ABSTRACT
Many Kenyan university students and staff tend to speak their mother tongues with their colleagues who understand it. However, those that speak in their mother tongues attract suspicious looks from those that do not understand them. This chapter is extracted from a larger study conducted in Laikipia University to establish the use of mother tongues among staff and students of the universities in Kenya as it seemed the policy was not being adhered to closely. Most studies have tended to look at students but have neglected the perspectives of staff. This chapter argues that everyone has a language right to speak in their mother tongue, irrespective of whom it offends. Nevertheless, the very concepts of language rights and mother tongue as discrete countable entities with clear boundaries have lately been questioned. The findings of the study have implications for language planners and applied linguists.
