Greetings to all my friends and audience, I am your friend Mnkong Emmanuel Saah. I wish to share with you on what I titled "International Mother Language Day celebration; Case study of Cameroon, Africa
✓ International Mother Language Day is a Worldwide annual observance held on 21 February to promote awareness of Linguistic and cultural diversity and to promote multilingualism.
✓ This day is celebrated to recognize the value of Linguistic diversity and take measure to protect these languages for future generations. International Mother Language Day is celebrated every year globally on February 21, and this year 2025, it has been observed on Friday.
✓ It is said that the government outlawed the protest but on February 21, 1952, students at the University of Dhaka and other activists organized a protest. Later that day, the police opened fire at the demonstrators and killed four students. February and was proclaimed international Mother Language Day throughout the world to commemorate the martyrs who sacrificed their lives on this very day in 1952.
√ Historically, and according to Ivan Ilyich, the term Mother Tongue was first used by Catholics Monks to designate a particular language they used, instead of Latin, when they were speaking from the pulpit. That's the "holy Mother the church" introduced this term and colonies inherited it from Christianity as a part of colonialism.
√ As a matter of fact the nameMother Tongue comes from the fact that a child often learns the basics of his family's language, many times from his/her mother. The mother tongue therefore is a language learned in childhood in the home environment, also referred to as mother, first language or native language.
✓ It should be noted that a child who has not yet learned many languages to speak has more than one mother tongue only if these languages are spoken to them equally often, so that the child learns.
√ Infact there are many cases of children of parents who speak different languages. These children will have at least two "Mother tongue".
° International Mother Language Day celebration; the Case Study of Cameroon, Africa :
√ Cameroon joined the global community to commemorate the international Mother Language Day. The year 2025 marks the 25th anniversary of international Mother Language Day, with the theme "Silver Jubilee Celebration of International Mother Language Day", commemorating a quarter-century of dedicated efforts to preserve Linguistics diversity and promote mother tongue use.
✓ It should be recalled that on 17 November 1999, UNESCO General Conference recognized 21 February as the international Mother Language Day. **Bangladeshis organized social gatherings honouring their language and culture, held literary competition, draw alpana on the roads, eat festive meals and listen to songs.
° Cameroon celebrated day in many ways. First and famous, awareness campaigns were carried out. Information about the importance of Linguistic diversity, the right to use one's native language, and current issues to disappearance of language is disseminated in the media and social network.
° The day witnessed many cultural events, including poetry reading, concerts, theatre performances, helped to preserve native languages. They involved most representative of national minorities and indigenous peoples.
° In most localities within the national territory, language courses and workshops were organized. Free language courses and workshops on native languages were organized in most regions to preserve and popularize vulnerable languages.
° The Educational establishments were not left out. Schools and universities held lectures, seminars and conferences devoted to multilingualism, language preservation and cultural diversity.
✓ The day was a great success. Hope this content blesses somebody!
Images: source - CNA, and getty images.