The Politics of National Languages in Postcolonial Senegal By Ib ...

and ‘un-technical’ nature of people of African heritage in Return to My Native Land:

In addition, Senghor, the architect of language planning and the language-in-education policy in Senegal, trumpeted everywhere his ‘civilisation de l’universel’ (universal civilisation) for the romanticised ‘rendez-vous du donner et du recevoir’ (give and take rendezvous). He contended that the education system in Africa should prepare Africans to be open to other cultures, but that at the same time, it should be rooted in African cultures and traditions—that is, the African people should be able to adapt new customs, cultures, and languages to the African traditions. To reach these aims, Senghor granted greater importance to Western languages—namely French and English because they were considered to be universal languages or at least languages of wider communication—and relegated the local languages to the background because their scope of usage was restricted. As a result, he skilfully conceived and implemented a language policy model for Senegal that was in line with his ideals.

In contrast to Senghor's view, Diop strongly rejected the Négritude philosophy and advocated an African Renaissance. He asserted that there were three fundamental requirements for an African Renaissance: (a) the development of African languages, (b) the strengthening of an African political ideology, and (c) the achievement of economic independence (Diop, 1996).

Of these three requirements, Diop (1996) firmly believed that ‘the development of our indigenous languages is the prerequisite for a real African Renaissance’ (p. 35). He argued that using foreign languages (European languages) was detrimental to the African identity and personality; he strongly advocated the use of local languages as a medium of instruction and believed the use of foreign languages was