92 SOCIAL SCIENTIST between the minority and the majority language. The speaker can continue to use the minority language in situations of home and hearth, while he uses the majority language in his professional and social contacts. Research on the subject of use of two or more languages has pro-^ vided conflicting generalisations. The primary focus of research has been whether instruction through the medium of a 'weaker* language improves learners' knowledge of that language. Is such instruction associated with losses in their stronger (mother-tongue or first) language? Macnamara1 points out that bilinguals are weaker than monolinguals in the monolinguals' language. He further reports that bilinguals were inferior to monolinguals in problem arithmetic (reasoning) but not in mechanical arithmetic (computation). This difference is apparently due to the language-bound situation in problem arithmetic; the learner is required to read and interpret prose passages in such situations. A study conducted by the Department of Education, Manila/ revealed such a retardation over the two years of primary schooling investigated. The International Institute of Teachers' College, Columbia,8 found even greater retardation at the twelfth grade level among Puerto Rican children who had been taught arithmeti^n English (the second language) from the beginning of the fifth grade. M^cnjamara4 found that bilinguals take longer to solve written problems when they are presented in their weak rather than in their strong language. It has also been posited in research that reading in a weaker language takes longer than reading in the stronger one/ The articulation of individual words might take longer in the weaker language; the learners might not be able to string words together (catenation) as effectively in articulating sentences in their weaker language. The adverse consequences of bilingual use by the minority language speakers arc bound by certain conditions. Negative effects in the areas of verbal and scholastic achievement can also indicate the learner's failure to overcome difficulties in coping with two or more languages. Later studies have reported positive consequences; the learners were able to overcome difficulties in coping with two languages* The conditions under which learning takes place assumes added significance. If learners have had equal proficiency in two or more languages., the consequences are^ not likely to be negative. Most of the minority language speakers in India are those who do not have equal proficiency in two or more languages. Instruction in the mother-tongue ceases to find place in the school curriculum after the elementary level. An additional factor in this context is the socio-economic status of the minority language speaker. Tiac distinction between the upper class children (elite) and the lower class children (folk) becomes