According to one definition, “Reading culture is an environment where reading is celebrated, appreciated and respected. Reading is the bedrock of the curriculum and is paramount to a child’s personal, social, and academic success, as well as their general wellbeing.” The level of reading culture varies from country to country. For analytical purposes, we can categorize the reading culture of countries according or along many variables.
Africa is ranking as a continent where the reading culture of the people is at a very low level. While reading books, newspapers and magazines is a daily exercise without which life loses much of its meaning in the developed world, most Africans do not enjoy this privilege for many reasons. There are many hurdles against the development of the culture of reading in Africa. These barriers vary from place to place or from one country to the other. Although a few countries have attained a tolerable level of reading culture, most of them are still at a very low level of growth in literacy or the culture of reading.
The fact that many African countries have no developed their own written scripts is sometimes mentioned as one of the hurdles in the retardation of the reading culture across the continent. Under colonialism, most African countries were forced to use the metropolitan language as their national languages and this has constrained the growth of local languages. Colonial languages were used for administrative and political purposes rather than as tools of communication among the indigenous populations. As a result of these people were forced to use oral communication while a few of them who were educated in the languages of colonialism were privileged to read and write in these languages.
According to one theory, language growth and develops when it used in day to day communication as both oral and written language. This process should come naturally and should not be forced or enforced. Colonial language policies in many former African colonies forced the indigenous populations to speak their languages to the detriment of their own. In the long ran, this was believed to have led to low levels of literacy and the absence of a reading culture in many of not most African countries. The opportunity to use local languages widely and promote literacy was created long after the colonial powers left the continent.
In many African countries, the level of literacy and reading culture is at a very low level. Although Africa has produced many writers and educated people the average African could not benefit from their knowledge due the continuation of the old colonial language policy in a new guise. As a result of this, most writers in Africa preferred to write in the European languages and neglect their native language.
The reason behind this trend was, and still is, the low level of literacy in Africa, and the consequent low level of reading culture has made it difficult for the writers to sell their books within the continent. As a consequence of this, the book market in the continent is underdeveloped and incapable of withstanding the stiff competition from European publishers and booksellers that are now controlling the global book markets.
Among the variety factors that contribute to the prevalence of poor reading culture in Africa is the state of overall poverty that is discouraging the pursuit of culture in general. People have to enjoy the basic necessities of life before they indulge in cultural activities that may sound luxuries under the now prevailing economic condition in most African countries. Poverty is therefore is a major factor that hinders reading habits in Africa. “Some of the other factors that hinder the growth of reading habit in Africa are, teaching methods, distractions like the use of mobile phones, poorly stocked libraries, insufficient physical infrastructures, unreliable electricity and excessive family responsibilities, overwhelming academic workloads and poor internet connectivity.”
The impacts of these constraints on society are substantial. “A lack of reading culture can have a negative impact on society, especially the youth. It can lead to anti-social behavior, low moral standards, and poor grammar. It can also negatively affect the development of writing skills and authorship.”
Additional factors that impact the reading culture in Africa are, “lack of materials, poor preparation of teachers, lack of interest, poor libraries or none at all, home background and lack of adult readers as models.”
In many African countries the growth of the reading culture is considered an important game changer. According to a recent research on reading culture, “Aggressively growing a sustainable reading culture in Africa has long-term advantages. There is an untapped market for reading for leisure and thus, an thus growing the reading culture in the long ran will result in increased demand for books in the medium to long term. This demand directly and positively impacts the growth of the local publishing industry Second, reading donates ideas about one’s identity, image, culture. Therefore by encouraging wide reading the narrative and perspective through which future generations perceive Africa and write about it will be increasingly positive.”
The situation is no different in Ethiopia. Ethiopia now ranks among African countries with low level of growth in the reading culture. Ethiopia now ranks among the lowest in adult literacy development in the world. We have now more than 100 million people according to official statistics but how many of them are illiterate is something we rarely ask or hear because deep down we know it is a shame to be unable to make at least the majority of the people literate instead of bragging about the number of universities we have built for spreading an educational system which is considered by many scholars as dysfunctional.
The situation has increasingly become difficult. How can you teach million of hungry people how to read and write when their immediate need becomes to get food and save their lives? How can you convince illiterate people to learn new skills to better change their lives when hundreds of thousands of degree holding youth are roaming the streets of big town in search of jobs? How can you ask the new generation of youngsters to read books while their biggest dreams has become to own a kindle a smart phone or a tablet? These are the million dollar questions for which no one seems to have an answer at least for now. What we know for sure is that reading culture is in free fall.
There have been many literacy campaigns or programs in Ethiopia in the past. The literacy programs started as a kind of “reading and writing for their own sake”. Reading and writing were rightly conceived as tools of knowledge and enlightenment on the assumption that “an illiterate population could not help build an informed or democratic society.
Then came the concept of “functional literacy” and replaced the notion of reading and writing for their own sakes. As you cannot practice art for art’s sake, there was no rationale in learning the alphabets simply for the sake of reading. Functional literacy supposed that literacy should be functional, that is to say, it has to fulfill some practical purpose as it should be directly relevant to the careers or productive lives of the practitioners. To give you a simple example, under functional literacy, farmers are supposed to read materials related to farming and try to improve their farming techniques and productivity. This project too was quickly abandoned as there was no time, resources or appetite to carry it through.
BY MULUGETA GUDETA
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SATURDAY 14 DECEMBER 2024
