Bilingual Education

Bilingual Education in Colombia: Towards an Integrated Perspective
´ Anne-Marie de Mejıa
Universidad del Valle, Cali, Colombia The purpose of this paper is to argue that the traditional division between bilingual education programmes offered to speakers of majority languages and those available to minority language speakers in Colombia should be reconsidered within a wider, integrated vision ofbilingual provision. Initially, developments will be situated in relation to the sociolinguistic context of language use in the country. This will be followed by a brief historical account of how and why bilingual education started in ethnic minority contexts in relation to present developments, with a consideration of both advances and certain difficulties which need to be resolved if theseprogrammes are to become more effective in the future. The main focus of the paper is on the situation of bilingual programmes for majority language speakers, particularly learners of English, related to both a historical perspective and current situation and effectiveness. Finally, possible areas of convergence between the two traditions will be indicated as ways forward for the future. Keywords:bilingual education, majority language contexts, minority language contexts, Colombia, policy, classroom practice

Introduction
In Colombia, as in many other South American nations (see King, this volume), there exists a traditional divide between policy, practice and research into bilingualism and bilingual education programmes for majority language speakers, and modalities offered for minoritylanguage speakers. Thus, teachers and researchers who work in schools offering bilingual programmes in international languages, such as English, French and German, normally have little contact with researchers and practitioners who are concerned with bilingual education programmes in the Amerindian and Afro-Caribbean communities. Indeed, bilingual education programmes for the ethnic minorities areofficially referred to as programmes of Etnoeducacin (Ethnoeducation) rather o than Bilingual Education.1 This separation leads to a necessarily limited view of the progress of bilingualism and bilingual education within the country as a whole, and means that linguistic and pedagogical insights and perceptions from each tradition are not available to inform future general developments in thefield. The visions of the communities that support bilingualism in these two traditions are also very different. Bilingual education in majority language contexts is associated with foreign language teaching and, as such, is connected with input from foreign-based organisations, such as the British Council, Goethe Institut, and L’Alliance Francaise. The families who send their children to ¸ bilingualschools come from the Colombian middle- and upper-middleclasses, the international community, and those working for multinational
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organisations, particularly in the capital, Bogot. In contrast, those who work a with the ethnicminority communities are generally Colombian anthropologists, ethnographers and more recently ethnolinguists, due to the influence of the Colombian Centre for Studies in Indigenous Languages (CCELA). The families whose children study in Ethnoeducation programmes are generally of peasant origin, and come from isolated rural communities, often caught between the demands of the left-wing guerrillagroups and the right-wing paramilitary organisations. Furthermore, in Colombia it may be noted that while bilingualism in internationally prestigious languages, such as Spanish–English, Spanish–French, and Spanish–German is considered worthy of investment of considerable sums of money, as it provides access to a highly ‘visible’, socially accepted form of bilingualism, leading to the possibility of...