Ericka A. Albaugh provides an in-depth analysis of language policy in African educational systems, from both synchronic and diachronic perspectives. Combining ethnography through direct or mediated interviews, documents analysis and archival research, Albaugh compares three models of African language education: the Anglophone, with the case study of Ghana; the Francophone, with Senegal; and a mixed system with Cameroon. After showing the continuity of the colonial legacy in terms of language education policy, she goes on to argue that the increasing recognition of local or African languages in these African countries, alongside European ones, has been due to ideational and material opportunities, as well as electoral incentives for current political leaders. After laying the theoretical and methodological underpinnings of the book, Albaugh gives a general description of the existing scholarship on mother tongue policy. She claims that two major parameters need to be addressed while examining the language policy change in Africa over these past decades. Moreover, for her, another major factor is context-specific and particularly linked to internal political issues, such as conflicts, democracy advocacy, and more importantly, electoral reasons for political leadership.

Albaugh argues that independent African language education policies were mere continuations or imitations of former colonial systems. The colonial British church was Protestant, with a more liberal approach to the use of religious language, condoning or even encouraging the transcriptions and use of African languages. By comparison, the author states, the French Catholic Church had a centralised orthodox institution that excluded African languages from the sacred realms, with a negative corollary on the transcriptions of those languages or their use in schools. However, in both colonial systems, language education was elitist, not designed or destined to the masses. Cameroon, because of its mixed colonial legacy – initially German colonisation, followed by British and French colonisation – stood mid-way between Ghana and Senegal, the two extreme edges of the two colonial models. However, inertia and neglect marked most African governments towards language policy in the aftermath of decolonisation. Preference was heavily granted to European colonial languages, considered as salvaging tools for ethnically fractionalised nations. The author points up the indigenisation experiments that swept the continent, yet hurtles by material deficiencies and a paternalistic reticence of former colonial governments.

After the analysis of the political impacts of language policy in Africa, Albaugh debunks the assumptions that multilingual policy is prone to spark off ethnic attachments and hostile interrelationships between linguistic communities, demonstrating that conflicting groups are not generally coterminous with linguistic entities. On the contrary, she claims, positive effects could be noted considering the rise of political awareness and participation of communities with written languages. The problems that seem to weaken her argument are that, firstly, she grounded it on sample responses of primary level schoolchildren, which, in my view, could hardly be valid for advancing such conclusions, because of the simple fact that the latter are not mature enough to engage in politics or other nationally sensitive issues. And secondly, she seems to overlook the prominence of some of the written African language scripts such as N'Ko (a Mande writing system and language).

This book is a considerable contribution in language policy, whose originality lies in its political approach to the debate. However, the totally blind eye to early African language transcriptions through Arabic, Ajami and N'ko scripts should be deplored, as it seriously undermines the contribution of non-Westernised African scholars in the African politics and cultural development.