ERIC ED473621: Majority and Minority Languages in South Africa.

18 Pages·2001·0.36 MB·English

by  ERIC

DOCUMENT RESUME
ED 473 621
FL 027 233
AUTHOR
Alexander, Neville
Majority and Minority Languages in South Africa.
TITLE
PUB DATE
2001-00-00
NOTE
17p.; In: Extra, G. and Gorter, D., Eds. The Other Languages
of Europe. Demographic, Sociolinguistic and Educational
Perspectives. (Multilingual Matters 118). Clevedon-Buffalo-
Toronto-Sydney: Multilingual Matters Ltd., 2001. p354-369.
PUB TYPE
Reports- - Descriptive (141)
EDRS PRICE
EDRS Price MF01/PC01 Plus Postage.
DESCRIPTORS
*African Languages; Elementary Secondary Education; English
(Second Language); Foreign Countries; Higher Education;
Indigenous Populations; *Language Attitudes; *Language
Minorities; Language Planning; Language of Instruction; Mass
Media; Multilingualism; *Public Policy; Uncommonly Taught
Languages
IDENTIFIERS
*South Africa
ABSTRACT
This paper discusses three categories of languages in post-
apartheid South Africa: high-status, low-status, and endangered. The first
section presents demolinguistic profiles and their representation in the
media, offering data on the relative numerical importance of the main
languages used in South Africa and the average and proportional allocation
at
three South African Broadcasting Corporation stations in 1996. The second
section examines the sociolinguistic status of South Africa's languages,
noting the processes that shaped language policy and attitudes during the
past 50 years. The third section discusses language in education, explaining
that most educators in South Africa continue to think of the indigenous
African languages as impediments to be overcome on the way to mastering the
English language. The fourth section describes prospects for African
languages in South Africa and its education system. The paper concludes that
a series of language planning steps is necessary to ensure that the
theoretically unchallengeable policy positions of the new South Africa
are
realized. Recommendations include large scale generalized critical language
awareness campaigns, multilingual or bilingual signposts and nameboards for
all government buildings and roads, and large-scale training for
interpreters, translators, journalists, media practitioners, and teachers.
(SM)
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Majority and minority languages
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minority languages
Majority and
Africa
in South
NEVILLE ALEXANDER
posed by language
concerning the challenge
As an object of comparison
Republic of South Africa
Union, the post-apartheid
issues in the European
between the language
there are generic similarities
is useful both because
situations are so very
Europe and because the two
situation there and in
and
highlight the differences
serve to
different. Such a comparison can
of specific choices.
and policy implications
thus to clarify the strategic
questions: in South
conceptual and terminological
To begin with
presently, we prefer not to
will become apparent
Africa, for reasons that
simple
have constructed a
minority languages. We
speak of majority and
i.e. 'high-status',
gradient of three categories,
typology consisting of a
for this
languages. The main reason
'low-status', and 'endangered'
terminology of 'majority'
explicit avoidance of the
approach and for the
ideological. Because of the
is political and
and 'minority' languages
of promoting
and the conscious strategy
immediate apartheid past
giving or strengthening
building'), we are wary of
national unity ('nation
premise
operates from the
the present government
the impression that
valuable
intrinsically more important or more
that some languages are
indicates clearly that the
terminology we prefer
than others. The
which involves
within a historical perspective, one
languages are viewed
of domination,
racial and other forms
centrally colonial conquest,
imply essentially
discrimination. In other words, we
including linguistic
in favour of what are
situation that must change
that this is an inherited
African Sign
languages, including South
loosely called 'marginalised'
Language (SASL).
as with so
different is that
why the terminology is
A second reason
generally,
specifically, and racism more
things - apartheid,
many other
though Afrikaans and
upside-down. Thus, even
turned everything
they are the dominant
of arithmetic minorities,
English are the languages
generally referred to
the features of what are
languages and manifest all
'majority' languages.
sociologists of language as
by sociolinguists and
indigenous African Ian-
demographically strong
And, conversely, the
Europe
The other languages of
356
together, they are spoken
isiXhosa and isiZulu, though,
guages, especially
population of South Africa
language by almost one-half of the
as a first
isiZulu,
South Africans understand
and between 60% and 70% of all
languages in the typical West
manifest all the features of 'minority'
history
because, for reasons of the peculiar
European country. This is so
until recently,
of the African languages have,
of South Africa, the speakers
painful
present undertaking the
constituted social minorities; they are at
the stigma that
from this situation and from
attempt to free themselves
goes with it.
white
by the fact that Afrikaner, i.e.
The matter is further complicated
of an
consider themselves to be part
Afrikaans-speaking intellectuals who
refer to as the
what for our purposes I
ethnic group, insist on using
they see Afrikaans as a 'minority'
Eurocentric terminology. Consequently,
treating
to realise that they are
language but, curiously, do not seem
though it is spoken as a first
English as a 'majority' language even
view at the
population of South Africa. This
language by under 9% of the
of democratic
different (consociational) notion
very least implies a
government
majoritarian notion to which the present
consensus from the
Afrikaner
thinkers and strategists of the core
is committed, in that the
of the
respect for and acceptance
community make it clear that their
which it effectively assuages the
constitution is dependent on the extent to
and culture. This is the main reason
fears of 'minorities' about language
Viljoen, the leader of the Freedom
why the right wing under General
estab-
the negotiations insisted on the
Front, during the last hours of
be
forum where such issues could
lishment of an ethnically defined
will happen in practice is indeed
discussed and resolved. Whether this
South Africa.
outstanding questions of contemporary
one of the crucial
of immigrant minority languages,
Since 1994 especially, the question
since millions of
has been latent as a 'problem'
as understood in Europe,
South Africa in search of better
people have been surging towards
conditions in their war-torn
opportunities or because of the impossible
early to speak of a consolidated or
countries. Although it is still too
doubt that the authorities in
definitive policy in this regard, there is no
policy of neglect at best and, at worst,
practice have tended towards a
policy (see Plueddemann,
what one can only describe as a xenophobic
enough to speak one of the many
1999). For those who are fortunate
Africa with its neighbours,
cross-border languages that connect South
fit into existing schools in
there is in principle no problem since they can
the townships and even in the rural areas.
357
Africa
Majority and minority languages in South
will
for purposes of orientation since we
These remarks are important
whereas, in the
speaking generically of the same things
be appearing to be
looking at a
have to bear in mind that we are
South African situation, we
typical West European country.
mirror image of the
and their representation in the media
Demo linguistic profiles
approximate
the 1996 census figures, we get an
From Table 1, based on
the main
of numerical importance of each of
idea of the relative order
South Africa.
home languages used in
(Source: Census 1996,
Main home languages in South
Africa
Table 1
/www.stassa.gov.za/census96/HTML/CIB/Populstion)
http: /
As %
Numbers
22.9
9,200,144
Zulu
17.9
7,196,118
Xhosa
14.4
5,911,547
Afrikaans
9.2
3,695,846
P-edi
8.6
3,457,467
English
8.2
3,301,774
Tswana
7.7
3,104,197
Sotho
4.4
1,756,105
Tsonga
2.5
1,013,193
Swati
2.2
876,409
Venda
1.5
586,961
Ndebele
0.6
583,813
Other
100.0
40,583,573
Total
of the
home language by less than 10%
Although English is spoken as a
dominance of the English language
population of South Africa, the
of the
analysis of broadcast schedules
becomes startlingly evident from an
Corporation for 1996. Table 2 gives an
South African Broadcasting
from
proportional language allocation
overview of the average and
stations in 1996.
6.00 24.00 o'clock at three SABC
The other languages of Europe
358
stations
Average and proportional language allocation at three SABC
Table 2
in 1996
Average
SABC 3
SABC 2
SABC 1
73.32
95.26
59.61
65.08
English
1.75
0.00
0.62
4.64
Zulu
1.57
0.00
0.14
4.57
Xhosa
5.91
0.14
14.06
3.53
Afrikaans
2.14
0.00
3.72
2.70
Sepedi
2.28
0.00
3.38
3.46
Setswana
2.28
0.00
3.72
3.12
Sesotho
0.07
0.00
0.00
0.21
Setsonga
0.07
0.00
0.00
0.21
Seswati
0.07
0.00
0.00
0.21
XhiVenda
0.07
0.00
0.00
0.21
SiNdebele
10.48
4.60
14.34
12.49
Multilingual
Afrikaans
Except for the fact that, because of pressure from organized
of Expression Institute, among others, the
groups and from the Freedom
halted and
rapid diminution of broadcast time in Afrikaans has been
is no
slightly reversed, the situation has remained much the same. There
though a
doubt that a strong case can be made for Afrikaans, even
privately-funded Afrikaans TV channel will soon be operative as the
Afrikaans elite cease looking towards government as the sole source of
that the
protection and promotion of the language. However, it is obvious
really marginalized languages are the indigenous African languages
taken together and Tshitsonga, Siswati, XiVenda and SiNdebele in
particular. South African Sign Language did not even feature in the
analysis at that time. In summary, almost three-quarters of all South
African television programmes are broadcast in English. In actual fact, the
proportion is much larger, since the rubric 'multilingual', which accounts
for another 10%, in fact refers to programmes that are largely in English.
Until dubbing and subtitling become feasible and economically possible
(in terms of the SABC's logic), South African TV will remain essentially
English, which is not to say that it is in any way 'good-quality' TV or that
it is even understood by most people who watch it. But that, as we know,
is a global problem.
359
Majority and minority languages in South Africa
than any
These illustrations explain the situation on the ground better
the fact that of
words could do. However, an even more telling datum is
received by
all the complaints about alleged violations of language rights
July 1998
the Pan South African Language Board (PANSALB) between 1
central
and 30 June 1999, more than 95% were complaints against
The vast
government, provincial government and parastatal institutions.
majority of these emanated from Afrikaans-speaking individuals or
of
institutions, usually against the unconstitutional or 'illegal' sole use
English as a means of communication by the relevant body with the
public. Besides revealing possible lack of organization and political will
and quasi-government agencies concerned,
on the part of the government
this datum reflects the level of organization of language communities and
the corollary degree of passionate commitment to the protection and
promotion of their specific language(s). As a result, the PANSALB Report,
from which these facts are taken, concludes that '... there is a need for the
PANSALB to educate people about their rights and improve its system of
monitoring and attending to issues of language rights violations ...'
(PANSALB, 1999: 30).
of correcting the perspective, it should be pointed out that the
way
By
PANSALB is a watchdog organization the main 'target' of which is
precisely the new government. It would be able to assist a member of the
public to bring a suit of linguistic discrimination against another member
of the public or against a private-sector organization but would not itself
have the right to institute such action. In regard to government, on the
other hand, it has considerable clout.
Radio, which is still the most widespread and most popular electronic
medium, is the domain in which the multilinguality of South Africa really
of the indigenous languages
comes into its own and where the potential
critically important fact that the popular
can be gauged accurately. It is a
state and community radio stations broadcast largely in these languages
and that English (and Afrikaans) radio listenership simply cannot be
compared with, for example, Zulu or Southern Sotho or Xhosa listener-
ships. This fact might constitute the launching pad for the eventual
establishment of the African languages as languages of power in South
Africa.
The other languages of Europe
360
Sociolinguistic status of South Africa's languages
This question has to be examined against the background of the
consequences of colonial conquest, slavery, migrant labour and apartheid.
It is a very large question and there is a wealth of sociolinguistic and
historical literature in which the processes of linguistic discrimination and
underdevelopment in the southern African region are described from
diverse perspectives (see, among others, Hirson, 1981; Alexander, 1989,
1992; Du Plessis & Du Plessis, 1987; Mesthrie, 1995).
In a nutshell, the processes that shaped language policy and attitudes
during the past 50 years or so can be summed up as follows: under the
National Party's Christian National Education policy of the Afri-
kanerisation of South African society, the African languages were
deliberately developed as Ausbau-languages, i.e. even where it was
possible in linguistic and political terms to allow the varieties of a
particular language cluster or sub-group, such as the 'Nguni' group, to
converge into a more embracing standard written form, they were
systematically kept separate through lexical and other corpus-planning
manoeuvres. The languages concerned were, moreover, starved of the
essential resources in such a way that they could not be used in contexts
that implied or demonstrated real power. General social and political
policies ensured throughout the era of high apartheid that the African
languages remained languages of low status. The apartheid governments
gave the impression that they were doing their best to develop and to
modernize the African languages when in fact they were under-
developing them quite deliberately. With utmost cynicism, a mere sense
of social progress (like special language boards for each of the African
languages) was given in order to impress 'the international community'
which was under the spell of the movement for African independence
and liberation from colonial rule at the time.
Tragically, the anglocentrism of the political, and to some extent of the
cultural, leadership of the oppressed people in effect, if not in intention,
ensured the predictable outcome of these policies. For it is a fact of
historic significance that the African (or black) nationalist movement
because of the salience of the racial question did not react to cultural
oppression in a manner similar to that of the Afrikaner (or white)
nationalists. At the critical time when Bantu education was being imposed
on the black people from the fifties to the seventies, the leadership of the
liberation movement across the board made a de facto decision to oppose
Afrikaans in favour of English. The option of promoting the African
8
361
Ian ua es in South Africa
MOOT' and minori
knowledge of the
while also ensuring as wide and as deep a
languages
In effect, therefore, the
English language was never considered seriously.
Achebe calls
its unassailable position - as Chinua
hegemony of English,
the only other
entrenched among black people. Because it was
it - became
(jobs
Afrikaans as a means to power
language that could compete with
and
only means to international communication
and status) and as the
became, as in other
world culture at the disposal of South Africa's elites, it
'language of liberation'.
African countries, the
attitudes referred
The important point, however, is that because of the
resistance to
the lack of foresight on the part of the leadership, the
to and
of the National Party did not result in the
the cultural-political policies
of the African languages
kind of cultural movement for the development
Unlike the resistance mani-
which, in retrospect, was completely possible.
(Afrikaans language movements) in
fested by the Afrikaanse taalbewegings
the
the cultural-imperialist policies of Lord Milner at
response to
cruder Milnerist policies of Dr
beginning of the 20th century, the even
middle-class strategy of
Verwoerd and his brothers merely gave rise to a
the strategy of promoting or tolerating
convenience and evasion, namely,
While there was no policy of actually
the sole value of English.
there was also no deliberate and
denigrating the African languages,
and spread the knowledge of
systematic attempt to develop, modernize
intrinsic empowering value of such
the indigenous languages both for the
explicit strategy of cultural-political resistance.
an exercise and as an
South Africans do not at present
In actual practice, the vast majority of
high status languages (English and
have a sufficient command of the
jobs and prestigious
Afrikaans) so that they can compete for well paid
who
of equality with the 20% of the population
career options on a basis
other hand, the language
do have the requisite language skills. On the
do have (most of the metropolitan and urban
resources that the majority
least two often radically
population can speak with high proficiency at
place. In
African languages), are not validated in the market
different
such that
other words, the indigenous languages are not accorded a status
speaker outside the
knowing them is of material or social benefit to the
thousand times
relevant speech community itself. This situation is made a
Africa, language and colour (or 'race')
worse by the fact that in South
historical
coincide to a very large extent because of the peculiar
of Bantu
development of the labour market. Because of the legacy
and most of the
education specifically, a general 'semilingualism' prevails
for power, position
youth have been handicapped in the merciless race
which we live.
and individual progress in the very competitive society in
Europe
The other languages of
362
in
the kind of proficiency
want to acquire
Most people, naturally,
which will enable them to
in Afrikaans)
English (and to a lesser extent,
calls an
what Kellman (1975)
well-paying jobs. They have
compete for
language. They
allegiance to the English
instrumental, not a sentimental,
and as
and home languages
languages as community
value their own
(urbanization has inexorably
identity, in general terms
bearers of cultural
and notions of identity).
of traditional values
brought about a questioning
for the
does not arise. Except
'survival' of these languages
The question of
languages
the indigenous
languages, none of
endangered Khoisan
strategists and intellectuals
of vitality. Afrikaans
display any sign of lack
simply because they
of 'survival' (not vitality)
raise the issue in terms
of equal
constitutional obligation
view) that the
insist (correctly in my
flouted by people in
openly and deliberately
treatment is being
government.
face,
which all African people
terms, the crisis
Of course, in linguistic
by black
acutely experienced
of their languages, is
i.e. the 'powerlessness'
lack of
of the crisis is the
the derivative elements
South Africans. One of
(mother-
their first language
have in the value of
confidence most people
apartheid produced.
total situation under
tongue) which the
or father
mind.
syndrome of the colonized
aspect of the
This is a very important
'do
the African languages
believe, for example, that
Most people really
As
objects and scientific concepts.
words' for most modern
not have the
that they learn the
believe that it is essential
they have come to
a result,
lan-
this 'deficit' of their
they can overcome
English language so that
self image is
and of a dignifying
resultant loss of self esteem
guages. The
fatal.
Language in education
educators in South Africa
described above, most
In line with the mind set
in the same way as
indigenous African languages
continue to think of the
during the 'voyages of
the European mariners
according to Lord Acton -
obstruction on the
African continent, i.e. as an
discovery' thought of the
in this paradigm, seen as
The African languages are,
way to India.
to mastery of the
be 'overcome' on the way
impediments that have to
English is seen by most
change the metaphor:
English language. Or, to
of
their children as the pot
by the educators of
black South Africans and
linguistic rainbow.
gold at the end of the
o