CHAPTER SIXTEEN TEACHERS’ATTITUDES TOWARDS SIGN LANGUAGE MEDIUM OF INSTRUCTION: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY (ACASE STUDY OF TWO SCHOOLS) IN SOUTH AFRICA

Abstract

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the 1996 South African Constitution became a beacon of hope in a world plagued by conflict, poverty and the failure of governments. The Constitution is a monument to the determination of a society to overcome the burden of its history–the evils of colonialism, racism and Apartheid and the manifold social problems that are the legacy of centuries of inequality (Currie & De Waal, 2002, p. 2). The Constitution not only addressed the monumental challenges of a long history of colonialism, racism and Apartheid and the manifold social problems that are the legacy of centuries of inequality–issues that have stalked South African society for centuries on end, but it also sought to alter South Africa’s social fabric in fundamental ways within the framework of transformative constitutionalism–a long-term project of constitutional enactment, interpretation, and enforcement committed (not in isolation, but in a historical context of conducive political developments) to transforming a country’s political and social institutions and power relations in a democratic, participatory, and egalitarian direction (Klare, 1998, p. 150). That the language dispensation of the Republic of South Africa is part of the social fabric that the Constitution sought to address in fundamental ways, cannot be gainsaid. As Blommaert (1996: 204) indicates, the new Republic set an important precedent by providing for eleven official languages instead of the one, two or four of most other African states. The