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Newham Council Community Language Survey Speakers of Bengali
1.
Characteristics of respondents
58
respondents answering the Language Survey were speakers of Bengali.
Table 1 summarises their general characteristics.
·
60% of the respondents were female and the vast majority were aged between
25 and 64 (88%), with over half aged 25-44 (55%).
·
Virtually all the Bengali speakers interviewed originated in Bangladesh
(97%), with just one respondent each from India and Colombia.
·
More than three-quarters of the Bengali speakers (78%) had lived in this
country for more than 5 years. Half had been here at least 10 years.
·
It appears that most of the respondents had not lived in Newham for all
of their time in this country – just half had been in Newham for 5 years
or more (52%), and only a quarter of respondents (25%) had lived in
Newham for 10 years or more.
Table 1: Characteristics of Bengali language respondents
2.
Language
and communication skills
Language most comfortable using
All
of the respondents were most comfortable using Bengali when speaking.
With
regard to both reading and writing, a small minority in each case (5%)
gave no answer as to which language they were most comfortable using,
as Table 2 below shows.
For
reading or writing, virtually all respondents were still most comfortable
using Bengali, although Urdu, Hindi and English were each mentioned
by 1 respondent.
Base
= all respondents
Having
stated which language they felt most comfortable using, respondents
were also asked about any other languages they felt comfortable using
for everyday conversations. 57% volunteered no other language, but a
third of respondents mentioned Urdu (33%), and 21% said Hindi. 2 respondents
named Arabic and 1 Portuguese.
Formal verbal communication in English/ own language
Respondents
were asked how confident they are about talking formally and understanding
what is being said when someone is talking formally to them – they were
given the examples of talking to their Doctor, the Police or the Council.
They were asked about their talking and understanding in both English
and their own language. Table 3 below compares the proportions able
to talk formally in English and understand when English is spoken formally
to them, with those able to talk or understand their own language in
a formal situation.
Respondents
were not at all confident about being able to communicate verbally in
English – in each case, at least half of the respondents say they cannot
talk formally or understand formal talk in English very well, and some
31% cannot talk in English at all in formal situations. The proportion
who can understand spoken English is higher than those that can talk
it – almost a third say they can understand English quite or very well,
whereas only 10% would feel able to speak it.
In
contrast, respondents show much more confidence about talking and understanding
in a formal situation when using their own language – 97% say they can
understand very well and 86% that they can talk very well in formal
situations.
Table 3 : Formal communication: talking and understanding
Formal written communication in English / own language
When
asked about written communication in English, respondents express very
little confidence, with over half (59%) saying they could not read
a formal letter in English at all, and a further 33% not very well.
Over 70% would not feel able to write a formal or official letter
in English at all, and a further 22% say not very well.
Neither
age nor length of time in this country appears to have any bearing upon
the respondents’ confidence with regard to reading and writing in English.
However,
respondents are also much less confident with regard to reading and
writing formal letters in their own language than with verbal communication
– only just half (48%) say they could read and understand a formal
letter very well, and only 29% believe they could write a formal
letter very well. 40% say that they would not be able to write a formal
letter in their own language very well if at all.
Table 4 : Formal communication: reading and writing
Reading an English newspaper/ publication
There
are virtually no Bengali speaking respondents who are confident that
they are able to read and understand the information in a daily newspaper
such as the Sun, Mirror, Guardian or Times. 22% are not very
confident about undertaking this, and 72% of all the respondents are
not at all confident about their ability to read a newspaper
in English.
Table 5: Level of confidence in being able to read a daily newspaper
in English Base
= all respondents
3.
Contact
with the Council
Use of council services
Over
three-quarters of respondents (78%) have used council services in the
past (45 respondents). These respondents gave a variety of reasons for
contact, most often regarding benefits (49%), council tax payment or
queries (42%), or relating to educational matters (31%). A minority
of respondents also mention a range of other reasons for contact
- housing and rent, Job Centre contact etc..
Table
6 below shows the level of understanding in both verbal and written
contact with the Council.
(Clearly
sample sizes are small so responses should be viewed with caution.)
Table 6: Ease of understanding Council staff/ letters from Council
Verbal contact with the council
93%
of respondents had had face-to-face contact with council staff, while
4% (2 respondents) had spoken to them on the telephone and one respondent
had spoken via a friend or relative acting as interpreter.
Virtually
all of these respondents had experienced difficulty in understanding
the council staff that dealt with their enquiry, as shown in Table 6
above. 60% had only understood council staff with some difficulty and
29% had experienced great difficulty in understanding.
Only
a third of respondents (33%) contacting the council were presented with
an option to use an interpreter, and only 1 out of the 30 respondents
not given this option felt that this wouldn’t have helped – 97% of respondents
said it would have helped.
Of
those 15 respondents given the option of using an interpreter, all then
mostly or fully understood the council staff as a result. No respondents
felt that having an interpreter failed to improve their understanding.
When
visiting Council offices, the vast majority of respondents normally
take someone else with them, only 16% say they go alone:
-
71% take a family member
-
13% take a friend
Written contact with the Council
As
with verbal contact, the vast majority of respondents only understand
letters received from the council with difficulty (Table 6). 40% experience
‘some difficulty’ and approaching half say they encounter ‘great difficulty’
(44%).
The
great majority of respondents (87%) said it would help if letters were
translated, essentially because it would allow them to read it for themselves
and be independent.
4.
Communication
options
Newspaper readership
57%
of all Bengali speaking respondents do not regularly read any newspaper.
Table 7 below shows the most popular newspapers among the sample, dominated
by Surma read by just under one in three of the sample (31%)
Potrika
and Notun Din are named by 5 and 4 respondents respectively, but although
some 8 other newspapers are mentioned, none are read by more than one
or two respondents.
Table 7: Readership of newspapers
Broadcast media
A
majority of respondents does not listen to any radio or TV channel in
their own language – 69% do not regularly listen to any radio programme
and 55% do not regularly watch any TV channel in their own language.
Most
popular among radio programmes is Sunrise Radio, which 26% of all respondents
claim to listen to regularly. 9% mention the Muslim translation of the
Quran on radio (5 respondents). 1 or 2 respondents mention Muslim Community
Radio and Spectrum radio.
By
far the most mentioned TV channel is Bangla TV, watched regularly by
a third of all respondents (34%). A further 19% watch Sonali TV. The
other specific television channel mentioned by more than one respondent
is ETV (9%). 10% of respondents say they watch Indian, Bengali or Sky
channels but are not specific which they see.
Computer ownership
43%
of all respondents live in households where someone has a computer –
none own a computer themselves, but have a family member who owns one.
However, only 3 respondents said they would be able to use the computer
to access information.
Table
8 compares the proportions of the sample as a whole who can be reached
by the different media types.
Table 8: Exposure to different media types Base
= all respondents
5.
Other
sources of information
Voluntary organisations visited
Only
28% of all respondents say they regularly use or visit at least one
voluntary organisation. Of these 16 respondents:
·
19% mention the Bengali Association – representing 5% of the sample as
a whole (3 respondents);
·
13% the Bangladeshi Women’s Project - representing 3% of the whole sample
(2 respondents);
·
13% the Froud Centre – representing 3% of the whole sample (2 respondents)
No
other centre or organisation is mentioned by more than one respondent
– but among those named are the Bangladesh Association, Sure Start at
Islington, Jammat and the Ekta Project.
Religious venues visited
A
slightly lower proportion of respondents regularly attends a religious
venue – 24%. 86% of these visit a Mosque, the most often named specifically
is the Shahjalad Mosque, mentioned by 29% of these respondents, just
7% of the sample as a whole (4 respondents).
Only
1 respondent specifies a Hindu Temple – the Radha Krishna Temple, and
1 respondent the Mitali Centre.
Sources of help and advice
Asked
where they would go for help, advice or support, by far the highest
proportion of respondents, 76%, would turn to friends, family or neighbours.
15%
would go to an Advice Centre, such as the Bengali Advice Centre, while
12% would approach their local ‘service
centre’. 5% mention each of
the Council offices/ Town Hall and religious venues.
1
or 2 respondents mentioned each of their Doctor, the Citizen’s Advice
Bureau, the Law Centre, the Warden’s Office, the Library, their college
or school or Community Links.
Usual sources of information
When
asked about ‘the most common way’ that they hear information (e.g. events,
benefits etc), over 60% of respondents rely on word of mouth. Almost
equal proportions refer to leaflets in their own language and leaflets
in English.
1
respondent mentions television as an information source.
Table 9: Most common way of hearing information Base
= all respondents
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