The dilemma of African languages in the wake of globalisation and the continuous empowerment
of other languages qua languages of industrialisation, technology and international currency, is one that
has occupied one of the most obscure positions in the national agenda of many African states. With
less and even lesser attention paid to the functional empowerment of these indigenous languages, since
a greater attention is paid to developing and promoting bilingualism (Cameroon), or an imposed second
official language (English in Mozambique and French in Nigeria), or a national cross-cultural language
(English, French, Spanish, Portuguese in other parts of Africa), the fear of their extinction is becoming
higher. As Mufwene (2001) holds, even written languages die, as was the case with Gaelic, Latin,
Sanskrit and (Bible) Hebrew. In the face of this, the current wave of standardisation and
alphabetisation (SIL, CABTAL, PROPELCA, NACALCO, in Cameroon – see table 2) has to be
corroborated with extensive functional duties that will make the languages to maintain a currency
proportionate to keeping them alive in the society rather than in the archives.
Earlier works in Cameroon on this topic, (Ngijol 1964, Fonlon 1969, Echu 1999, Alobwede 1998,
etc.) strongly call for standardisation, alphabetisation, and teaching of these languages in schools
(Njock 1966, Tadadjeu 1975, Chumbow 1980) but do not explicitly advance a functional scheme for
them. What will it serve to learn how to write and read a language that will not serve you in any career,
or any aspect of national life, nor for integration into any sector, etc.? This therefore ought to be the
point of focus, that is, pulling the indigenous languages out of functional seclusion and introducing
them into spheres where learning them will be a necessity. However the “linguistic cultural baggage”
(Samarin 1984:436) that was brought together with colonialism still reigns whereas it ought to have
evolved to the same multilateral (linguistic, cultural, ethnic, etc.) status of the postcolonial states today.