Policies without planning?: The medium of instruction issue in Hong Kong

Policies without planning?: The medium of instruction issue in Hong Kong

• Hopkins, Mark Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Language and Education, 20(4), 270-286, 2006

Routledge

2006

• F Learning & Teaching
  • FE Medium of Instruction, Language of Teaching, Bi-& Multilingual Education, Problems of Bilingualism, Code-mixing & Code-switching
• P Social Context of Education
  • PE Law & Education ; Politics & Education
• R Educational Policy & Administration
  • RC Educational Planning & Decision Making Process, Educational Administration

Foreign Countries Official Languages Language Planning Educational Policy Educational Change Language of Instruction Policy Formation Sino Tibetan Languages Mandarin Chinese English (Second Language) Futures (of Society) Hong Kong

• Hong Kong

• 1997.7 onwards

• Unknown or Unspecified

The debate in Hong Kong over which language (Cantonese, Mandarin or English) should be used as the teaching medium in publicly funded educational institutions predates the city's transition from colony to Special Administrative Region in 1997. In the past nine years it has been presented as the cornerstone of the ongoing educational reform process. This paper argues that the issue has become increasingly ideologically motivated since the end of the colonial period, and identifies two factors contributing to the decisionmaking process in Hong Kong: the role of outside vested interests in educational policymaking and the shortfall in specific language teaching expertise. Against the complex background of Hong Kong's official language policy of 'trilingualism and biliteracy', the paper shows how educational policymakers are constrained by these factors and prevented from engaging in substantive educational language planning as a starting point for root-and-branch reforms, and how this may have led them to commission research to support pre-existing executive decisions. The study analyses official statements and policy documents on the medium of instruction issue, in combination with observations of the current situation in publicly funded secondary schools, in an attempt to indicate future directions for Hong Kong.
[Copyright of Language and Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.2167/le633.0]

• English

Journal Articles

• 09500782

• 10.2167/le633.0

https://bibliography.lib.eduhk.hk/bibs/00f895f7

2010-09-27