the physics of Newton, i.e. Indian only in external features, but for all intellectual and practical purposes steeped in western, nay English philosophy, science and literature.
In the 18th century, Indian masses received religious education pertaining to Christianity through Christian missionaries. However, when the East India Company came to India they did not allow the missionaries to propagate religious education to the common people in India. They felt that, the education from the missionaries would encourage religious sentiments among the people in India that could affect the business policy and the diplomatic role of East India Company. It was through the Charter Act of 1813 that a state system of education was officially introduced in the Indian history. This clause of the Charter Act of 1813 compelled the East India Company to accept responsibility for the education of the Indian people. As a result, from 1813 to 1857, the company opened many schools and colleges under their control, which laid the foundation of the English system of education in India In this clause, Governor-General-in-Council directed that a sum of one lakh of rupees, each year shall be set apart for the revival and improvement of literature and encouragement of the learned natives of India, and for the introduction and promotion of knowledge of the science among the inhabitants of the British territories in India. For the first time official money was allotted to expand the education of the Indians. Macaulays Minute Lord Macaulay landed in India on June 10, 1834 and was immediately appointed as president of General Committee of Public Instruction. Macaulay arrived in Madras on June 10, 1834, and proceeded to Ootacamund, Nilgiris, where the Governor General of India William Bentinck was camping for the summer. Macaulay wrote of his initial experience as follows: To be on land after three months at sea is of itself a great change. But to be in such a land! The dark faces, with white turbans, and flowing robes: the trees not our trees: the very smell of atmosphere that of a hothouse, and the architecture as strange as the vegetation (Trevelyan 1876: 334). There was a salute of fifteen guns when he set his foot on the beach! . Lord Macaulay wrote a minute on 2ndFebruary 1835,
where he made the decision regarding the controversy. Macaulay always devoted his best to the job on hand. In his youth, Macaulay exhibited vehemence, overconfidence, the inability to recognize that there are two sides to a question or two people in a dialogue, just as other young men displayed (Trevelyan 1876; 112). While these traits were tempered in his later years, Macaulay was always a man of his own ideas. And he was greatly influenced in his ideals, ideas, and ideologies by the great achievements of Western civilization, sciences, philosophy, and theology. His nephew-biographer writes, His speeches and essays teem with expressions of a far deeper than official interest in India and her people; and his minutes remain on record, to prove that he did not affect the sentiment for a literary or oratorical purpose (Trevelyan 1876: 235). In 1835, the arguments Orientalists were put before Lord Macaulay, who rejected the arguments of the Orientalists through a very forceful minute wherein he supported the education of the classes and made a vigorous plea for spreading Western learning through the medium of English. On March 7, 1835, Lord William Bentinck also accepted Macaulays recommendations and sanctioned it officially. In 1837 English was made the court language and a Government Resolution of 1844 threw high posts open to Indians. These measures resulted in a rapid growth of English education. The missionaries also established a number of English schools and colleges Macaulay wrote in his minute we must at present do our best to form a class of persons Indian in blood and colour and English in taste, opinions in morals and in intellect, Macaulays arguments in favour of English: Macaulay rejected the claims of Arabic and Sanskrit as against English, because he considered that English was better than either of them. His arguments in favour of English were 1. It is the key to modern knowledge and is therefore more useful than Arabic or Sanskrit. 2. It stand pre eminent even among the language of the west in India, English is the language sponsored by the ruling class. It is likely to become the language of commerce throughout the seas of the east. 3. It would bring about renaissance in India, just as Greek or Latins did in England or just as the languages of western Europe in civilized Russia
4.
The natives are desirous of being taught English and are not eager to learn
Sanskrit or Arabic. 5. It is possible to make the natives of this country good English scholars, and to that end our efforts ought to be directed 6. It was impossible to educate the body of people but it was possible through English education to bring about a class of persons Indian in blood and colour and English in taste , opinions in morals and in intellect, and that education was to filter down from them to the masses
Macaulay concluded his Minute with a characteristically dramatic flourish, threatening to resign from his position as President of the GCPI if his proposals were rejected. He knew that this was an empty threat, and, as he anticipated, Bentinck immediately gave his entire concurrence to the Minute. Bentinck appears to have been anxious to settle the education controversy before his departure from India . As noted above, he gave the Minute his immediate assent, and to effect its speedy implementation, he deliberately prevented any discussion of Macaulays scheme in the GCPI. Seed (1952) claims that Bentinck purposely withheld action on the education question until the very end of his term in office because he feared that the radical nature of the policy would arouse the opposition of the Court of Directors in London, upon whose blessing all policies ultimately depended. Seed further argues that the timing of Bentincks decision was shaped by his experience in Madras in 1807, when he was dismissed from the Governorship for his alleged insensitivity to Indian religions and customs.By introducing the controversial new policy on the eve of his departure, Bentinck perhaps calculated that he would succeed in avoiding a similar humiliation. Bentincks underlying caution is evident in his Resolution of 7 March 1835 giving effect to the new policy. In accordance with Macaulays proposals, the Resolution stated that the great object of the British Government ought to be the promotion of European literature and science among the natives of India, and that all the funds appropriated for the purpose of education would best be employed on English education alone . However, in a significant departure from theMinute, Bentinck disavowed any intention to abolish any College or School of Native learning, while
the Native Population shall appearto be inclined to avail themselves of the advantages which it affords . Although the Resolution stipulated that no further stipends be awarded for Oriental studies, it was careful to direct that native scholars already in receipt of government grants would continue to enjoy their allowances. Bentincks concessions on these points seem to have been prompted by pressure from influential groups in Calcuttas Muslim and Hindu communities, who, upon hearing news of Macaulays scheme, submitted petitions to the government protesting against the new policy. The Governor-Generals softening stance towards Oriental studies a matter of weeks after expressing his entire concurrence with the Minute would therefore appear to bear out Rossellis contention that Bentinck let Macaulay fire the rhetorical big guns while ensuring that vested interests suffered little actual damage. Macaulay left India in December 1837, apparently with satisfaction for the job he did in India Analysis of Macaulays Minute Since the decision to promote English education had been taken well before the Minutes composition, Macaulays purpose was essentially to justify the policy which had already been agreed upon rather than to persuade Bentinck to support the Anglicist position. Macaulay was aware that in formulating its education policy the GCPI was bound by the Charter Act of 1813, which required the East India Company to encourage both Western and Oriental learning. While the Anglicists project accorded with the Acts stipulation that funds be assigned for the introduction and promotion of a knowledge of the sciences, it was apparently at variance with its requirement that education policy should also be directed towards the revival and improvement of literature, and the encouragement ofthe learned natives of India. Though perhaps not an explicit statement of British intentions, it was generally accepted that this objective envisaged the revival and improvement of Arabic and Sanskrit literature ratherthan English literature. Indeed, as Spear(1938 )notes, the flimsiness of Macaulays legal case accounts for the content and tone of the Minute: the withering attack on Indian learning, the source of its continuing notoriety, was intended to distract attention from the provisions of the Charter Act, which he knew provided the Orientalists with their strongest argument. Given the fragility of his case, it is not surprising that Macaulay addressed the legal issue in a perfunctory manner, brushing aside the arguments of the
Orientalists with what Spear (1938: 84) describes as an Olympian statement of opinion that the Act of 1813 intended the exact opposite of what its words implied. Having concluded that the grant at the Governments disposal could be used to promote learning in any way which may be thought most advisable ,Macaulay proceeded to discuss the most useful way of employing it. Since all parties agreed that the vernacular languages contained neither literary nor scientific information and were thus too poor and rude to be used as instructional media, the GCPI was faced with a straightforward choice between Sanskrit/Arabic and English, the central question being, according to Macaulay, which language is the best worth knowing? (p. 1405). Macaulays case for English was founded on his belief in the intrinsic superiority of English literature and science over Indian learning, and on his conviction that a strong desire for English-language education existed among certain segments of the Indian population. Macaulay maintained that his low estimate of the value of Indian learning was shared by his adversaries in the Orientalist camp: I have never found one among them who could deny that a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia(p. 1405) .According to Macaulay, the claims of English were hardly necessary to recapitulate. It stood pre-eminent among the languages of the West. Whoever knew English had ready access to all the vast intellectual wealth which all the wisest nations of the earth have created and hoarded in the course of ninety generations . The important political and economic role which English was beginning to assume in India and in the emerging Empire also provided a strong justification for promoting education in the language. Thus, whether viewed from the perspective of Britains growing imperial interests, or its value as the repository of a superior body of knowledge and thought, English was the language which Macaulay believed would be most usef ul to our native subjects (p. 1406). The simple question before the British authorities was whether, when it was in their power to teach English, they would instead teach languages in which there are no books on any subject which deserve to be compared to our own,whether, when we can teach European science, we shall teach systems which, by universal confession, wherever they differ from those of Europe differ for the worse, and whether, when we can patronise sound Philosophy and true history ,we shall countenance, at the public expense, medical doctrines which would disgrace an English furrier, astronomy which would move laughter in girls at an English boarding school, history abounding with kings thirty feet high and reigns thirty thousand years long, and geography made of seas of treacle and seas of butter.
Apart from extolling the virtues of English literature and science vis--vis traditional Indian learning, Macaulay sought justification for his plan by arguing that Indians evinced a far stronger desire to learn English than Sanskrit or Arabic. In setting out his case, Macaulay challenged the time-honoured Orientalist argument that the promotion of Oriental studies helped to conciliate the influential classes in Indian society. Macaulay contended that unanswerable evidence existed to prove that we are not at present securing the co-operation of the natives; in fact, the policy of engraftment was having quite the opposite effect. For Macaulay, the state of the market should determine language policy (p.1409): We are withholding from them the learning which is palatable to them.We are forcing on them the mock learning which they nauseate. This is proved by the fact that we are forced to pay our Arabic and Sanskrit students while those who learn English are willing to pay us. (p. 1408) Having presented his case for English, Macaulay advanced the idea of downward filtration, which proposed that the meagre parliamentary grant be used to cultivate a class of anglicised Indians who would not only serve as cultural brokers between the British and their Indian subjects, but who would also refine and enrich the vernacular languages, and thereby render them fit media for imparting Western learning to the masses: In one point I fully agree with the gentlemen to whose general views I am opposed. I feel with them that it is impossible for us, with our limited means, to attempt to educate the body of the people. We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect. To that class we may leave it to refine the vernacular dialects of the country, to enrich those dialects with terms of science borrowed from the western nomenclature, and to render them by degrees fit vehicles for conveying knowledge to the great mass of the population. While the sentence advocating the creation of an acculturated Indian elite is justifiably regarded as the epitome of cultural and linguistic imperialism, Macaulays critics have tended to overlook the significance of the preceding sentence, which indicates that his controversial scheme was entirely dictated by government parsimony, and have similarly chosen to ignore the import of the following sentence,
which reveals that the development of vernacular education constituted an important element in the Anglicists project. Macaulay accompanied his plan with three specific measures designed to strike at the root of the bad system which has hitherto been fostered by us (p. 1412). Though careful to stress that existing interests should be respected, he nevertheless proposed that the CalcuttaMadrasa and Sanskrit College (Calcutta) be abolished,that the printing of Arabic and Sanskrit books be discontinued, and that no further stipends be awarded to students wishing to pursue Oriental studies at the Delhi Madrasa and Sanskrit College (Benares). .It is important to note, however, that the authorities in Calcutta formulated and began implementing the new policy on their own initiative rather than seeking prior approval from the Court of Directors. In fact, the documents relating to the new policy did not reach the companys London offices until January 1836, that is, almost a year after Bentinck had given his initial assent. It was not, however, until January 1841 that the controversy over Macaulays Minute was finally laid to rest, and it would be a further 13 years before the British produced, in the shape of Woods despatch, their definitive statement on language policy in India.
Critical Appraisal of Macaulays Minute It was the knowledge of English language, just like that of Persian or Arabic in the age of the Mughals, was and is, the surest way to better employment opportunities. English was and is a definitely and distinctively powerful language used by those in power. It is the surest, best and fastest way to achieve the mush coveted social mobility in India. Ironically, English is the paradigm modern language of political and economic power; the factor responsible for disenfranchisement of a vast majority of populations in the third world . There are, in fact, two nations in our country today: one that is designated as Hindustan, and the other India.Hindustan speaks vernaculars and dreams of climbing the power and social ladder. The English speaking, rich and powerful section of our country are designated as India by thinkers today. The present paper is an attempt to trace the development of India and Hindustan from the pre-independence India. Its focus will be on Thomas Babington Macaulays Minute of the Educational Policy (the Minute), 2 February 1835, that is widely blamed or acclaimed as the foundation of the future education
policies of India, hence of future India. Taking up such an old link in the chain of colonial policy and using the past as a parallel to the present is justified by the fact that the past continues to live with minor changes even today. Even today there exist in India the powerful elite who rules and the powerless masses that is ruled and exploited. Even from todays free India, there is a huge drain of wealth, like its preindependence colonial days, to both a parallel black economy and to various foreign bank accounts. The juggernaut set in motion in the nineteenth century crushes the bones of millions of Indians even today, although they are citizens of a free democracy with freedom to choose between a whole set of options between a life in perpetually powerless poverty and a slow but definite descent into death. It is also important because English Language Teaching (ELT) policies in India descended from those of the Raj era, just as many of the implicit assumptions regarding education and value of native civilization and languages. It is education that plays the dominant role in suppressing local languages and forcing alien languages and cultural values onto people (Kachru et al 306). InIndia, as Macaulay had planned, the system and medium of education planted in the past did their work perfectly. Thomas Babington Macaulays Minute of the Educational Policy (the Minute), 2 February 1835, that Lord William Bentick had later assented to, was the cornerstone of the long term development of the education system of the Indian subcontinent as it had the support of the powerful government lobby and was a classic example of using language as a vehicle for destabilizing a subjugate culture with the aim of creating a subculture . Macaulay had written it, as a Member of the Council of India, in reaction to the policy of education being followed in India at his time. The 1813 Act of the British Parliament had set apart one lac rupees for the revival and promotion of literature, and the encouragement of the learned natives ofIndia, and for the introduction and promotion of a knowledge of the sciences among the inhabitants of the British territories (Macaulay). Macaulay was totally against the way the above mentioned amount was used. He was heavily critical and disapproving of the Arabic and Sanscrit literature. His idea of a learned native was of a native familiar with the poetry ofMilton, the metaphysics of Locke, and the physics of Newton, i.e. Indian only in external features, but for all intellectual and practical purposes steeped in western, nay English philosophy, science and literature. A scholar of the Sanskrit sacred books, Hindu rituals and philosophy was not to be called learned.Moreover, Macaulay based his strong plea for change in the educational policy on the explicit mention of the promotion of the knowledge of science among the colonized natives. The orientalists were campaigning for the maintenance of the
status quo. Macaulay, on the other hand, was very sure of the uselessness of teaching certain languages and certain sciences, though those languages may become useless, though those sciences may be exploded. He claimed with certainty that the vernaculars would become useless with the passage of time, being replaced by the dominant language: English. Time proved him wrong. Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Tamil are spoken by a very large proportion of the worlds population today. The number of people who call these languages their mother tongue is increasing day by day. Macaulays claim of the unscientific native sciences was not reached at through a scientifically valid research and analysis of only facts. It was based on baseless and immature opinions of an opinionated white man. Macaulays confident assumption of the eventual exploding the native sciences was made with an arrogance that knew no bounds. It was with this very characteristic faith in his white racial supremacy that he declared: We have a fund to be employed as Government shall direct for the intellectual improvement of the people of this country. The unsaid yet widely believed opinion of his time was that the Orientals were beasts of natural impulses, given to the pleasures of flesh, and nothing else. His generalizations are so totalizing and confident that they leave one speechless with intellectual rage. He had the courage to pronounce: All parties seem to be agreed on one point, that the dialects commonly spoken among the natives of this part of India contain neither literary nor scientific information. He was not alone in explicitly or implicitly mentioning so. There were many, among the colonized too, who were of a similar opinion. They had, as Paranjape points out, an insufficiency thesis regarding their own culture and its products. Raja Ram Mohan Roy, a famous social reformer and enlightened Hindu who started Brahmo Samaj movement in Bengal, did not have much use of traditional or Sanskrit learning. He demanded for his countrymen the knowledge of the western sciences and the modern empirical method. It is this very unqualified enthusiasm for techno-modernity that Gandhi later opposed in his Hind Swaraj. His Hind Swaraj contains the anti-thesis of Rammohuns insufficiency thesis. Gandhi advances what might be termed the complete self-sufficiency thesis. He says Indian civilization is superior to modern civilization Macaulay was not making his assertions on his own authority, or in opposition to the claims of the point of view he opposed. In fact, one of his most infamous assertions is made on behalf of both Orientalists and Occidentaslists, as he had never found one among them [the Orientalists] who could deny that a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia. The intrinsic superiority of the Western literature is indeed fully admitted by those members of the committee who
support the oriental plan of education. It was their faith of their superiority, fed by their collective chauvinism, which made the colonizers blind to reason. Macaulay mentions very clearly that even among the orientalists, the Sanskrit and Arabic poetry, the best and choicest fruit of these classical languages, was seen as inferior to the European one. The Minute had not a single idea that was invented. Macaulay was just presenting the then prevalent line of thought that had matured through the long struggle between the two major and contending views the colonizers held of the colonized of the East: the Orientalist versus Occidentalist controversy. It was the overall discourse, i.e. large body of texts with a similar intent and set of protocols, of contrapuntal positions . It had generated all the ideas and the heat, one part of which is strongly present in the Minute. Neither extreme of views was race exclusive, as they had both white and brown proponents, depending on the part of grand narrative they were interpellated with. Yet, they did constitute parts of a structure and could only function while belonging to it. The Minute only present a set of ideas, not essentially and exclusively related to either the content or the medium of education. It is very important to focus on the Minute in detail because it is from this point of origin that whole subsequent system is alleged to have come, especially by those who criticize it. Macaulay made sweeping generalizations disregarding both common sense and specific examples that might have proven it otherwise. He claimed that the English had to educate a people who cannot at present be educated by means of their mother-tongue, while either ignoring or ignorant of the fact that in Bombay presidency vernacular was successfully used as the medium of instruction in schools. His linguistic chauvinism knows no bounds when he asserts confidently that English stood pre-eminent even among the languages of the West. His claim was neither unique nor uncharacteristic of his times. In addition to the obvious superior intrinsic value of English language, he was also presenting more concrete reasons: Thus he was presenting a very strong case for the adoption of English as the medium of education and also for an insidious infiltration of young minds when they were the most impressionable. He knew that language is a system of culture, not merely a system of communication. [and a] culture is deeply embedded in a language . Thus he was aiming at something much more significant than just the medium of instruction. His explicitly expressed objective, just like that of his race, was regarding a great impulse given to the mind of a whole society, of prejudices overthrown, of knowledge diffused, of taste purified, of arts and sciences. His race was there to civilize the ignorant barbarians of the East and he knew that the white mans sacred burden ought to be shouldered with a dutiful faith. His arrogance, a very
characteristic imperial arrogance, oozes out of the whole body of the text. He takes the implicit assumptions of his time as self-contained and self-sustaining axioms of the perfect Euclidean Empire. His certainty is amazing, as is his unshakeable faith in the superiority of his race. He opines that, when a nation of high intellectual attainments undertakes to superintend the education of a nation comparatively ignorant, the learners must be guided by their masters (pun intended), and not the other way round. His generalizations had no rational ground or support. He declared the literature, history, metaphysics and theology of India as absurd. With a very strongly chauvinistic assumption regarding his race and its culture, Macaulay asserted that the British must try to create a class of Indians who would act as interpreters between their countrymen and their white masters. He envisioned very shrewdly the creation of a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect. To a large extent he succeeded in his plan. The postcolonial theory very clearly states that it is impossible for an alien nation to colonize and exploit another nation until they get ample support from certain sections of the colonized people themselves. The collusion of the colonized with the Empire was one of the main reasons not only behind its successful entry into India, but also behind the sustenance of the colonial rule. Macaulays success was so complete that even today a whole set of counter currents run in the Indian system, as was mentioned in the beginning of this paper. The colonizers had created an elite and language was an important element in the successful execution of their plans as the colonizers were also in part linguistic codifiers, who were able to act as gatekeepers for those who wished to share in the economic and other benefits of becoming English users. Macaulays confident assertions may be proven fallacious, illogical, and even ridiculous today, but, ironically, his prediction turned out to be true. English is the most coveted and the most popular medium of education in urban India. The hegemony of English language and literature is directly linked with the forces of globalization and polarization of powers both military and monetary. As far as India is concerned, English happens to be the passport for securing gainful employment in the private sector. Thus, it acts as it did nearly two centuries ago, as is mentioned in that much detested and debated about document. Even poor people send their children to English medium schools in hope that learning English would definitely enhance their employability and will finally help in moving up from the social stratum they belong to. The same motivation was working exactly in the same manner in Macaulays time too. The language of power was creating market and
learners at a very fast pace; just as it had done in past after the Muslim invasion and expansion in India. Macaulay had very incisively opined about the market demand for his language and its eventual spread in India: Nothing is more certain than that it never can in any part of the world be necessary to pay men for doing what they think pleasant or profitable. He had ample support favouring English against the classical languages of learning. Analysing Macaulays premises, assumptions and claims leads one to a coherent and distinct attitude he had towards life and humanity. He appears to have a firm faith in the superiority of the West over the East aesthetically and intellectually, arising implicitly out of its geopolitical superiority. He may have been proven wrong about the geopolitical and temporal strength and extent of the Empire, but he was accurate about the predictions he made regarding the strength and future of the linguistic entity called the Empire of English language. Two hundred years after the Minute was written Randolph Quirk expressed a similar confidence in the future and power of his language: a language the language on which the sun does not set, whose users never sleep. It is this very empire of English language of which South Asia is a part. Most of the erstwhile British colonies in South Asia, English stayed there, even after the Empire was done away with. It has now taken roots that have gone too deep to be uprooted in near future. Macaulays aim of creating an intermediary class was fulfilled. He did not know it fully that his prophesy would come true one day, especially when he was mentioning the future of English language in the world
Discuss some of the circumstances that led to the emergence of English Writing by Indians?
History of English language and literature in India starts with the advent of East India Company in India. It all started in the summers of 1608 when Emperor Jahangir, in the courts of Moguls, welcomed Captain William Hawkins, Commander of British Naval Expedition Hector. It was India's first tryst with an Englishman and English. Jahangir later allowed Britain to open a permanent port and factory on the special request of King James IV that was conveyed by his ambassador Sir Thomas Roe. English were here to stay.
As East India Company spread its wing in southern peninsula, English language started to get newer pockets of influence. But it was still time for the first English book to capitalize. Late 17th century saw the coming of printing press in India but the publication were largely confined to either printing Bible or government decrees. Then came newspapers. It was in 1779 that the first English Newspaper named Hickey's Bengal Gazette was published in India. The breakthrough in Indian English literature came in 1793 A.D. when a person by the name of Sake Dean
Mahomet published a book in London titled Travels of Dean Mahomet. This was essentially Mahomet's travel narrative that can be put somewhere between a Non-Fiction and a Travelogue.
In its early stages, the Indian writings in English were heavily influenced by the Western art form of the novel. It was typical for the early Indian English language writers to use English unadulterated by Indian words to convey experiences that were primarily Indian. The core reason behind this step was the fact that most of the readers were either British or British educated Indians. In the coming century, the writings were largely confined to writing history chronicles and government gazettes.
In the early 20th century, when the British conquest of India was achieved, a new breed of writers started to emerge on the block. These writers were essentially British who were born or brought up or both in India. Their writing consisted of Indian themes and sentiments but the way of storytelling was primarily western. They had no reservation in using native words, though, to signify the context. This group consisted likes of Rudyard Kipling, Jim Corbett and George Orwell among others. Books such as Kim, The Jungle Book, 1984, Animal Farm and The man-eaters of Kumaon etc were liked and read all over the English-speaking world. In fact, some of the writings of that era are still considered to be the masterpieces of English Literature. In those periods, natives were represented by the likes of Rabindra Nath Tagore and Sarojini Naidu. In fact, Geetanjali helped Tagore win Nobel Prize for Literature in the year 1913.
There was a lull for more than 3 decades when India was passing through the era of aspiration and reconstruction. Some sporadic works such as 'A Passage to India' by E M Foster, 'The Wonder that was India' by E L. Basham and ' Autobiography of an unknown Indian' by Nirad C Chaudhuri though set the stage on fire but were unsuccessful in catalyzing and explosion.
It was in late seventies that a new breed of Convent, boarding school educated and elite class of novelists and writers started to come on block. The likes of Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Amitabh Ghosh and Dominique Lepierre set the literature world on fire. Rushdie' s ' Midnight Children' won Booker in 1981 and send the message loud and clear that Indians are here to stay. Arundhati Roy and Kiran Desai repeated the feat when they won Man Booker in the year 1997 and 2006 respectively. In the mean time, a new crop of authors such as Pankaj Misra, Chetan Bhagat, Jhumpa Lahiri, William Dalrymple, Hari Kunzuru have arrived on the international scene and their writings are being appreciated round the globe.
India became independent from Britain in 1947, and the English language was supposed to be phased out by 1965. However, today English and Hindi are the official languages. Indian English is characterized by treating mass nouns as count nouns, frequent use of the "isn't it?" tag, use of more compounds, and a different use of prepositions. With its distinct flavor, Indian English writings are there to stay. With he surge of English speaking population, the future looks anything but bleak.
In The Beginning... The first English writing by any Indian as it has been appeared so far is Sake Dean Mahomets travelogue Travels of Dean Mahomet. This book was published in 1793 from England. Sake Dean Mahomet (Shaikh Din Muhammad) was an Indian soldier from Bihar in the British Army and was carried to Britain by his chief Captain Godfrey Evan Baker after his retirement, as Din Mohammad was a good cook. Dean later learnt English academically and wrote his memoirs in Britain. But it is exceptional Indian writing as the British colonial rulers were not interested in English education rather they were stressing importance to educate natives in their native vernacular language. It was actually Raja Ram Mohan Ray (1774-1833) and other social activists of that time who made British colonial Rulers introduce English into the schools as a medium of learning with vernaculars. Michael Madhusudan Dutt and Bankim Chandra Chatterjee were two prominent writers of that time who started to write in English. Dutt wrote epic verse in English while Chatterjee wrote his debut novel Rajmohans Wife. The novel was started in serialized form in a magazine from 1864 but did not appear as a book until 1935. It is interesting to note that neither Dutt nor Chatterjee returned back to English writing again and they established themselves as prominent personalities in native Bengali literature. Toru Dutt, another good example of that time, was a very young (teen) girl when she wrote her poems and novels in French and English. She died at the age of 22 and at the time of her death, she left behind two unpublished novels Le Journal de Mademoiselle dArvers (thought to be the first novel in French by an Indian writer) and Bianca, or the Young Spanish Maiden(thought to be the first novel in English by an Indian woman writer) In addition, she had also written two unfinished volumes of original poems in English entitled Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan. The Mid-Section... English writing became more popular with the rise of Nationalism in the later period of the nineteenth century into the early period of twentieth century.The English Language became a sharp and strong instrument with which to express intimate feelings to British rulers. Dada Bhai Naroji wrote Poverty and Un-British Rule in India where he brought attention to the draining of India's wealth into Britain and Surendra Nath Banerjee started to publish an English newspaper called the Bengali through which he spread liberal ideas and nationalistic messages to the people. Later the freedom struggle resulted in a revolutionary brand of writing by Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Lala Lajpat Ray, Mahatma Gandhi , Aurobindo Ghose, Kasturi Rnaga Iyer, T. Prakasham, and Sarojini Naidu. Besides writing in their vernacular native
languages, they also adopted the English language to express their sentiment and agony. These personalities not only expressed their ideas through critical essays, but developed in other literary forms as well. Tagore introduced his Bengali poems to English readers by translation while Naidus romanticism charmed English readers through her poems. Mahatma Gandhis An Experiment withTruth and Jawahar lal and Nehrus Glimpses of Indian History and The Discovery of India were all established as jewels of Indian English writings.These writings were not meant for the British readers at all. Rather, they were written for the Indian readers who felt comfortable with English because the English language had taken a position to communicating different native languages and it was no more with any colonial characteristics. English thus became an Indian language and a fluent and easy media in which to express ones ideas to a greater mass. Later in the 1930s, R.K.Narayan, Raja Rao and Mulk Raj Anand played a significant role in English writing with their fiction. They three were regarded as the founding fathers of the Indian English novel. Mulk Raj Anands novel Untouchable (1935) proves itself as a premier of dalit writings in Indian literature. It is the story of a single day in the life of Bakha, a toilet-cleaner, who accidentally bumps into a member of a higher caste. Prominent among his novels are The Village (1939), Across the Black Waters (1940), The Sword and the Sickle (1942), which all were written in England, and Coolie (1945), and The Private Life of an Indian Prince (1953) which were written in India. He was among the first writers to render Punjabi and Hindustani idioms into English. Raja Rao was considered a Nationalist novelist. His novel Kanthapura(1938) was an account of the impact of Gandhi's teaching on non-violent resistance against the British. His other novel The Serpent and the Rope is a work dramatising the relationships between Indian and Western culture. The serpent in the title refers to illusion and the rope to reality. Cat and Shakespeare (1965) was a metaphysical comedy that answered philosophical questions posed in earlier novels. Rao borrows the style and structure from Indian vernacular tales and folk epics. R.K. Narayan (full name Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer Narayanaswami, (1906-2001)) is one of the most famous and widely read Indian novelists even in recent days. He wrote numerous novels like Swami and Friends (1935),The Bachelor of Arts (1937), The Dark Room (1938), The English Teacher(1944), Mr. Sampath-The Printer of Malgudi (1949), The Financial Expert(1952), The Vendor of Sweets (1967), The Painter of Signs (1976), A Tiger for Malgudi (1983), Talkative Man (1986) and The World Of Nagaraj (1990).In addition, he wrote a few short stories about Malgudi, a fictitious semi-urban town in southern India. He was awarded by Sahity
Academi for his novel The Guide (1958). In 1980, R. K. Narayan was awarded the A.C. Benson award by the Royal Society of Literature and was made an Honorary Member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. His style is more descriptive, less analytical, and rooted in a detached spirit, providing for a more authentic and realistic narration where he successfully employed the use of nuanced dialogic prose with gentle Tamil overtones based on the nature of his characters. In the post-colonial period, a tremendous change in the characteristics of IWE has been observed. The societal subjects have been diminished and anindividual has emerged in the writings. Kamala Markanday, Vikram Seth, Bharati Mukherjee, Salman Rushdie, Vikram Chandra, Anita Desai, Kiran Desai, Arundhati Roy, Gita Mehta, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Raj Kamal Jha, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bharti Kirchner, Khushwant Singh, Vijay Singh, Tarun Tejpal, Amit Chaudhuri, Amitav Ghosh, Vikas Swarup, Rohinton Mistry, Suketu Mehta, Kiran Nagarkar, Dr. Birbal Jha ,and C. R. Krishnan have been some notable writers of the post-colonial period who have made IWE more popular in abroad than in India. But they subject IWE to a debate whether or not their writings are totally Indian? Some of writers like Kamala Markanday, Salman Rushdie, Bharati Mukherjee, Anita Desai, Kiran Desai have moved themselves abroad and away from the country. Hence a question is raised as to whether their writings can be treated as authentic Indian writings? Rajendra Yadav, a noted Hindi writer once complained, The IWE take a touristy look at India, like Pankaj Mishra's The Romantics, where he's simply a tourist who doesn't know the inner psyche of the people or the more clever device Vikram Seth uses in A Suitable Boy, the pretext of looking for a bridegroom, which takes him to different locales and professions. It's a creatively written traveler's guide. They travel into our culture, describe a bit of our geography; their total approach is to westerners: a third-rate serpent-and-rope trick." Nobel Prize winner and one of Indias Diaspora writers, V.S.Naipal once alleged that IWE writers are responsible for creating a body of literature in exile mainly written by writers and read by readers living abroad. Altaf Tyrewala, the author of No God In Sight, also criticizes these NRI writers, who place themselves as front liners in the eyes of Western readers and Western media and that these writers live in the First World and write about the Third, traveling for a month or so to India to gather material on which to base their writings. There were a few western writers starting from Rudyard Kipling to Mark Tully, Dominique Lapierre and William Dalrymple who have remained the major time of their lives in India, wrote their texts on India and Indian people, but our critics never assimilated them with IWE writers as their race was different. Hari Kunzru, author of The Impressionist and Transmission asked a
serious question if we deny these writings as Indian writings, how and why we include the writings of Naipaul, Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Hari Kunzru and the Desais as India writings, while the first group came to India and the second group moved away from India? Is Indian writing a form of racial identity? Kunzru claims that he is not an Indian writer but a British one, thus categorically denying any claim that Indians may make of him being an IWE. Amit Chaudhuri, who judged the Man Booker Literary Prize for fiction in 2009 along with Andrey Kurkov and Jane Smiley, says, For me, the position of the outsider is of great importance to the health of any society. My anxiety is that in the last 20 years, India, typically for a globalizing country, hasn't theorized a position for the outsider or for the misfit or for failure. Its rhetoric is concerned with success in various ways. In India, everybody is some way in some kind of nexus of power. We need to regain that space for the irresponsible. And what better way to seek that elusive vantage point than to move away from the nexus and observe it with a dispassionate eye. Presently... Today, writers from Russia, France, Italy, and even Latin America, any day, write in English, but their writings are considered as masterpieces of global writings. Their writings are abundantly available through English translation and have been labeled as Russian writing or French writing or Italian writing, or Latin American writing. But when the question of Indian writing arises, critics run for Rushdie or Vikram Seth, forgetting that Indian writing has a long tradition. At a reception organized at Santiniketan to pay homage to Rabindranath Tagore's literary genius after he had been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, Tagore said, The insult and infamy that was my lot to suffer at the hands of my country were not inconsiderable in quantity and so long I had borne them with patience. In this context, I have not been able to understand clearly why I received honor from outside. I did not know that God, whom I had offered homage sitting on the Eastern shore, would extend his right arm in the western shore to accept the same...Europe has given me the garland of honor. If it carries any value, it lies in the aesthetic sense of the men of culture of that country. That has no connection with our country. It can be understood easily, how our authentic Indian writings are being ignored by we the people who placed ourselves in the chair to judge what is Indian writing and what is not. Our misjudgment not only make the actual writings ignored but also represents the mask as Indian Literature beneath which India remains invisible to global readers. When we read Garcia, we could encounter Latin America, with all its essence, cultural milieu, lives and tradition. But in bestsellers, IWE in western countries basically portray the lives of Indian Diaspora and their alien culture.
Post-colonial literature cannot be intended by neglecting literary works in the original languages of nations. The post-colonial literature has been termed on many connotations. Common questions frequently asked are, what is the new cultural identity of the country after independence has been achieved?Who really is in power here? Why and how does an independence day really mean independence? And where does an individual fit in this condition of the country and how does he/she make a living? In fact, actual Indian post-colonial writings that are accessible with regional writings and English writings get, in some extent, alienated from the people and country. So, this seems hard to skirt, when Nirmal Verma, the noted Hindi writer, gives a cautious thump on the back to the IWE big league, saying, My language links me to a tradition of 5,000 years, to the medieval writers, the Bhakti poets, to the Sanskrit classics, and it also connects me to the philosophical texts of Indian culture. But English writers are deprived of all this unless they are very sensitive. Only one percent of IWE are able to link themselves to the culture of their region, its real life, its metaphors, and images. The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie, Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh, Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri, Past Continuous by Neel Mukherjee and Escape by Manjula Padmanabhan were shortlisted for the Vodafone-Crossword Book Awards 2008 and the award was given jointly to Amitav Ghosh and Neel Mukherjee. Ghosh had to share the award with Mukherjee because, it is told, the debut novel of Mukherjee is the first attempt in Indian writing to explore alternate sexuality, though Vikram Seth has been discreet but not secretive about his views on gay and bisexual orientation, depicting this alternative sexuality in his novels The Golden Gate and A Suitable Boy in very obscure way. Similarly, Jhumpa Lahiris attempt to portray the complexity of ones identity concerning with ones name opens a new door for Indian literature through her novel The Nameshake . But these trends prevailed in other Indian writings earlier than Seth or Lahiri or Mukherjee. From the 1950s, one can discern a change in the style of Indian writing. The Indian writers became bolder and stronger in expressing their emotional needs. Marxism, Existentialism, Magic Realism and all modern trends of global literature are not untouched in Indian writings and in comparison to English writings, these Indian Literatures are not lagging behind any more. Jagadish Mohanty is a prominent personality in Oriya Literature and is considered a trendsetter in Oriya fiction. He has also been regarded as the prime figure in the introduction of existentialism to Literature. His novel Nija Nija Panipathwas, published in eighties, where the protagonist, a Brahmin young boy from coastal Orissa, flies to the plateau region of Western Orissa and purchases a job card of a fake tribal name Samaru Khadia from a job
provider mafia group and is employed at the coal fields there. The protagonist begins to find everything regarding his identity seems to be in crisis as he is not he but another person with a total different identity. This novel was serialized and was published in book form much earlier than the publication of Lahiris The Name Shake. It is only because Mohanty has not been translated that his credit had been limited to Oriya people only. Similarly in 1927, a Hindi writer, Pandey Bechan Sharma, better known by his pen name Ugra (extreme) had published a book, an anthology of ten short stories entitled Chocolate. These stories are on gay sexuality. The book provided a nationalist construction of Indian identity, especially in relation to ideas of Indias past, gender, masculinity and sexuality, and of Hindu -Muslim, and India-foreign relations. Recently the English translation of this book has been published by Oxford University Press. So, it is only our critics ignorance to declare Vikram Seth or Neel Mukherjee as premier writers of gay sexuality in literature. These are only two instances. Bringing It All Together... This essay does not aim to prove the superiority or inferiority of either English writings or regional writings. Rather, it aims to assimilate English writing into the mainstream of Indian writing with a status of Indian identity. Indian-ness should be a theme constructed only for detecting Indian writings. So for R.K. Narayans time, IWE could never be considered alien from Indian writings. Neither Tagore nor Amrita Pritam were treated as vernacular writers. Kamla Das successfully managed to write both in English and Malayalam. Nobody asked what language a writer was writing; either he was Krishna Chandra or Sadat Hassan Monto. They were writing in Urdu but their writings were available easily in Hindi and English as well. IWE at that time was not termed with lingua franca but with the characteristics of Indianness.But recently, Indian writings in other languages, which are available in English, are held off, keeping in mind that they are not written in English. English enjoys the status of the link language to the outer world and also is a necessary instrumental media to communicate. Presently and after globalization, it has remarkably placed its significance and never anyone today could define its tenure as colonial or outsider. While speaking about Indian writings, how can anyone omit the writings of Fakir Mohan Senapati, Premchand, Amrita Pritam, T. Shivshankar Pillai, N.T Vasudevan Nair, or Mahashweta Devi when their writings are all available in English? However, another view prevails in the mind of some intellectuals that the English language alienates a text from its culture of origin. Once the Indian author Shashi Deshpande expressed her ideas that the English language is in some ways harmful to Indian culture not because it is the language of the excolonizers, but because it has become the language of the privileged, elite
classes in India. She admits that when she writes in English she is aware that her work will reach out to only a few English-speaking readers, most of whom will be thinking the way she does. The problem is that if an author writes in English with the purpose of changing social traditions, the language excludes the poor and down-trodden whose involvement is most needed, and English has no place in the daily lives of those people Another problem is the fact that writing in English also means using a language in which most, or at least many, of its characters do not speak. However, for many Indian authors, English is no more than the medium through which they express themselves and through which they can reach an international audience. But it is worth noting that English is the only source where a link can be made with global literary fields; although in India, the readability of literature in English shows a minuscule acceptance despite the rapid growth of literacy in English and in incomes of urban Indians.
Bring out the link between language teaching and the study of literary texts
The relationship between Literature and English Language Teaching has been rather a difficult marriage throughout all these years. There have been moments of unfortunate separation and attempted reconciliations skilfully planned (Carter, 1988a, 1988b; Carter, 1989; Lazar, 1993; Cook, 1994; Short, 1996) which seem to foretell they will live happily for a while. Yet, one should not be oblivious of the years they have been through under the scrutiny of contemporary scholars and have a general picture of this relationship (Parkinson and Reid Thomas, 2000; Hall, 2005; Carter and Stockwell, 2008; Paran, 2008). However, all the controversies and different stances taken by linguists, literary critics and practitioners have not been able to hide the reasons for incorporating Literature into the English Language classroom. Collie and Slater (1987: 3-6) support the inclusion of literature in the language classroom as it provides valuable authentic material, develops personal involvement and help contribute to readers cultural as well as language enrichment. These advantages, they move on to assert, can be achieved provided teachers use relevant and appealing material to learners through the use of activities that promote involvement, reader response and a solid integration between language and literature. Practitioners, that is, teachers in the battlefield (though I do not mean a conceptual metaphor like TEACHING IS WAR), indicate that they use Literature in their English teaching practices a. to broaden students' horizons by giving them a knowledge of the classics of literature; b. to improve student's general cultural awareness; c. to stimulate students' creative and literary imagination and to develop their appreciation of literature; d. to introduce students to masterpieces in British and American literature as an educative experience, and to add to students' knowledge of the world at large.
(Akyel and Yalin, 1990: 175) Following this trend, Carter and Long (1991:2-3) propose three models to justify the use of Literature. The first model in their discussion is the CULTURAL MODEL which represents the possibility Literature brings into the picture as regards the understanding and appreciation of different cultures and ideologies together with the developing of ones pe rception of feelings and artistic forms. Their second model is the LANGUAGE MODEL. This model emphasises the fact that language is the literary medium and that literature could be seen as an instrument to teach specific vocabulary and structures. Last, their PERSONAL GROWTH MODEL entails students engaging with the reading of literary texts, appreciating and evaluating cultural artefacts and, in broad terms, the understanding of our society, culture and ourselves as we function within that social matrix. With regards to this last model, I personally interpret this aspect as one which covers the previous two since cultural understanding presupposes some cultural knowledge and in order to engage with a text and evaluate it one must resort to language to achieve such a purpose. Even though no general categories are put forward, Lazar (1993: 11) asserts that literature should be seen as an invaluable resource of motivating material and as a bridge to provide access to cultural background. Literature, she moves on to say, encourages language acquisition, expands students language awareness and interpretation abilities, claims which might be connected to the role of stylistics in the study of literary texts (Alderson and Short, 1988; Short, 1988; Lazar, 1993; Cook, 1994; Short, 1996), and last, it educates the whole person, position which resembles the personal growth model described above. Building on previous reasons for the teaching of literature in a second language, Parkinson and Reid Thomas (2000; 9-11) add that it provides a good model for good writing; it is memorable, non-trivial and challenging, and it also helps assimilate the rhythms of a language; therefore facilitating intelligence and sensibility training. Last, it is further claimed that literature helps enhance the psycholinguistic aspect of language learning as it focuses on form and discourse processing skills and improves vocabulary expansion and reading skills. Literature, in addition, has experienced a revival with the advent of communicative approach in language teaching as it provides learners with authentic, pleasurable and cultural material (Hall, 2005:47-57). The same justifications outlined above could be also used to justify the incorporation of a novel as one type of literary text in our syllabus o course plan. According to Lazar (1990: 204-205), when using a novel, teachers should look at both possible drawbacks and educational as well as linguistic opportunities. I will briefly mention the reasons behind the latter. First, a novel provides a more involving motivational source for pedagogic activities, and it also engages learners intellectually, emotionally and linguistically. Furthermore, it provides a picture of another culture, though some cultural background is deemed essential. Last, the act of reading a novel enhances meaning making processes and language capacity (Widdowson, 1984:246) in our learners. Why do I use Literature in English Language Teaching? First, because I am a reader and I would love to share with my learners this enthusiasm and pleasure in reading fiction. Second, because I believe it can help students engage in the learning of English and at the same time improve their communicative competence. Third, because I believe that Literature enables us to grow personally and socially raising cultural awareness. Last, but not least, because I believe that English should also let learners know that they can build bridges between their backgrounds in Spanish Literature by revisiting literary terminology together with other aspects involved in the study of/about Literature. References:
Akyel, A. and E. Yalin (1990) Literature in the EFL class: a study of goal -achievement incongruence. ELT Journal 44/3: 174-180. Alderson, J. and M. Short (1988) Reading literature, in Short, M. (ed.) Reading, Analysing and Teaching Literature. Harlow: Longman. Carter, R. (1988a) Directions in the teaching and study of English stylistics, in Short, M. (ed.) Reading, Analysing and Teaching Literature. Harlow: Longman. Carter, R. (1988b) What is stylistics and why can we teach it in different ways?, in Short, M. (ed.) Reading, Analysing and Teaching Literature. Harlow: Longman. Carter, R. and M. Long (1991) Teaching Literature. Harlow: Longman. Collie, J. and S. Slater (1987) Literature in the Language Classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cook, G. (1994) Discourse and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hall, G. (2005) Literature in Language Education. New York: Palgrave. Lazar, G. (1990) Using novels in the language-learning classroom. ELT 44/3: 204-214. Lazar, G. (1993) Literature and Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Paran, A. (2008) The role of literature in instructed foreign language learning and teac hing: An evidence-based survey. Language Teaching 41/4: 465-496. Parkinson, B. and H. Reid Thomas (2000) Teaching Literature in a Second Language. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Short, M. (1996) Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose. Harlow: Longman.
Traditional Approaches The teaching of literature has recently been resurrected as a vital component of English language teaching. Over the past few decades, there has been much discussion on the value of attempting to teach any kind of literature, whether it be the classics or any imaginative work written in English, as part of an English language syllabus. For instance, in the sixties and seventies, there was a distinct reaction against the use of any literary English before the pendulum swung again in support of literature teaching. The opposition towards literature may well have been due to the impact of the approaches that were practised in the decades prior to the sixties and seventies and prevailing ideas in language teaching and methodology. The study of literature acquired eminence during the Romantic period when the Romantic poets such as Wordsworth and Coleridge asserted that the "imaginative
truths" expressed by literature were superior to those discovered by scientists, historians and other scholars: ....the Poet, singing a song in which all human beings join with him rejoices in the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all Knowledge; Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge - it is as immortal as the heart of man. (Wordsworth: 1805) Literature was seen as a body of knowledge which ought to be learnt for its own sake. The process of creativity and the entire body of literature were given an honoured and elevated status that sustained the elitist nature which the study of literature had already acquired. In examining traditional approaches to literature, what is apparent is the prevailing views amongst the elite were continually emulated by educationists, possibly preventing a clearly-defined role for literature teaching in education. Most of these views remained as propaganda and failed to motivate a reasoned set of proposals as to how a literature course could be designed. The ultimate purpose of literary criticism can be defined as interpretation and evaluation of literary writings as works of art and the major concern of the critic is to explicate the individual message of the writer in terms which make it clear to others. However, this is a difficult process to implement without a sufficiently explicit and pedagogicallyoriented definition of the nature of literature study as a subject. A consistent assertion that literature illuminates the mind with no specific aims in terms of objectives only served to make literature an unpopular subject. Moreover, changes began to happen in the sixties and seventies. The approaches in language teaching in the sixties and seventies stressed the structural methods to language learning, with emphasis on discrete-point teaching, "correctness" in grammatical form, repetition of graded structures and restricted lexis. These approaches represented a methodology unsuited to literature teaching, and were unable to accommodate literary texts. Thus, in many situations, while English language teaching adopted a structural approach, literature was taught as a separate subject, sometimes comprising of purposeless poetry recitation. Nevertheless, current approaches have endeavoured to reexamine the value of literature and have begun to uphold its worth again. These approaches assert the value of literature teaching from several aspects, primarily, literature as an agent for language development and improvement, cultural enhancement and also for the eminence that many poets have previously ascribed to it. Literature is beginning to be viewed as an appropriate vehicle for language learning and development since the focus is now on authentic language and authentic situations.
The Relationship Between Language And Literature It is difficult to supply a watertight definition of the term "literature" but what can be asserted is that literature is not the name of a simple, straight-forward phenomenon, but an umbrella term which covers a wide range of activities. However, when it becomes a subject of study, it may be seen as an activity involving and using language. The claim "the study of literature is fundamentally a study of language in operation" (Widdowson: 1971) is based on the realisation that literature is an example of language in use, and is a context for language use. Thus, studying the language of literary texts as language in operation is seen as enhancing the learner's appreciation of aspects of the different systems of language organisation. Linguistic difficulty has been one of the main arguments against literature. There has been a general pre-supposition that to study literature, one required knowledge of the intricacies of language and an inherent interpretative ability to derive the writer's message. Traditionally, literature has been used to teach language use but rarely has it been used to develop language use. The advantage of using literature for the latter purpose is that literature presents language in discourse in which the parameters of setting and role-relationships are defined. R. Carter (1986) insists that a natural resolution would be to take an approach in which language and literature teaching are more closely integrated and harmonized than is commonly the case at the present time so that literature would not be isolated, possibly rejected, on account of the "literariness" of its language: It is my contention that some of the language activities and work with models on the literariness of texts can aid such development, and that responses can best develop with increased response to and confidence in working with a language using a variety of integrated activities, with language-based hypotheses and in classes where investigative, student-centred learning is the norm. (R. Carter: 1986) Another argument against literature also relates to literariness. With the shift to communicative approaches to ELT in the eighties, literary language is seen as not providing the conventional and appropriate kinds of language required to convey, practical, everyday messages. Poems, plays and novels make use of the same basic language system but have differing functions from non-literary discourses in the communicative function. The result is that poets, novelists and playwrights produce linguistic messages, which by their very nature, stand out prominently against the reader's background awareness of what is both communicatively
conventional and linguistically appropriate to the social purpose that the message is to fulfill, though grammatically intelligible in terms of syntax and vocabulary. Yet, what emerges from such work is the recognition that the precise contextual values of every word, phrase, clause and sentence can be inferred from its interaction with all the others in the text.