Did you know that we can actually preserve African native languages through African Translation services? Yes we can because this here means that translations are done into and from these languages thus leaving the original source intact and available for viewing in the archives.
For those who went or go to school in an African country have gone through, witnessed or at least heard of students getting punished for speaking their native languages at the school premises! These punishments include/included wearing sacks on top of the school uniform, back cloth in Uganda, cleaning up vast surfaces or being spanked as means to deter one from speaking their very own language.
And sadly there are some homesteads that discourage native languages especially with toddlers as official languages speaking toddlers are viewed as more desirable and are depicted to fit in more in the societies. There are cases where nannies and older siblings are instructed to speak to these young children in languages like English, French, Portuguese or Arabic, depending from which part of Africa they hail from.
This therefore made/makes most people growing up in Africa hate their native languages because they were associated with punishments from a very young age. Instead students are always encouraged to use formal languages while at school, even in their free time and dormitories if they are in boarding schools and the encouraged languages usually include; English, French, Arabic and Portuguese apart from a few African countries that are blessed to have some of their native languages included on the official language list.
Instead of discouraging people from speaking their native languages, professional African Translation Services should be embraced so as to kill 2 birds with one stone. In this way, African native languages will be preserved as people will continue speaking them freely and using them in all forms and yet still professional African Translation Services will be hired for purposes of effective communication with people speaking different languages.
This means that for businesses wishing to expand in African countries, they will have to hire translation companies to translate their product/service information into languages most understood by their audiences. This will definitely drive the point across more than it will have been in a person’s second or third language which their country uses as an official language.
Effective communication is crucial and although official languages that were once foreign to Africa like Arabic, English, Portuguese, French, German and Spanish foster that, African native languages should be made a priority because they are an identity to Africa and eroding them away would be eroding Africa and therefore Professional African Translation Services are the best alternative to preserving them.
By Angela Kyolaba
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