the british made english the medium of instruction in india in 1835.
the british made english the medium of instruction in india in 1835.
when did the british make english the medium of instruction in india?
1835
english language public instruction began in india in the 1830s during the rule of the east india company (india was then, and is today, one of the most linguistically diverse regions of the world). in 1835, english replaced persian as the official language of the company. lord macaulay played a major role in introducing english and western concepts to education in india. he supported the replacement of persian by english as the official language, the use of english as the medium of instruction in all schools, and the training of english-speaking indians as teachers. throughout the 1840s and 1850s, primary, middle, and high-schools were opened in many districts of british india, with most high-schools offering english language instruction in some subjects. in 1857, just before the end of company rule, universities modelled on the university of london and using english as the medium of instruction were established in bombay, calcutta and madras. during the british raj, lasting from 1858 to 1947, english language penetration increased throughout india. this was driven in part by the gradually increasing hiring of indians in the civil services. at the time of india's independence in 1947, english was the only functional lingua franca in the country.
glossary of the british raj
after the defeat of the boers by the british in 1902 the orange free state became known as the orange river colony during which time the official language was changed from dutch to english. therefore when the grey university college was founded in 1904, the language medium was english. however, dutch was one of the subjects taught at the college from the very beginning. language activists in favor of afrikaans made it possible for the language to be accepted as one of the subjects at the college as a "supplementary subject to dutch" in 1919 where afrikaans became a popular subject. in 1950 the university of the orange free state (uofs) was established and the official medium language was afrikaans. the name of the university again changed in 2001 to the university of the free state as it is known today. although a bilingual language policy (afrikaans & english) were introduced since 1993 it was formalized in 2003. however, the university decided to make english the primary medium of instruction in 2016. this decision was jointly challenged by civil rights group afriforum and solidarity (south african trade union) but the decision to remove afrikaans was upheld by the constitutional court of south africa in 2017; when the judgment favored the university's new language policy which has been implemented since then.
university of the free state