Intercultural education in the multicultural and multilingual Bolivian context

Abstract

Intercultural bilingual education (IBE) has been discussed in Bolivia since the 1970s. The first Educational Act with a bilingual and intercultural curriculum adapted to cultural and linguistic diversity – Ley de Reforma Educativa – was passed in 1994 with implementation starting in 1996. However, discussions continued: when the Evo Morales government was installed in January 2006, it abolished the act initiating work on a new law – ‘Ley Elizardo Pérez y Avelino Siñani’ (decolonised community education) – arguing that intercultural education is more than bilingualism; the new law would emphasise the main values of Amerindian communities. The article will focus on the contextual background of educational reforms in relation to IBE. How is IBE defined and related to an Amerindian context? Why did the government dominated by ministers of an indigenous background abolish an educational act that emphasised intercultural education? Why would a revision not have sufficed? As the historical process is the basis for the current situation, I will begin by presenting the country’s history emphasising the state of education and progress.

Educación intercultural bilingüe, EIB, se ha discutido en Bolivia desde la decada de los 70. Cuando la Ley de Reforma Educativa LRE fue aprobada en 1994 el curriculo fue adaptado por primera vez a la diversidad cultural y lingüistica del país. Sin embargo, el debate continuaba y cuando el gobierno de Evo Morales tomó posesión en 2006 abrogó el código iniciando el trabajo con una nueva ley, ‘Ley Elizardo Pérez y Avelino Siñani’. La argumentación principal fue que educación es más que bilinguismo; la nueva ley enfatizaría mejor los valores principales de las comunidades indígenas. El enfoque del articulo será la base contextual de la las reformas relacionada con EIB. ¿Cómo se define EIB? y ¿cómo se relaciona en un contexto amerindio? ¿Por qué fue necesario para un gobierno dominado por ministros indígenas anular una ley que enfatiza la educación intercultural? ¿Por qué no era sufficiente hacer una revisión? Ya que el proceso histórico siempre es la base de la situacion actual empezaré con una breve presentación del país enfatizando la situación y los procesos educativos.

Keywords:

• Bolivia
• intercultural education
• bilingual education
• IBE
• multicultural
• educational reform
• decolonisation
• Amerindian values

Notes

1. http://www.gobernabilidad.org.bo/noticias/2-noticias/709-ley-de-educacion-avelino-sinani-elizardo-perez (accessed December 17, 2010). There has been some revision in the final act; however, the main emphasis is the same as in the proposal.

2. Since 2004, I have visited Bolivia four to six weeks a year on educational trips with students.

3. I am especially grateful for the cooperation of the Bolivian anthropologist, Martin Bazurco, the academic coordinator at EIB in Cochabamba; Guido Machaca, the executive for alternative education at the urban teachers’ union (CTEUB); Arcenio Mayorga, the facilitator at the Norwegian Mission Alliance; Hipolito Llanque and language teacher Joel Vera, Master of Arts in Quechua.

4. Citations from Spanish and Norwegian sources have been translated by the author’s translation. The interpretations are the author’s responsibility.

5. Amerindian or indigenous peoples are descendants of the peoples who populated the western hemisphere prior to the arrival of the Europeans and have maintained some cultural and organisational characteristics (Canessa 2005, 31; Luykx 1999).

6. Post‐colonial refers to ‘the ways in which modes of thought and belief learned through colonial history continue to affect cultures after the formal collapse of empires’ (Patke 2006).

7. Official census statistics on belonging to ethnic group and bilingualism have several limitations such as time and money and whether the respondent and census‐taker share the same idea about the terms used (Romaine 2004, 400ff.).

8. For 2010, the Bolivian Statistical Institute (INE) stipulates 10.4 million inhabitants (http://www.ine.gov.bo/indice/visualizador.aspx?ah=PC20410.HTM).

9. Mestizo traditionally signifies an individual presumably of both Hispanic and Indian descent. Today the term signifies more a social group of people one chooses to join than an ethnical term.

10. The Sociologist Félix Patzi Paco was the first minister of education in the Morales government.

11. Cárdenas, leader of MRTKL, Tupac Katari Liberation Revolutionary Movement, was the first Aymara ever to reach high public office.

12. The proposition is named after the teacher Perez and the Aymara religious leader Siñani that founded clandestine schools for indigenous pupils before the revolution.

13. The Andean word is yachac often translated shaman. A yachac is a person that has knowledge; in this context he has knowledge on the Indian beliefs, culture and ethics to be included in education.

14. ‘Culture is a way of living as a group of human beings: their ideas, values, rules and norms, handed down from one generation to the next – often gradually changed’ (Klausen 1992, 27).

15. Albó is a naturalised Bolivian from Catalonia, an ordained Jesuit priest and has a doctorate in sociolinguistics and anthropology. For Albó’s involvement in the process for educational reform, see http://albo.pieb.com.bo/albo.htm.

16. He now works at PROEIB ANDES in Cochabamba.

17. ‘The School to Rescue the Native Country’.

18. For a discussion of the concept of interculturality in the educational reforms, see Drange (2007).