On a Multiple Mother Tongues in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC): The Case of the University of Kinshasa

Abstract

This paper set out to analyze the concept of Mother Tongue (MT) in a student community at the University of Kinshasa.

The underlying hypothesis, based on the researchers’ experiences and observations, was that the concept of MT as viewed and defined by UNESCO (1953) with a combination of chronological and competence meanings, could not be applied so straightforwardly to this study setting in DRC, where the dominant languages in the repertoires of a number of young people are not necessarily the first languages acquired as children. It was then posited that the regional language, in this case Lingala, or the official language, in this case French, or indeed any other second national language like Ciluba, Kikongo or Kiswahili, could take up the role of a MT, that is, with a MT effect. In this respect, a multiple MT has been naturally envisaged.

The Democratic Republic of Congo is a multilingual country par excellence, with around $250^{*}$ spoken languages, and in the capital city of Kinshasa, speakers of the four national languages, namely Ciluba, Kikongo, Kiswahili, and Lingala, interact daily in addition to the official language, French. No wonder any of these languages could end up emerging as the dominant one, depending on social backgrounds and domains of language use.

Linguistic data were collected empirically as well as in classrooms, using both qualitative and quantitative observation and interview techniques, as well as a questionnaire with both open and closed questions. The informants were 100 sample students selected from a target population of the Department English and Business Computer Science, at the Faculty of Arts, University of Kinshasa.

Using a number of psycho-sociolinguistic parameters to assess the dominant language (s) in the informants’ linguistic repertoires, it has been realized that the examinees are truly bilingual in French and Lingala.