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Ngugi Wa Thiongo's Decolonizing the Mind and Makoni and Pannycook's Disinventing

and (Re)Constituting Languages Reaction Paper

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Ngugi Wa Thiongo's and Pannycook Reaction Paper

One of Ngugi Wa Thiongo's most important works, Decolonizing the Mind, is a

tribute to all individuals who write in African languages and those who have preserved the

dignity of African literature, culture, and philosophy over time. As Makoni and Pannycook

(2005) point out in their work Disinventing and (Re)Constituting Languages, to engage

critically with modern language, every critical linguistic effort must address the necessity for

linguistic disinvention and reconfiguration, no matter how noble their intentions may be on

the political front of things. This response will highlight the main ideas from Wa Thiongo

Ngugi and Makoni & Alastair Pennycook and how the two works interact.

Ngugi Wa Thiong'o (1994), in discussing how language was utilized for spiritual

oppression, based his work from his schooling life. Wa Thiong'o characterizes Gikuyu as the

language for his peasant family's contact with each other, with the society at large, and as

their method to exchange culture, notably via orature. According to him, languages "serve as

both a method of communication and a way of transmitting culture." A lack of attention to

the material and political consequences of how we talk and think about language will lead to

unfortunate situations in which it is the language rather than its speakers that are developed.

As such, Languages get more funding than its speakers.

Makoni and Pannycook (2005) make the case that acknowledging that languages have

been formed and that dialectal meta-language affects the universe through specific ways is

not enough; we must also comprehend the complex web of links that exist among language

inventions, metadiscursive regimes, linguistic impacts, alternative ways of interpreting

language, colonial history, and tactics for disinvention and reconstruction. Any serious effort

placed on linguistic that is aimed at a specific language in the present world must

comprehend the adverse language impacts it may spawn unless it faces the need for linguistic

disinvention and reconstruction.

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As Ngugi Wa Thiong'o work subtitle suggests, "The Politics of Language in African

Literature," the key debate is the African language should employ by African authors in

composing their works of literature. Despite the fact that skeptics have recognized the

difficult nature of language formation, Makoni and Pannycook (2005) contend with Ngugi

Wa Thiong'o idea and further contend that English language does not exist, nor is there any

other language for that matter. Makoni and Pannycook (2005) suggest that theree is still a

need for this analytic approach to language. to acquire a larger grasp of the processes of

creativity.

A national culture must contain that nation's literature conveyed in that nation's

original language (Ngugi wa Thiong'o, 1994). For Thiong'o, this means that in regions where

colonialism has been used as a means of oppression, the languages of the occupying power

should not serve as the primary language of instruction and culture. Ngugi wa Thiong stresses

that colonialism and the efforts and wishes of Africans to recover their cultures, economics,

and politics from colonial rulers are the social factors that have made the language of African

literature require attention and problem solving responses. He, however, argues that while the

colonial control, which can be classified as physical ceased, Africans are still exposed to

colonialism via language in African literature.

In conclusion, Makoni & Pannycook (2005) and Ngugi wa Thiong'o (1994) address

themes of language, education, colonialism and neo-colonialism, and culture in their writings.

Consequently, According to Makoni and Pannycook (2005), the fight for the creation of

language with regards to concerns of societal stratification gave rise to the unique shaping of

language and its function in the manufacture modernism: While Ngugi wa Thiong'o (1994)

emphasizes that the language of African literature cannot be analyzed meaningfully in terms

of the problem that is calligraphic because of societal factors that made it an issue to be

addressed.
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References

Makoni, S., & Pennycook, A. (2005). Disinventing and (re) constituting languages. Critical

Inquiry in Language Studies: An International Journal, 2(3), 137-156.

Wa Thiong'o, N. (1994). Decolonising the mind: The politics of language in African

literature. Zimbabwe Publishing House (Pvt.) Ltd.