BBC Radio 4 2016-01-19

BBC Radio 4 2016-01-19

The last country I visited where I couldn’t speak the language was Poland. Yes, most people spoke in English and communication was hardly a struggle but it still made me realise how dependent I was on others to translate occasionally, and the way this limited my enjoyment of another society. Knowing a language isn’t simply about communicating words, it’s about entering another world, a world which remains partially closed if you can’t express yourself.

In this sense the government’s proposed 20 million pound language fund to help help end what the prime-minister called the "passive tolerance" of separate communities, is welcome. While many of the big statistics focus on Muslim women, money will be spent on all women who are in the greatest danger of isolation, whether it’s voluntary or imposed. English language therefore is a means to building the Prime-minister’s goal of an `integrated, cohesive one nation country.’

But knowing English doesn’t necessarily lead to integration and certainly can’t guarantee one of the ultimate aims of this investment, which is curbing the tide of extremism and radicalisation within certain sections of the Muslim community. After all most young people who have been drawn to violent jihadism speak fluent English. In such societies, parents are the repositories of tradition and culture, but if they’re struggling to communicate with their children, it’s not necessarily because of their inability to speak English.

Language skills may help some women gain access to education, become empowered and mobile, all necessary for a more just and equal society. But if integration is to mean anything, it must harbour a sense of emotional belonging and shared citizenship despite cultural differences. Culture is more than holding onto food, dress and ritual. Cultural awareness and feelings of belonging demand a mindset, an ability to have vision for your life wherever you live, to be aware of your heritage but not be held back by traditions that encourage only imaginary rather than real bonds. This has to come from the individual and the state for all its good intentions, and its vast reach, is limited in what it can do to foster this.

Many people may share a neighbourhood but they share little in terms of thoughts or activities. Often there’s no resentment, no hostility but only apathy to how other people live and male female relations. The Qur’anic verse ‘Men are the protectors and maintainers of women’ has been subject to decades of interpretation but also decades of abuse, in which communities have denied women their rights. I think all women should have freedoms and opportunities. But the truth is that there are many women who don’t wish to enter another world because the world they’re in is enough for them. And it seems to me that no amount of English language lessons will be able to change that.