Women Development and the English Language

She was shivering and weeping...

She needs an interpreter to explain to the doctor how much pain she is feeling and when last she felt it... Looking tensed and in-pain, she screams in her dialect, "I am in pain!!!..." (translated).

The lady by her side understood that language and transferred the screamed message to the doctor...

What if that woman by her side wasn't there to interpret her language to the doctor? I know how

she feels, maybe I could say, I can imagine how she feels. Many women are truly uneducated, perhaps I'm just knowing this because I spent most of my life in the city (even Ibadan city).

When women like Melinda Gates are clamoring for empowering women and educating them, I thought to myself, 'many women are educated na, what is there to educate again', few women are educated, the education I'm talking about here is being able to make sound judgement and communicate effectively. A pregnant woman and her cliq of female friends needs education, the education that will expose them to what and what to do and take during their pregnancy.

 That brings us to the topic on the use of English Language. Before now, I use to think that, that Language called English is another form of neocolonialism. I was fed with ideologies that English was in place to 'kill' our cultural language, guess what, I dropped that view/idea some hours ago.

English is a universal language, its like a passport to reach the world. The reason why this is so is that, knowledge is transferred through that language. Every form of knowledge, from medicine, to law, philosophy, economics and what have you are passed through the English Language from their original Greek or Latin source(s).

This however is not suppose to be the norm, but the English language, which is like water that gives life, has spread across every profession. Such that, it takes a person who can speak in English to communicate with them. Seldom times, the nurses are always the saving grace, but this is not always effective.

If we want to abort the problem of birth mortality, health centers needs to make use of the service of language interpreter. Or should we say, the consultant or doctor rendering a service in such hospital must come from the community they are serving? Maybe so.
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