28
October 2006
Alexander Aminoff's linguistic
proficiency in childhood
An
analysis of claims made by the Swedish social services in
connection with the forcible removal of him from his mother
By
Marianne Haslev Skånland, Professor
* * *
This analysis was carried out in September 1995, to assist
lawyer Siv Westerberg in her work with Alexander Aminoff's
case.
Marianne Haslev Skånland is a professor of linguistics at
the University of Bergen, Norway.
The article has previously been published in
Norwegian on the RBV Forum and on NKMR's website, and in English also
on NKMR.
The Alexander Aminoff case is described in Birgitta Wolf's
book about the case, Fallet
Alexander – Ett beslagtaget barn and in Brita Sundberg-Weitman's
book Rättsstaten
Åter!.
The case, including the allegations of abnormal language
development and abnormal linguistic proficiency is also
described in Lennart Hane (red): Rättvisan
och psykologin. References to all there may
be found in NKMR's section Books. The books are published
only in Swedish. Articles in English: The Alexander Aminoff Case
by Sven Hessle
and Child prisons? In Sweden?
by Siv
Westerberg. An English translation of Brita
Sundberg-Weitman's preface to Wolf's book has been
published as The Alexander Case - A Confiscated
Child.
Mrs Eva Aminoff's case against Sweden on behalf of her son
and herself has been admitted to the Court of Human Rights
in Strasbourg. Based on the Commission's report, Mrs
Aminoff was granted compensation from the Swedish
state: Aminoff v. Sweden. Friendly settlement.
Commission Report.
* * *
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According to an account of the actions taken by the Swedish
social services against Alexander Aminoff, two points
regarding his use of language have formed part of the
criticism of him and his home made by the social services.
In the following I shall comment on each of these.
1
A medical doctor and a psychologist are quoted as having
stated that Alexander Aminoff was uncertain of his own name
and therefore had a deficient understanding of his own
identity.
This conclusion seems to be based on the fact that
Alexander called himself variously "Alexander", "Iskander"
and "Nenne".
The name Alexander is of Greek origin but has been
reinterpreted in Arabic as a combination of
Al
(definite article)
and Iksander/Iskander.
The latter form has become widespread especially in the
south-eastern part of Europe and the Middle East. The
form Alexander
is also in use,
however, and in the languages of the area the two forms are
generally recognised as equivalent but with geographic
differences of usage. Alexander
and
Iskander
must therefore be
considered as regularly established variant forms of the
same name (in a manner partly analogous to the way
Amadeus
and
Theofilius
have been used as
equivalent names internationally in Europe). The custom or
habit of using different names in different circumstances
is, furthermore, quite common in several cultures,
including within European naming traditions.
If Alexander Aminoff as a child alternated between calling
himself "Alexander" and "Iskander", this is therefore not
attributable to his having a deficient sense of his own
identity. Rather, such an interpretation is an indication
that the doctor's/psychologist's background of general
cultural orientation was weak and, furthermore, reveals
that he has not managed to compensate this limitation of
his by seeking information and checking it - an essential
procedure when results are desired which are sufficiently
clear and reliable to be considered scientific.
As regards Alexander
–
Iskander,
such information is readily available. Very likely
Alexander's mother, Mrs. Eva Aminoff, would have been able
to supply the explanation, had she been asked, since the
variant usage is culturally codified and the child
Alexander must therefore have learnt it through his home
environment.
Or one might consult standard reference works. Maps with
international name-forms would e.g. show that Alexandrette
in Turkey is often given as Iskenderun,
and that two name-forms are usual for Alexandria in
Egypt: Alexandria
and
Al/El
Iskandariya. Many encyclopaedias give
corresponding information, for instance the 1990 edition
of Encyclopædia
Britannica, Aschehougs
Verdensatlas (1970) and Damms
Internasjonalt Atlas (1990) (the latter two are
Norwegian atlases).
If young Alexander's alternating use of Alexander
and
Iskander
were to be taken as
any kind of indication of his cognitive development and
personality, it would have to be that he was at an early
age already fully capable of understanding that linguistic
expressions refer to cultural features and situations which
are partially equivalent. These are aspects of language
which most normal children learn to master in their use of
language, with no special instruction. Alexander's ability
to handle variant forms is an indication that his
intelligence and maturity were both normal.
The idea that a child's report of having what is obviously
a nickname – Nenne
– should be a sign
of abnormality, can hardly be in need of any comment; its
patent unreasonableness is enough to discredit it. I do not
know of any statistical studies of the prevalence of
nicknames but it is certain that millions of people use
them, and they are probably known in every society. Very
many people of course also continue to use their nicknames
in some contexts in adult age.
2
Social workers criticised the fact that Alexander Aminoff
and his mother spoke English to each other. The social
services believed this to hinder young Alexander's
acquiring proficiency in Swedish and thus to be detrimental
to him, possibly lead to a total lack of language, a
phenomenon which the social workers claimed is found among
Finnish immigrant children in Sweden.
Particularly in the 1970s, linguistic studies by some
Swedish and Finnish scholars appeared, claiming that
growing up bilingually, e.g. for Finnish children in
Sweden, did not lead to bilingualism but rather to "double
semi-lingualism" – i.e. to the children becoming fluent in
neither language.
Some of these articles did not express pessimism regarding
the children's proficiency in Swedish as much as worry
about the most important of all to the children: that their
contact with their Finnish-speaking parents might suffer.
The argumentation pertaining to this can therefore not
necessarily be used in the manner which the social services
seem to have done in their case against the Aminoffs, in
which consideration for the home environment has not been
in their thoughts.
More important, however, is the fact that the
above-mentioned research has been subject to considerable
criticism internationally, especially from sociolinguists.
The claims relating to "double semi-lingualism" simply do
not agree with the comprehensive information we have about
bilingualism and multi-lingualism from a large number of
societies around the world. Several hundred millions of
people, perhaps into the billions, grow up more or less
multi-lingually. They function normally and draw great
benefit from their several languages in a variety of
circumstances. There is no evidence indicating that their
multi-lingualism has negative effects.
It is correct that a multi-lingual child does not
necessarily acquire every part of all his languages at the
same speed. This especially affects vocabulary and modes of
formulation: if a pupil at a Swedish school learns turns of
phrase and concepts pertaining to special subjects, like
"molecule", "metabolism", "cosine" or "parliamentary
immunity", while the conversation in Finnish at home does
not comprise such formalised topics, then the young
bilingual will have a more limited ability to talk about
such matters in Finnish without training in a scholarly
milieu. (Such limitations of course apply to mono-lingual
individuals as well.) Similarly, the child growing up may
lack Swedish terms for concepts which are only discussed in
his Finnish-speaking home. But the precise way in which
child language develops into adult language and the tempo
with which it develops vary considerably from individual to
individual in any case. If several languages are all to a
certain extent used through a child's years of growing up,
such differences will normally disappear and the young
adult will have full mother tongue proficiency in several
languages.
The beliefs of the social services relating to the
acquisition of language appear to be yet an example of a
well-known phenomenon: proposals put forward as hypotheses
and discussed within the framework of a scholarly debate,
in which the positions taken may be pointed and exaggerated
by scholars whose views tend in certain directions, are
taken by people outside of the scholarly milieu as proven
or provable hard facts, are strongly over-dramatised and
are treated as means to particular ends without
qualification.
The acquiring of several languages does not take the form
of a competitive war for storage space in the brain or for
maximum practice time per day or week. Language learning to
a considerable extent does not consist of acquiring as many
words as possible but of developing and employing
strategies for the learning of systems. The potential to
acquire be it one or several languages as a mother tongue
is:
genetically based;
independent of intelligence within very wide limits;
dependent for its realisation on being put to practice
during a certain period of maturation (before 12-14 years
of age), in the same way as are many other skills in living
beings;
dependent on the child spending some of its time - but not
necessarily incessantly or for very many hours at a time -
together with others who speak the language/languages in
question;
completely independent of formal training or pedagogical
instruction. The belief sometimes found among teachers or
social workers that children learn language by being
consciously taught the use of language and the development
of concepts in kindergarten and school, is therefore a
misunderstanding.
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