This module is designed to help learners of Swahili as a foreign language achieve Advanced Mid proficiency on the ACTFL scale. For classroom learners, it is most appropriate for students who have already studied Swahili for two or three academic years, while self-directed learners and/or those who have spent a significant amount of time in East Africa may find it useful at earlier or later stages of study.

This module combines three approaches, (1) “critical pedagogy” (the connection of language learning to wider social issues), (2) intercultural communication, and (3) a “pedagogy of inquiry,” to encourage Swahili-learners to analyze how language and culture work with regard to sexuality and gender.^[1].

Jinsia na Mapenzi Afrika ya Mashariki starts from the premise that both Swahili-as-a-foreign-language (SFL) classrooms and Swahili-speaking communities in East Africa are “multisexual,”^[2] that is, comprised of not only heterosexual people but also those who might be considered “queer.”  It is inaccurate to talk about East African Swahili-speakers as if they are all heterosexual, and, as a matter of ethics, we should not assume that all Swahili-learners and/or the people in their lives are heterosexual. Incorporating discussions of gender and sexuality into our teaching and learning of Swahili thus opens up avenues to not only explore complex topics related to norms and ideologies in East Africa, but also to fully include all students in the project of learning about Swahili and the cultures, values, and norms of the people who speak it competently.

Using language appropriately is a way of claiming co-membership in a community that speaks it.^[3] But, since language use not only reflects and contributes to, but is also moderated by, cultural values, there will always be cases in which a foreign language learners’ values do not match the dominant values in competent speakers’ communities.^[4] Taking an intercultural approach, this module encourages learners to exercise their “learner subjectivity.”^[5] In other words, learners may choose not to use a particular form, but should nevertheless be able to show that they have knowledge about the appropriate form and give their reason from abstaining from it.^[6]

The module also rejects the notion “that there is ‘correct’ cultural knowledge or information that reflects the authentic ‘insider’s’ perspectives, and that developing understandings of such accurate information reduces stereotypes.”^[7] Instead, the goal is to help learners develop intercultural competence and awareness of multiple perspectives. Thus, throughout the module I emphasize the diversity of values and norms among Swahili-speakers and Swahili-learners. While most native speakers reside on the East African coast and are Muslims, the majority of Swahili-speakers use Swahili as a second language and many are Christians; first language, religion, ethnicity, urban or rural residence, and cosmopolitanism may all impact how people use language and the values they transmit through discourse. Queer Swahili-speakers may use different words for themselves than others use about them.^[8] Women may speak differently than men or have different ideas about gender. People use Swahili differently depending on context and audience. This module thus encourages both teachers and learners to pay attention to diversity both in our classrooms and among Swahili-speakers and to resist essentialism. Fundamentally, it underscores the importance of not simply learning Swahili as a language but also of increasing our awareness of how it is used in society, thereby helping learners attain sociolinguistic proficiency in actual language use by considering both societal and individual factors.^[9] In this sense, exploring gender and sexuality is merely an entry point to a broader approach to engaging with competent speakers of Swahili in culturally appropriate ways and thus encouraging learners to gain intercultural competence.

You may notice that this module uses more English than you typically find in Swahili materials at this level. My use of English is purposeful, with Swahili and English serving dynamic and varied purposes. There are three main reasons behind my code choices in this module:

First, one of the goals of the Mellon LCTL project for which this module was created was to share resources not only among teachers of any given LCTL (in this case Swahili), but also among LCTL teachers of various langauges, in order to foster the creation of additional materials. Keeping much of this module in English thus allows teachers of other LCTLs who don’t understand Swahili to use this module for ideas as they create their own language teaching materials.

Second, students at high levels of proficiency should be engaging with authentic materials (Swahili texts created for real-world use rather than with learners in mind), not with textbook materials. The instructions here are designed to get you quickly engaged with the authentic texts herein (transcripts of Swahili conversations and interviews), so that you don’t waste too much time reading “textbook Swahili.”

Finally, and most importantly, the idea that only Swahili should be used stems from (and feeds into) a false sense of how language works, a kind of “canned monolingualism” that resembles “teacher talk” more than it does how Swahili speakers talk in the real world outside of classrooms and textbooks.^[10] Swahili speakers use different linguistic resources for different purposes, frequently switching among or mixing Swahili, other East African African languages, English, or Arabic, with the particular languages at play influenced by the context, the speakers’ ethnic or religious backgrounds, and their level of education.^[11] Learners of Swahili need to be able to develop these skills as well.