The status of Thailand's implementation of international treaty obligations regarding linguistic human rights in education

Abstract

Given the recent consideration by the Thai government of a national language policy, this article considers the status of Thailand's treaty obligations regarding linguistic human rights in education. It presents a general background, a brief linguistic profile of Thailand, a concise summary of the concept and importance of linguicide, and a description of relevant treaties, preceded by an analysis using a standard taxonomy. Thailand's domestic legal position concerning linguistic human rights in education is examined in order to analyze the state of compliance with treaty obligations. This is followed by an analysis of the current policy framework and an examination of the extent of policy implementation in the case of Thai Malay in the Deep South, with small linguistic minorities, and in the case of Thailand's main regional languages. The article concludes by reporting on future developments based on the role that the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization considers the role of the mother tongue, in the context of the implementation of the UN Education for all programs, and how this may affect Thailand.

Keywords:

• linguistic human rights
• Thailand
• teaching the mother tongue
• south of Thailand
• multilingualism
• linguicide

Acknowledgements

The author acknowledges a grant from the Center for Research on Plurality in the Mekong Region at KKU as well as European Union Grant EuropeAid/131209/C/ACT/T for the Isan Culture Maintenance and Revitalization Programme, both of which made this research possible.

Notes

Beginning with UNESCO (1953). For more recent expositions of this ideal in the Asian context, see UNESCO (2005b, 2007).

This is also called Lanna, also the name used for a historical northern kingdom, and is used more broadly in this way so as to include cultural studies by some institutions mentioned in the article. For a full list of alternative names, see Lewis (2009).

Chiang Mai was a separate kingdom until the late nineteenth century, and for a justification of the separate historical identity of Isan see Draper (2004) or Wilson (2009), the latter of which traces the incorporation of the elite of the Khorat Plateau of Isan into the Thai hegemony in the nineteenth century.

As described as a component of cultural genocide, originally formulated in Article III of the UN Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which, however, was not adopted in the final Convention of 1948 as GA Res. 260 (III), 9 December 1948 (UN, 1948). For a discussion of this, see Skutnabb-Kangas (2000), especially pp. 314–317.

Following Field Marshal Pibul Songgram's taking office as prime minister in 1939, with his ninth Rattaniyon (dictat). See Chaloetiarana (1978), pp. 251–252. For a brief history of the political and ideological issues surrounding the Thai language, see Keyes (2003, pp. 177–210).

This role of the school as an agent of the state/government (indistinguishable during monarchical rule and military governments) has not changed significantly since Keyes’ (1991) article on the role of the school in Thailand and Vaddhanaphuti's (1991) article on education in the North.

Following Smalley (1994, pp. 155–175).

Comprising the provinces of Yala, Narathiwat, Satun, and Pattani, the four Thai Malay majority provinces, together with parts of Songkhla. For the history of their integration into Thailand, see e.g., Che Man (1990) or Yegar (2002, especially pp. 78–80). Because of Satun's largely Thaiified Thai Malay population, it is sometimes not considered a part of the ‘Deep' South.

See Note 6, which while covering only primary and secondary education, also reflects the situation regarding tertiary education. This paradigm of government-supported institutions emphasizing militarized obedience to government/state ideology is visually reproduced in the fact that Thai universities are among very few in the world with a mandatory uniform code. In addition, all KKU students receive their diploma from a member of the Thai royal family.