Letters

What a way to learn English

While in the Maldives recently, on a foreign press assignment, I laid hands on a book published by the Sri Lanka Official Languages Department as a textbook of English for beginners, titled "English for Better Understanding".

In its Foreword, the Commissioner of Official Languages states, "To achieve the goal of peace through languages, the book has been used in Second Language Training Programmers throughout the 16th Lessons contained therein."

But the book is replete with mistakes of usage, idiom, context, grammar and spelling. The Commissioner herself, in her Preface says, "The Board of Editors who took much pains to make this a useful text".

A few other blunders are as follows:

Page 7: "Then we shall not feel how high we have to climb" (stairs).

Page 23: "When we describe people or things we have to show different laves of the quality of them.”

Page 24: "An American elephant is bigger than an Indian elephant" (the elephant never lived in the American continent).

Page 8: Collective nouns - "Swarms of bees" repeated.

Page 16: “Excise on pronouns given to be filled - the pronouns do not fit into the sentences given.

Page 17: “A woman bringing a basket of Fresh Keuns on her hend.”

Page 28: “On racing days the send the horses" (Spelling: the for she) "if the horses run well the conversations is pleasant.”

Page 38: he lives in a village beneath the hill.”

Page 57: “Why has the matchmaking became less important today.”

I earnestly urge the Minister of Buddha Sasana, Justice and National Integration, W.M.J. Lokubandara, the Minister in charge of the Official Languages Department, to withdraw this text from circulation immediately and/or rectify its presentation. As one who coordinated the postal teaching of English and Sinhalese to public servants in the Official Languages Department during the tenure of Dr. Nandadeva Wijesekara as Commissioner of Official Languages, I am quite ashamed of this publication and so should be Minister Lokubandara, as he was also a Research Officer of the same Department then.

Mahinda Ranaweera

Diyatalawa