The teaching of foreign languages in Africa, as an inheritance from colonization, was initially a way for Westerners to subjugate the Africans who were meant to serve them. The Western desire to subjugate Africans was materialized by well-developed teaching contents and methods for this purpose. The great focus on the civilization of these countries helped to create a strong integrative motivation among African populations: they too aspired to the wellbeing that they were made to dream of. The status of foreign languages, especially the German language, as well as the teaching methods has thus evolved over time. However, the failure of these imported methods has given rise to reflections within the research community. These researchers later on highlighted the necessary contribution of the social context to the success of the teaching/learning process and the possible improvement of the living conditions. An analysis of a German textbook has in fact, revealed the continuity of the preponderance of foreign ideologies, despite the various reforms, that took place in the field of education. This led us to reflect on how to teach this language according to our priorities. This contribution aims to analyze the status of foreign languages, as well as the multilingual context in which learners from French-speaking Africa live, and then to examine the benefits they can derive from them, for themselves and for their different nations, if contextualization in the teaching process becomes a reality. This form of resilience seems to be one of the opportunities, if properly implemented, for Africa to access development and the kind of modernity that suits Africans, as pointed out by Jean Marc Ela. The theoretical framework is based on socio-didactics and the methodology is the qualitative analysis of the content of a German textbook. However, even if resilience is necessary, the need for integration remains, hence the need for a balance between integrative and instrumental motivation.

Keywords:

foreign languages, sociodidactic, motivation, competences

Pages:

75-86

Full text

in PDF

Type:

Research Paper

Field:

Applied Linguistics

Topic:

Language and Literatures Teaching and Learning

UDC:

81`276.16(671.1)(072)

DOI:

10.5281/zenodo.7707667

Research Paper

Citations

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