Arabic as an Early Language Learning Provision in Bangladesh: Policy Perspectives

This chapter provides an overview of the policy and planning of Arabic as an instance of early language learning in the religious stream of education (known as madrasa) in Bangladesh. Drawing on historical and ecological perspectives, we first contextualise the policy and practice of Arabic in the madrasa sector. We then utilise a language-in-education policy framework to examine curriculum policy for Arabic based on policy and curriculum documents and media resources. We demonstrate that while the national education policy seeks to harness the benefits of Arabic teaching for meeting spiritual as well as material goals, such goals seem unlikely to materialise on curricular and structural grounds. We observe that Arabic teachers have been entrusted with teaching a crowded curriculum in under-resourced conditions with limited teacher training and professional support. Arabic teaching in the madrasa system is also unlikely to thrive in a hostile social and ideological environment constructed by media, politics and discourse at local, regional and global levels. We conclude the chapter by inviting classroom research on Arabic language teaching and learning as a priority.