The use of English
The series of articles in The Jakarta Post of April 5 about the use of English in Indonesian schools and institutions was quite interesting.
Former minister (of education and culture) Wardiman Djojonegoro's decree to finally allow English to officially enter our education system was courageous. Like it or not, English is the language of business, diplomacy and science. Due to our geographical position, however, and from both the economic and political points of view, one might wonder whether it would not be advisable to allow Japanese and Chinese some time in the future as well.
The most sensible things about the shortcomings of English training in the republic were said, as so often, by Mochtar Buchori. I'd like to complement his words with a few examples from my own experience.
Ten years ago, I was lecturing in one of the business schools in Jakarta where the vehicle of education was nearly exclusively English. The students could be divided into two distinct categories. Those who had lived abroad even for a relatively short time and were generally able to converse quite well in English (often the children of diplomats). Those who had been trained entirely locally, were often simply hopeless, except for those who had completed advanced courses at LIA.
My four daughters get exposure to English at home, but the gains they make there seem to be destroyed systematically in school.
When they ask me for help with their English homework, the first thing I have to do is to correct the texts to put some sense into them. Take the homework sheet that one of my daughters, class SMK-1 (Senior Vocational High School), had to translate recently. One passage will do: "Salesmen who have more experience in the job are the pioneers to market some new products. By having more skillful salesmen in the business means having main capital to market the products. To market the products is not simple job, but it depends on salesmanship of the salesmen, after all."
So, I corrected and simplified the text, the kid was happy to finally understand the mystery behind these sentences, only to be scolded later by the teacher for this affront to his or her authority.
A couple of months ago I thought it a good idea to have them watch TVRI's News in English, Mama mia! I quickly dropped the idea, but started, out of curiosity and probably a sense of revenge as well, to rate the quality of that program.
Sometimes the speakers are OK, but then there are the subtitlers who spoil the ratings. After the new cabinet was announced, the 008 access code welcomed through the subtitlers "our new elected cabinet minister." Until then, I had thought that Pak Harto had "elected more than one excellency, there were at any rate many more pictures in The Jakarta Post of March 15 than just one lone minister, but who am I to doubt the veracity of the New Order's mouthpiece, right?
And the speakers are not always right. Most of them, admittedly, score on my ratings sheet an 8/10 or above. Just as a yardstick for purposes of comparison, Ali Alatas scores with me 9/10. Equally good, or even better, are the two Soebrotos, Ines, Tiya, Kris, Inke, Ian and Priyo. Cut scores a 7 but could quickly climb the ladder if she could get rid of her ubiquitous "t" after words such as resolution, action, direction, etc.
Two others score 5 and 5.5 but that is still better than the producers and studio technicians (3/10) who show intifada kids throwing stones at Israeli soldiers while they have the speakers comment on Pak Harto's meeting with the IMF. The funniest contributions come from the subtitlers however (2/10). On Sunday they had a couple of good ones again: "Familly Circle Club Tennis, Habibie meet Helmut Kohl and Seven Banks Prozen."
My idea of using TVRI's News in English as an educational tool to improve my kids' English was none too brilliant, as I can only give it a regrettably low score.
IDRIS KYRWAJY
Jakarta