprehend the extent of the problem, then there’s gonna be some serious long term issues.
You get the message.
Te Reo Reclamation is step one
Sometimes opponents will say ‘stop living in the past’ or ‘build a bridge’ when ever Te Reo Māori being banned BY LAW in schools is brought up.
Firstly, we have stopped living in the past, and secondly, we have built bridges. But, it’s undeniable that there are still long term effects which need remedial action now.
There needs to be central Govt supported practical solutions implemented in order to fill that gap of 1) our language as a nation and 2) our education as a nation and 3) our identity as a nation.
Looking at our history honestly, isn’t living in the past. We need to know where we’ve been as a nation in order to figure out where we are going.
#RealNZHistory #KoreroTukuIho #Aotearoa