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Multicultural Victoria Act Discussion Paper Submission
Submission by: Aleksandra Ceferin, Director, Institute for Slovenian Studies of Victoria Inc.Date: 16 July 2004Multicultural Victoria Act is a great document for multicultural Australia, most comprehensive incovering the principles of social justice, equal rights, social harmony and cultural diversity.They are principles that work extraordinarily well in practice, and make Australian citizens fromnon-English speaking backgrounds proud to be Australians.The record of the Victorian government in the area of language teaching has been remarkable. Ithas supported language teaching at all levels, and has made it possible for languages to betaught and accredited to the VCE level - chiefly through the institution Victorian School of Languages. I regard the many languages taught within the system and at a professional highstandard as one of the greatest achievements of Australian democracy and its multiculturalpolicy, hardly repeated anywhere else in the world. The Victorian School of Languages, uniqueto Victoria is with its 44 languages an extraordinary institution and a major keystone for languagemaintenance.I would like to refer to one specific area however, which I believe deserves more attention. Iintroduce my comments from the point of view of a language teacher and a course developer for Slovenian, one of the smaller languages of Australia. I have been involved personally andprofessionally since 1976 in introducing Slovenian into the state school system including theVCE, and maintaining it through a series of educational reforms. I was also a member of FOSCfor LOTE from 1986 to 1991, and have participated as LOTE Consultant and VSL Area Manager and Assistant Principal for Curriculum in CSF and VCE Curriculum and ProfessionalDevelopment Programs.I have been closely involved with development of major and minor languages and haveparticipated apart from Slovenian, also in German VCE Design Projects.My chief reason for presenting this submission is that Slovenian is one of the five languages of low VCE candidature (Slovenian, Czech, Latvian, Lithuanian and Bengali), which have beennotified in May this year by the VCAA and ACACA that they will be suspended as VCEaccredited languages from 2006. The reason given was low candidature and resource intensiveVCE procedures. Languages are to be re-accredited under the condition that they present fifteencandidates for three subsequent years. Since there were hardly ever fifteen candidates for anyof these languages, this means virtually the end of VCE accreditation.This decision, most disappointing for languages concerned, opens the way for other languagesto be suspended and goes directly to the equity, social justice and diversity principles of themulticultural policy of Australia.Therefore I am making a special plea for the role of smaller community groups and languages.There is no point mentioned in the Discussion Paper about their position and role.1
 
I would like to argue that numerically small languages can and do, as in the case of Slovenian,make a valuable contribution to language teaching in Australia, have contributed in a significantway to the cultural diversity of Australian society, and add significantly to overseas business andcultural links.In my view it is precisely the smaller groups that have created the cultural and linguistic diversityassociated with the concept of multicultural Australia. Several major language groups wouldhave possibly remained just that, creating their separate individual environments, rather than therich mix that we have today.It is stated in the discussion paper that the Government recognises the great benefits of thediverse cultural backgrounds, languages and abilities of Victorians as one of the State’s greateststrengths, providing economic and social benefits to all Victorians, and
increased funding 
 
for languages
referred to as one of the achievements of multicultural Victoria.The policy states for the future:
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Improving the delivery and quality of language services
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Improving the effectiveness of the teaching of languages other than English (LOTE) inVictorian schoolsI can attest to the success and value of this policy, particularly through my involvement withSlovenian language at all curriculum and administrative levels.I wish to put forward the view however that the language policy, which I believe is a cornerstoneto the achievement of results in Victoria enumerated in the Discussion paper, needs to beextended by the notion that languages spoken by its people represent an enormous asset for Australia, and should be supported for that reason.We accept the fact that not all languages can be equally highly funded and that more must bespent on larger language groups in a response to their needs, although that is arguable. It couldalso be argued that small languages need more support for their maintenance. The post-migrantgenerations are not supported by an environment of native speakers and often lose the ability tospeak within one generation.Small languages have been given the opportunities of equity and access available to all LOTEs,and assisted in various ways right up to VCE accreditation. However, one major difference wasfunding. Only “major” languages, that is numerically strong groups were fully supported byfunding. This required from the professionals involved with a minor group commitment anddedication over a long period of time, use of their own resources, not to mention professionalexpertise and a great deal of time. Some funding for minor languages was provided in time, butwas never comparable to the support provided for “major” language groups.For instance, till 2001 all professional curriculum development work at primary, secondary andVCE level was not remunerated, and small languages depending exclusively on the commitmentof the professionals in each language to initiate, maintain and support the language. If one is toconsider that some of the smaller languages also lacked the teaching resources that major language take for granted, one gets at least some idea of the work and dedication required.I would like and consider it essential that this principle be included in the multicultural policy onlanguages. I suggest:2
 
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All languages (major and minor) are supported because they represent a valuableresource for Australia and add considerably to the diversity of multicultural Australia.I would like to support my proposal by presenting the case of Slovenian, as example of thrivingwithin the possibilities offered through the multicultural underpinnings of Australian democraticsystem, of effectiveness, achievements, use of resources, and finally of information technology.
The Case of Slovenian
.In Australia the Slovenian community is relatively small, and geographically dispersedthroughout Melbourne, Victoria and Australia.It has been estimated that there are nationally about 25,000 Slovenes living in Australia, andabout 8,000 Slovenes in Victoria, mostly in Melbourne and Geelong. English philologist DavidCrystal stated in an interview in 2003, that statistics show that Slovenian is in the top ten per cent of spoken languages of the world. Although the population of Slovenia is only two million,with a further 400,000 Slovenians living abroad, such a world ranking indicates that a smaller country is significant in more ways than population figures suggest.The Slovenian community in Victoria has availed itself of all the opportunities available to non-English speaking groups, including formal study of Slovenian language. The considerablecontributions to Australian diversity include an active social and cultural life, the development of LOTE curriculum, and establishing major cultural Internet projects.There are five cultural, social, and sporting associations and the Slovenian Religious andCultural Centre. They contribute to the diversity and richness of Victorian cultural life with artexhibitions, festivals, traditional celebrations, traditional polka music bands, entertainingcommunity groups from central Europe, and folk dance groups.Slovenian language was initially taught in clubs and centres. It was introduced as a secondarysubject with VCE accreditation into the Saturdays School of Modern Languages in 1976.Slovenian Teachers’ Association of Victoria was formed in the same year. It was reconstituted in1998 as the Institute for Slovenian Studies of Victoria in response to new necessities andopportunities offered by the Information Technology,with broader aims and membership.It is evident that the initial support subject by the Government was crucial to the success of Slovenian in Victoria as a school subject and later even more significantly, as a motivating anddriving force to establish a Web base from where the language and culture could be promotedand linked globally. The great response from the global audience has proven the strategy to be amajor success for promoting language learning, as well as developing Slovenian language andcultural resources.The Funding given in 1998 by the LOTElinx project, initiated by the Victorian Department of Education and offered to all LOTE associations, gave the initial impetus for a Slovenianlanguage and culture web node. The website was created and is being developed further byISSV. It is now a platform for a number of bilateral Slovenian language and cultural projects andis accessed (an average 200,000 hits each month) by an audience from over fifty countries.3
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